Black Pioneers of the North American Soccer League (1968-84)

By Patrick Horne

They are the Forgotten Figures! They came from Africa, the Caribbean, the Americas, and the United Kingdom and showed America how to play soccer. They exhibited highly technical skills of the game, taught the youths in communities across the USA and Canada, and were their role models. They crusaded the game's uniqueness and its beauty. They were the black pioneers of the (original) North American Soccer League (1968–'84). Among them were the first MVPs of the league and the very first NASL Rookie of the Year; they were among the leading scorers and led their teams to NASL titles. In the process, they played a significant role in making the NASL a world–respected league, which led to the 1994 World Cup in the USA and now the successful MLS. Their efforts made soccer an American sport, and among them were Alberto, Archibald, Auguste, Best, Cannon, Charles, Coker, Cole, Cubillas, Cummings, David, De Leon, Eusebio, Evans, Fowles, Gamaldo, Grell, Horne, Horton, Ingram, Kapengwe, Knight, Lamptey, Largie, Lewis, Lichaba, Lindsay, Mathieu, Mfum, Mokgojoa, Motaung, Mwila, Ntsoelengoe, Odoi, Pearce, Phillips, Sanon, Scott, Sono, St. Lot, St. Vil, St. Vil, Steadman, Valentine, Welch, Welch, Whalen, and Pele. It all started with them; now they will be forgotten no more. This book is their tribute!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Apr 10, 2019
• ISBN: 9781644622803

Book preview

The North American Soccer League

The all-important 1967 merger between the United Soccer Association, the FIFA-sanctioned league, and the National Professional Soccer League resulted in the NASL (North American Soccer League) kickoff of its inaugural season in 1968 with seventeen teams. The new league lined up clubs from Toronto in the north to Florida in the south, and from New York in the east to California in the west: the Atlanta Chiefs, the Baltimore Bays, the Boston Beacons, the Chicago Mustangs, the Cleveland Stokers, the Dallas Tornado, the Detroit Cougars, the Houston Stars, the Kansas City Spurs, the Los Angeles Wolves, the New York Generals, the Oakland Clippers, the San Diego Toros, the St. Louis Stars, the Toronto Falcons, the Vancouver Royals, and the Washington Whips.

The first year of the NASL was very disappointing as teams struggled to survive with an average game attendance of just over 2,000 fans. At the end of this first campaign, the NASL went from seventeen clubs to five: Atlanta, Dallas, Kansas City, St. Louis, and Los Angeles. These hopeful owners, in hindsight, should be referred to as the magnificent five because of their determination to keep the NASL alive and kicking despite its part-time status. They forged ahead in search of new ownership and new solutions in an effort to revive the league.

The 1970s rolled in and the old adage Fortune favors the brave came to the fore. The NASL experienced a resurgence as new franchises entered the league. The New York Cosmos, the Rochester Lancers, the Washington Darts, the Philadelphia Atoms, the Montreal Olympique, and the Toronto Metros added much-needed stability. By this time, the Atlanta Chiefs had defeated the San Diego Toros by a 3–0 aggregate score in the home-and-away series to win the first NASL title, in 1968, with black pioneer Kaiser Motaung emerging as the Chiefs’ leading scorer with eleven goals and three assists to be named the NASL’s first Rookie of the Year. The Chiefs returned to the NASL Final series twice in the following three years, losing to the Kansas City Spurs for the 1969 title, which was determined by most points in the regular season, despite Motaung’s league-leading scoring effort with sixteen goals and four assists; and going down to the Dallas Tornado, 2–1, on aggregate in the 1971 NASL Finals, a two-game series. In 1970, the Rochester Lancers prevailed over the Washington Darts, 4–3, on aggregate after two games, to capture that NASL Final series. The Darts were led by black pioneer Lincoln Phillips, who was the player-coach, the first black player to serve in such a capacity in the NASL. Phillips led a number of his fellow Trinidadians and other black pioneers in the Darts lineup.

The significant addition to the now expanded NASL was the New York Cosmos, which became the high-profile franchise with the signing of Pele on June 10, 1975, and later, a bevy of world-class players. New York became the flagship club of the league. Ironically, the New York Cosmos franchise, which would be at the heart of the league’s heyday in the seventies was also, inadvertently, at the core of its downfall.

Before its bevy of stars arrived, the New York Cosmos dominated the league. It won its first NASL Final at Hofstra University on August 26, 1972, only two years after joining the league, when black pioneer Randy Horton of Bermuda led New York to a 2–1 victory over the St. Louis Stars in the single-game final. The big Bermudan scored the New York Cosmos’ first goal and had led the NASL in scoring that year with nine goals in fourteen regular season games.

