Coffey Double-Shot
The Thorns announce a two-year extension for the essential Sam Coffey
Some absolutely massive news came out of the Thorns earlier today: the team and midfielder Sam Coffey agreed to a two-year contract extension for the 2026 and 2027 seasons. So far this year, Thorn Town hasn’t taken much stock of which players will be free agents at the end of the season. But: before this deal, Coffey would have been one of them. As one of the most consistent presences in this generation of the USWNT, Coffey could have absolutely had her pick of destinations, both in the NWSL and internationally. Coffey held the leverage in this negotiation, and it’s a fantastic sign for the long-term health of the team that she not only wanted to return, but agreed to this deal well before free agency even approached.
In fact, the most bizarre aspect about this announcement is that this contract extension had actually been signed all the way back in March. I can’t think of another professional sports contract, in any league, that was kept under wraps for so long, and I can’t figure out any reason or advantage for holding this back. It doesn’t really matter at the end of the day, but, still a little weird.
Jumping in here for an edit well after this post was published: it was already bizarre enough to learn that this contract was agreed-to in “March,” I just went ahead and figured that meant March of this year. And so just completely missed that the ESPN reporting actually says this contract was agreed to an entire year earlier, way back in March of 2024. Okay, now this really is weird! But, whatever works!
Coffey’s role within the Thorns is so crucial, but so subtle, it probably doesn’t get remarked on enough here at Thorn Town. Over the years, I’ve started to think of Coffey as the soccer equivalent of Sue Bird, the legend of the WNBA. Both players simply make the best decision with what to do with the ball, virtually every single time they have it. While that may not produce as many jaw-dropping highlights as other players, ultimately being a good-decision-making engine just wins games for your team. And that’s become one of the most stable truths of the NWSL: Coffey is a winning player, period.
Here’s a small chunk of Coffey’s statistical accomplishments since joining the Thorns at the start of the 2022 season:
Played 87.7% of all possible regular season minutes — an incredible mark of consistency and availability.
Coffey has a career individual plus-minus of +41 goals. During that small 12.3% of minutes when Coffey has been on the bench over the last four seasons, the Thorns have scored exactly the same number of goals as their opponents. Then, when she’s on the field: massive +41 margin.
Coffey was drafted by the Thorns in the second round of the 2021 Draft, at 12th overall, and then stayed at Penn State for an additional year, arriving in Portland in 2022. That means almost everyone in Coffey’s draft class had a year-long head-start on her when it comes to accumulating NWSL statistics. And still, among all players in her class, she is fourth overall in minutes played (behind Tara McKeown, Trinity Rodman, and Emily Fox), and second overall in assists (behind Rodman).
Coffey’s 15 assists have already made a serious impact in the Thorns’ franchise record books. By my count, across all regular season games, Coffey is tied with Sophia Wilson for fourth all-time in team assists, trailing only Christine Sinclair (17 assists), Meghan Klingenberg (21), and franchise leader Tobin Heath (24).
In 2025, Coffey is personally top-20 in the league in the following statistics: Progressive Passes (at least 10 yards upfield), Shot-Creating Actions Per Minute, Goal-Creating Actions Per Minute, and Passes Blocked. Just to recap: there are both offensive and defensive stats in that mix.
What an all-round great piece of news for the Thorns.
Hopefully Wilson also signed an extension in 2024.