AUSTIN, Texas – Landon Donovan stepped out of the elevator bank at a downtown hotel with a hat in his hand and a smile on his face.
After more than a decade as the face of the U.S. men’s national team, Donovan, the program’s all-time leader in both goals and assists, grew accustomed to throwing on the cap with some sunglasses when he wanted to go unnoticed. On the evening before the U.S. played Ecuador in a friendly in the Texas capital, Donovan was preparing to go incognito again for a walk to the team hotel. Only this time, he didn’t need the hat.
On top of his head, Donovan already had an unfamiliar sight that he found was helping him go a bit more unnoticed: hair.
For two decades, Donovan struggled with hair loss. Twice he underwent a hair replacement procedure. The second effort unintentionally went public when Donovan was on the desk for Euro 2024 and cameras captured where his head had been shaved for the attempt. Now, Donovan welcomed the public in on a decision he knew he would eventually have to address.
He posted a video on his social media channels.
“Alright guys, I need your help. Since I was 18, 19, 20, I’ve been dealing with…” Donovan turned his head down and ran his hand over his balding head. “That.”
Time to fix this balding head once and for all 👨🏼🦲
Open to suggestions, share your ideas below pic.twitter.com/D1glQS49Cv
— Landon Donovan (@landondonovan) September 29, 2025
“Hairline used to be here, and now this. So, I tried everything. I tried the hair transplant treatment here, tried it back here. Nothing’s worked. My options now are: Shave it bald, don’t want to do that. Not an option for me. Leave it as is — not an option right now. Or I can try the last thing: which is a hair system … basically a wig, to see if that works. So that’s what I’m thinking about doing. But I need your help if I do it. What type of hairstyle should I get? I’m sure there’ll be a lot of banter, funny answers. That’s fine. But real answers, too. I need your help. Thanks.”
Soon after, Donovan posted another video of himself getting the “hair system.”
After years of trying different methods, I’ve finally tried a hair piece. I’ve been encouraged by your messages over the last few days. It’s allowed me to be vulnerable and open up about my experience and process. Thank you for all your messages of support! pic.twitter.com/HEubE5mY8W
— Landon Donovan (@landondonovan) October 3, 2025
The American soccer legend distinguished himself during his playing career for a willingness to open up about his biggest vulnerabilities. Donovan publicly discussed his struggles with depression. He became an advocate for mental health support before it became a normal part of the professional sports conversation. In that way, it felt fitting that Donovan once again shared an insecurity with the public.
As he sat in the lobby last Thursday, Donovan told The Athletic his choice to bring people into the decision had an unexpected payoff.
Hair update! Thank you guys for your support! Headed to Austin for @USMNT match 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/LNiyww7WSe
— Landon Donovan (@landondonovan) October 7, 2025
“I’ll be honest, with (opening up about) mental health and depression, there was a conscious thought that this will help people, I know this will help people,” Donovan said. “It’s not like it was super intentional, but I did know that it would help people. With this, I had no idea. You have no idea the messages I’ve received. The messages and responses have been insane. I had no idea how many people deal with this and feel like I did. I could read you thousands of messages from people saying, ‘Thank you so much, I’ve dealt with this.’ Famous people, tons of people I know, (people I) don’t know, who have just said: ‘Thank you for being honest about this. I’ve been struggling with this. I’ve been trying to figure out what to do and it’s given me some motivation to just do it and go with it.’ It’s been really powerful, honestly. And that was not at all in any way the intention. But it’s been a really nice side effect.”
Donovan’s journey to a hair system started two decades ago when, as a 20-year-old, he noticed his hair was receding. He remembers one moment when he was warming up for a game against FC Dallas in Frisco and fans started chanting at him: “Rogaine! Rogaine!”
Donovan responded playfully, smiling at the supporters, but the heckling cut to the heart of the young professional’s insecurity.