The 1972 Final would be the first of five NASL titles for New York, which went on to win the 1977 Soccer Bowl, 2–1, over the Seattle Sounders on August 28 at Portland’s Civic Center, and the ’78 Soccer Bowl versus the Tampa Bay Rowdies, 3–1, in front of 74,091 fans at Giants Stadium in Rutherford, New Jersey, on August 27. It was the largest turnout for an NASL Soccer Bowl. Other Soccer Bowl titles came in 1980 with a 3–1 triumph over the Fort Lauderdale Strikers on September 21, at RFK Stadium in Washington, DC, and on September 18, 1982, in San Diego Stadium, New York defeated the Seattle Sounders, 1–0, to win its last NASL title.

Bankrolled by American conglomerate Warner Communications Inc., the New York Cosmos—renamed The Cosmos from 1977–’79 during its first years at Giants Stadium in the New Jersey Meadowlands—had the financial wherewithal to sign high-profile stars. After Pele donned the green, white, and gold colors of the New York Cosmos, a host of other stars followed: World Cup stars like Pele’s Brazilian teammate Carlos Alberto, German captain Frantz Beckenbauer, and former Yugoslavian and Red Star Belgrade midfielder Vladislav Bogicevic made New York home.

As the league expanded, the international stars kept coming. Dutchman Johan Cruyff played for the Los Angeles Aztecs and the Washington (DC) Diplomats; German striker Gerd Muller and Peruvian legend and black pioneer Teofilo Nene Cubillas were with the Fort Lauderdale Strikers (Florida); former West Ham United (England) striker and black pioneer Clyde Best, along with Englishman Rodney Marsh, was with the Tampa Bay Rowdies (Florida); and Northern Ireland legend George Best played for the Strikers and the Los Angeles Aztecs.

The NASL experienced further growth from the moment Pele arrived and throughout the seventies. His debut on June 15, 1975, against the Dallas Tornado, reportedly was watched nationwide by millions of enthusiastic fans on a live CBS television broadcast from Downing Stadium on New York’s Randall’s Island. The NASL nurtured that enthusiasm the following three years to emerge as a 24-team league by 1978, which included the expansion Memphis Rogues, where I played.

The 24-team NASL experienced its best years from 1977–1980 when attendance was at its peak, with a league-average game attendance improving to 14,000 from 9,000. Meanwhile, New York averaged 47,000 at Giants Stadium, well over the league standard, and for some big games, the Cosmos enticed over 70,000 fans, which, in hindsight, portended the league’s demise. In a 1977 postseason game against the Fort Lauderdale Strikers, The Cosmos drew over 77,691 fans to Giants Stadium, the largest crowd to witness an NASL playoff game.

Along with improved attendance, the league was bent on enhancing the excitement. The offside marker was moved to the 35-yard line so forwards could start their forays on goal much closer to the opponents’ goal area. The shoot-out was introduced to determine the outcome of drawn games, which meant a one-versus-one situation against the goalkeeper from 35 yards with five seconds to shoot. The NASL also stipulated that there must be two American citizens on the field at all times from among the six required on each club’s roster. Interestingly, the Philadelphia Atoms became the first expansion team in any American sport to win a national title when it defeated the Dallas Tornado, 2–0, at Texas Stadium in Erving, Texas, to win the 1973 NASL Final—with six Americans in its starting lineup.

The Los Angeles Aztecs topped the Miami Toros, 5–3, in a penalty shoot-out, to take the ’74 NASL Final in the Miami Orange Bowl on August 25. The game featured two black pioneers for Miami—Trinidadians Warren Archibald, the NASL MVP the previous year with the Toros, and Steve David. The year after, David won the 1975 MVP award with the Toros. The CBS live broadcast of the ’74 title game was a rare national broadcast of a soccer match in the USA. The following year, at San Jose’s Spartan Stadium on August 24, the Tampa Rowdies, led by goals from black pioneers Clyde Best and Arsene Auguste, triumphed over the Portland Timbers, 2–0, in the 1975 Soccer Bowl, the first year the championship game was renamed. Next, it was the Eusebio-led Toronto Metros-Croatia, which stormed into the King Dome in Seattle on August 28 and defeated the Minnesota Kicks, 3–0, to win the ’76 Soccer Bowl.

