A nine-foot-tall bronze statue of Cobi Jones will be unveiled by the Galaxy, highlighting his iconic dreadlocks and dynamic playing style. The statue aims to capture the motion and essence of the soccer legend.
Galaxy star Cobi Jones, with his dreadlocks flowing, celebrates after scoring a goal against the Kansas City Wizards in 2007. (Branimir Kvartuc / Associated Press)
On the soccer pitch, Cobi Jones was defined by blinding speed, a tireless work rate and an exceptional soccer IQ. But thatâs not what stood out most when you watched him play.
It was the shoulder-length dreadlocks that made him instantly recognizable whether he was playing for the Galaxy or the national team.
So those became the most important â and more difficult â things to replicate in the nine-foot-tall bronze sculpture of Jones that the Galaxy will unveil Sunday before the teamâs MLS matinee with Real Salt Lake.
âEssentially you build it out of clay and then you take it to a foundry and you pour bronze over the clay. That turns it into a statue,â said Galaxy president Tom Braun, who oversaw the process. âBut you canât do that with the hair. You have to build them individually and then solder them in.â
That meant artists Oscar Leon and Omri Amrany had to painstakingly join approximately 100 separate dreadlocks into the sculpture. The result, said Braun, one of two people other than the artists to have seen the finished statue, is remarkable.
âThis is a once-in-a-lifetime piece that is going to show him, and everything about him, in a really iconic way,â Braun said. âBut I think when it comes to the hair specifically, they did a really nice job.â
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The statue honors Cobi Jones as a franchise legend and aims to capture his dynamic playing style and iconic dreadlocks.
The statue will be unveiled on Sunday before the Galaxy's MLS match against Real Salt Lake.
The sculptors were tasked with replicating Cobi Jones' motion and distinctive features, particularly his shoulder-length dreadlocks.
The statue is nine feet tall and emphasizes Jones' flowing dreadlocks and dynamic presence on the soccer field.
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The statue will join liked-sized tributes to David Beckham and Landon Donovan in Legends Plaza, which fronts the main entrance at Dignity Health Sports Park. Those sculptures, also done in Amranyâs studio, were unveiled in 2019 and 2021 respectively.
For Jones, the tribute is humbling.
âJust to be in the plaza itself and have a statue, thatâs the incredible part for me,â he said. âWhen Iâm long gone that statue will be there. My grandkids, hopefully, will still be able to see it.â
Yet having himself rendered in bronze was the furthest thing from Jonesâ mind when he started playing soccer as a 5-year-old in Westlake Village.
âI donât think that crossed anyoneâs mind,â said Jones, 55. âIt was all about just playing and having fun and trying to be the best player that I could possibly be. I was more focused on how do I beat the opponent in front of me than thinking about 20 years, 30 years down the road.â
âIt makes me truly think about the past a bit more,â he continued. âAll the various things that had to happen â that didhappen â that came to this moment. It makes you kind of reminisce [on] the various histories and all the people that helped you.â
The statue is as much a monument to Jonesâ self-confidence and refusal to quit as it is to his stellar playing career. Unable to land a scholarship coming out of high school, Jones used his academic success to enroll at UCLA, where he played as a walk-on for a strong Bruin team coached by Sigi Schmid. He wound up leading UCLA to its second NCAA championship while earning All-American honors â as well as a scholarship and a place in the schoolâs Hall of Fame.
Galaxy star Cobi Jones heads the ball above the Chicago Fire's Carlos Bocanegra on Oct. 17, 2001. (Fred Jewell / Associated Press)
He played the first of a U.S.-record 164 games with the national team in 1992 and played in the first of three World Cups in 1994 before starting a professional career that would take him to teams in three countries. He spent the majority of that time with the Galaxy, appearing in a franchise-record 306 games while making five All-Star teams and winning two MLS Cups, two Supportersâ Shields, two U.S. Open Cups and a CONCACAF title. He also served the team as an assistant coach and interim manager.
âItâs unequivocal that Cobi should have gotten a statue,â Braun said. âNo one is doubting the contribution that Cobi Jones has had on the Galaxy and U.S. Soccer. So I think was an easy one for us to decide on and itâs probably long overdue.â
The plaza is nowhere near full, nor has the list of Galaxy players and coaches who deserve statues been exhausted, so Braun said there likely will be more sculptures added in the near future.
Jones had substantial input into the design of his statue, choosing the pose and offering other guidance. But it was important the statue show motion, as the Beckham and Donovan sculptures do. And the most obvious way to do that was to have Jonesâ ample dreadlocks flowing behind him.
It might have been the most obvious way, but it certainly wasnât the easiest one.
âWe asked [Amrany] if he ever sculpted hair like this and he said no,â Braun said.
And he probably wonât do it again either â at least not for the Galaxy.
âThey got to a point where they started to do it and we wanted some adjustments,â Braun recalled. âWe wanted the hair to flow a different way and we thought maybe the hair was too long so we had them shorten it and move the hair a certain way that makes it look like itâs in motion.â
Although Jones said he wasnât allowed to see the finished product so he has little idea how he has been rendered for history. Heâll find out Sunday.
âThey took me out of the statue process as they started getting to the face and the head and hair and all that so that I could still have some element of surprise when itâs unveiled,â he said.
It figures to be a hair-raising moment.
✠You have read the latest installment of On Soccer with Kevin Baxter. The weekly column takes you behind the scenes and shines a spotlight on unique stories. Listen to Baxter on this weekâs episode of the âCorner of the Galaxyâ podcast.
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.