“It wasn’t like a breakthrough, soul-crushing moment,” he said. “But that’s sort of a microcosm of what it’s always been my whole life.”
Donovan attempted his first hair restoration in his mid-20s. Then he left it alone until the recent attempt that went unintentionally viral in the niche American soccer world. Donovan tried to keep his head turned to hide where his head was shaved, but eventually the cameras caught it during the Euros. Screengrabs went viral. His former LA Galaxy teammate Mike Magee encouraged Donovan to embrace it and acknowledge it on social media — almost as a way to protect himself by making light of it.
Sorry @landondonovan 😂 pic.twitter.com/VGj2AFwWhs
— Mike Magee (@magee18) June 18, 2024
The world was now looped in for the first time on Donovan’s attempts to address his hair — or lack thereof. And on top of it, the procedure once again did not take.
“Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t,” Donovan said. “It just didn’t work.”
For almost his entire adulthood, Donovan harbored a simple desire: He just wanted to know what it felt like to have hair. After the failed restorations, Donovan came across examples of men getting hair pieces on social media. He started to explore the possibility.
“I got to this point where — and I don’t know, maybe it’s mid-life crisis or whatever — where psychologically it was (important),” Donovan said. “I thought to myself it’s just annoying to have this. Every time I saw myself in a picture: ‘I’m bald here and bald up here.’ And I don’t even know what it’s like to have hair. No idea. So my choices are leave it as is, shave it all off or try to do a hair piece.”
Donovan told his family he was going to try the hair system. His three kids laughed about it and teased Donovan a bit, but they quickly adjusted. His wife, Hannah, was initially against it — she liked him the way he was, he said — but she, too, has started to adjust to her husband’s new hair.
As a public figure, however, Donovan knew he would have to address it for fans. He has a popular podcast called Unfiltered with former U.S. men’s national team goalkeeper Tim Howard.
“If I just showed up on TV the next time or on the pod and I had hair, it’s going to be f***ing weird, right?” Donovan said. “You can’t just show up and be like, ‘Hey, look at me!’ I’m going to have to talk about it at some point. So I just figured just be transparent with it.
“I watched Wayne Rooney when he got hair plugs and he just said it before and nobody could really say anything. How is someone going to make fun of you? ‘Oh, look what you did.’ You’re being honest about it and that’s it.”
Was there a payoff to being so public about it?
“It’s therapeutic in a way,” Donovan said. “Maybe there is a level of attention, ego, from appreciating and liking the feedback you get from people and the positive response and reaction. Of course, there is a lot of negative response, too.”
A balding Landon Donovan in the summer of 2024 as the interim manager of NWSL’s San Diego Wave (Orlando Ramirez / Getty Images)
But Donovan said he learned long ago to tune out the negativity. He recalled the first time he left Germany to return to MLS and people called him “soft and weak.” After a career in which his performances got picked apart and in which he was constantly criticized for staying in MLS, Donovan said he learned to block most of it out.
“You just hit a point where you don’t give a s*** anymore,” Donovan said. “We all want to be liked. But there is a point where it’s really peaceful where you don’t give a s*** if someone doesn’t like you or doesn’t like something about you. For athletes we are so used to seeing and reading and hearing the negative, negative, negative. You become immune to it.”
More than that, any negative comments were outweighed by the simplest of things: Donovan is happy.
“My confidence in the last week when I’m just walking around is skyrocketing,” he said. “I didn’t realize how much I was aware of my hair, or lack of, because now I walk around and think: ‘I’m kind of handsome. I’m not this ugly balding guy.’ I feel like I’m an all right-looking guy.”
That alone made the decision to share it publicly pay off, Donovan said, because maybe it would give someone else the courage to do something similar — whether shaving their head, getting extensions or getting a hair system like him.
“We’re just people struggling trying to figure it out and doing the best we can,” he said. “I’ve had an amazing life. I’m very confident in who I am, and (the new hair is) still giving me confidence.
“So for other people I think it can do a lot.”