The Vancouver Whitecaps captured the 1979 Soccer Bowl in a 2–1 defeat of the Tampa Bay Rowdies in Giants Stadium on September 8; and the 1981 Soccer Bowl saw Haitian defender and black pioneer Frantz Mathieu, in an MVP role, lead the Chicago Sting to a 2–1 shoot-out victory over the New York Cosmos at Toronto’s Exhibition Stadium, on September 26. The Tulsa Roughnecks beat the Toronto Blizzard, 2–0, to win the ’83 Soccer Bowl at BC Place Stadium, in Vancouver (British Columbia), on October 1; and the Chicago Sting, again led by Mathieu, captured the 1984 NASL Soccer Bowl, the last NASL title, after a home-and-away series against the Toronto Blizzard by winning both games.

The NASL’s demise, ironically, came about in an attempt to improve on the gains of the 1970s, specifically the attendance and popularity of the New York Cosmos. NASL clubs increased their investments, especially in player acquisitions, but the returns did not materialize. The American markets beyond New York, with few exceptions, just did not reciprocate. The ABC broadcast contract was not renewed, and teams went into a financial freefall just trying to attain attendance standards set by the New York Cosmos. As the early 1980s rolled on, the writing was on the wall, and it was clear that the 1984 campaign would be the last. The sad and fateful day came on March 28, 1985, when the NASL officially ceased operations.

The famous slogan Soccer, a Kick in the Grass was no more.

Of significance is the fact that Pele, the black pioneers, and the other NASL stars had planted the seeds among the American youths the previous sixteen years, and not long after, those seeds bore fruits. The first generation of American players, influenced by the NASL, emerged, and the likes of Tony Meola, Desmond Armstrong, John Harkes, Tab Ramos, Greg Vanney, Paul Caligiuri, John Doyle, Steve Trittschuh, John Stollmeyer, Pablo Mastroeni, Brian Bliss, and Peter Vermes formed the nucleus of the first generation of truly gifted American players that commanded worldwide respect.

This generation ushered in a new era in World Cup soccer for the USA, when it carried the national team to an amazing 1–0 upset victory in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, in a crucial World Cup qualifier. The historic win on November 19, 1989, in Port of Spain, resumed the USA’s appearance at the World Cup in Italia ’90 after a 40-year absence. The Americans have appeared in every World Cup since, until the 2018 FIFA showcase in Russia: in a case of poetic justice, the Americans were knocked out of the 2018 FIFA tournament by host Trinidad and Tobago.

In Memoriam Tributes

Phil Woosnam, first NASL commissioner!

Welsh international and former West Ham United (England) player Phil Woosnam became the NASL’s first commissioner until the league’s penultimate year, 1983. Woosnam came to the USA in 1966 and in ’68 became the first coach and general manager of the Atlanta Chiefs. He actually acted as the league’s commissioner, unofficially, from 1969 until he was officially named to the position in 1971.

He coached the Atlanta Chiefs to the NASL’s inaugural championship in 1968 and was voted the league’s first Coach of the Year. As commissioner, he steered the NASL through its roller-coaster years and is considered the single administrator most responsible for its survival and subsequent success.

Under the Welshman’s reign, the NASL developed the reputation as the league responsible for the growth of the game in North America and the single entity most credited for soccer gaining a permanent foothold in the USA. As American soccer expanded, the sport’s governing body, FIFA, took notice of the achievements of the NASL during its sixteen years (1968–’84) and realized the potential for the sport in North America. On July 4, 1988, Independence Day, FIFA named the USA host of the 1994 World Cup—thanks mainly to Woosnam and Pele and others involved with the NASL.

The 1994 World Cup was a tremendous success in many aspects. Woosnam’s influence in nurturing soccer in North America, through his work with the NASL, was directly responsible for the future growth of the game in the region. He probably should be recognized as the father of US soccer. The game should forever be indebted to him especially, and to all NASL pioneers. Phil Woosnam died in July 2013, at the age of 80.

May his soul rest in peace!

Woosnam, ever the standard bearer!

In Woosnam’s latter years, not long before he passed away, he got word of the start of the present-day NASL and ever the standard bearer for soccer in North America, he gave the new league his blessing in the following letter sent to the organizers:

It is a great honor to welcome all of you, owners and club executives of the new NASL, to this meeting. What an exciting time for soccer in this country. To think that you are here to renew and continue the legacy of the NASL, and to connect past with present, is indeed a wish fulfilled for me.

It was a long road, but a short time, from our office in the basement of the Atlanta Braves Stadium in 1969 with five teams, to our New York accommodations where the NASL ultimately became twenty-four teams in 1978. My hope for all of you is to repeat and, in the near future, surpass that success.

It was not all easy but definitely worthwhile. Our challenge was to find players, coaches, management and yes, fans who would understand and appreciate our great game. You now have a National Team that will be playing England in round one of the World Cup and, has the skill to win! I’m proud of the many foreign players who helped build our league and even prouder of the many North Americans who learned their skills by playing alongside those talented players. They have passed those skills down the line. You will have a great talent pool and perhaps still, as Europe is now doing, import a limited number of fine players from other countries, on a loan basis. That combination will bring fans to your stadiums just as it did for the first NASL.

Good luck with your meeting and plans for the future. With very best wishes, Phil.

Carlos Alberto Torres, defender extraordinaire!

Many of us in North America first took notice of Carlos Alberto when he stormed down the right wing from his right fullback position to score on a perfect pass from the legendary Pele. It was Brazil’s last of four goals against Italy in the World Cup Final on June 21, 1970, in Mexico’s Azteca Stadium. Alberto’s goal is listed at 36th among the 100 Greatest Moments in Football based on a poll conducted in England. He captained Brazil that year to an unprecedented third World Cup title, as Brazil became the first team to permanently keep the Jules Rimet Trophy.

At only 25, he led what many soccer purists and others referred to as the best ever team in World Cup history. Alberto was a main clog in the defense ahead of goalkeeper Felix and alongside center backs Brito and Piazza and left fullback Everaldo. Alberto’s midfield was the clever Clodoaldo and the general Gerson, both in the middle of the pitch, flanked by the mysterious left footer Rivelino and the powerful Jairzinho on the right. The front line sported the majestic Tostao and the genius of Pele—the greatest player of the game.

This Brazilian team is still considered the greatest World Cup eleven—ever!

After an illustrious career in Brazil, where he won numerous titles as captain of Botafogo FC, Alberto came to anchor the New York Cosmos defense in the NASL. He won titles with the Cosmos in 1977, his first year in the USA, and followed it with NASL Soccer Bowl trophies in 1978, 1980, and 1982. Alberto was considered the best right fullback of his time. He was a smart player who read the game well and was exceptionally composed on the ball. He brought a calm presence to the New York Cosmos and to the California Surf, where he played for a season.

Alberto was a joy to watch, and I had the privilege of watching him in action up close. I was on the Memphis Rogues team on that famous and memorable night on May 24, 1978, when we hosted Alberto and The Cosmos. The Rogues pulled off a 1–0 win, probably poetic justice for scorer Tony Field, who played a major role in The Cosmos’ championship-winning season in ’77 and was traded to Memphis before the start of the ’78 campaign.

The Brazilian played 145 games for The New York Cosmos, scored eight goals from his fullback position, and helped the team win four titles. He left the New York Cosmos and the NASL in 1982 as a five-time NASL All Star. He also left us a lifetime of memories and was inducted into the US Hall of Fame in 2003.

Carlos Alberto Torres was a football broadcaster in his native Brazil at the time of his death from heart failure on October 25, 2016, in Rio de Janeiro at age 72. He died a month after his twin brother’s funeral.

Rest in peace, Carlos Alberto Torres!

Johan Cruyff, the cerebral one!

I was surprised at hearing of Johan Cruyff’s passing. The news came during a conversation with black pioneer Warren Archibald, who recalled the Dutchman as a tremendous player who contributed to the NASL. Cruyff was a member of the Los Angeles Aztecs in 1979 and the NASL MVP that year; he also was a member of the 1980–’81 Washington Diplomats. It all made sense when I learned that he died of cancer, because I remembered images of Cruyff with a cigarette in hand. I just hadn’t heard of his cancer diagnosis.

I later read the statement released to the media: On March 24 2016 Johan Cruyff (68) died peacefully in Barcelona, surrounded by his family after a hard-fought battle with cancer. It’s with great sadness that we ask you to respect the family’s privacy during their time of grief.

Cruyff was an enigmatic personality and ever a student of the game. He once said, Every disadvantage has its advantage. I rank Cruyff among the top ten greats of all time, despite not having lifted the World Cup trophy. He led Holland to the 1974 World Cup Final and despite the 2–1 loss to Frantz Beckenbauer’s Germany, he was named player of the tournament. On hearing of Cruyff’s death, Beckenbauer declared, Johan was the better player, but I became world champion.

I own firsthand memories of Cruyff years before he played in the