EPISODE 338: 50 Years of San Jose Earthquakes Soccer - With Gary Singh

It's a "retcon" special this week, as we celebrate the 50th anniversary of one of the most colorful and persistent franchises in American pro soccer history - with a return visit from Episode 40 guest Gary Singh (The Unforgettable San Jose Earthquakes: Momentous Stories On & Off the Field).

As one of four West Coast expansion teams (along with the Los Angeles Aztecs, Seattle Sounders and Vancouver Whitecaps) added for the North American Soccer League’s breakthrough 1974 season, the original San Jose Earthquakes were an immediate hit both on the field (finishing second in an all-new Western Division, led by league-leading scorer [and Episode 35 guest] Paul Child) - and in the stands, where they averaged 15,000+ fans a game to a less-than-modern Spartan Stadium, more than double the league average at the time. 

Though never regular championship contenders, the ‘Quakes cultivated a rabidly loyal fan base that became the envy of clubs across the league – until the NASL’s ultimate demise ten years later. 

Fragments of the club soldiered on semi-professionally in the following years, but the appellation (along with some of the previous cast) returned in earnest in 1999, when the management of San Jose’s struggling (and unpopularly named) Major League Soccer “Clash” sought to rekindle some of the original NASL team's magic; by 2001, the second iteration of the Earthquakes were contending for and winning MLS Cup and Supporters’ Shield titles.   

However, stymied by an inability to construct a soccer-specific stadium in the area, owner-operator Anschutz Entertainment Group pulled up stakes and relocated the club to Houston (Dynamo) for 2006 – taking further championships with them. 

Nonplussed San Jose fans revolted – and a new “expansion” franchise was quickly announced by MLS officials, with plenty of structural caveats that ensure today’s now-third incarnation of the ‘Quakes rightfully retains all of its accumulated heritage and rich legacy.

The Unforgettable San Jose Earthquakes: Momentous Stories On & Off the Field - buy book here

EPISODE 333: "Soccer Tom" Mulroy

We buckle up this week for a wild and revelatory ride across 50+ years of big-time soccer in the United States with one of the biggest unsung heroes of the American game - and unquestionably, one of its most prominent "keepers of the flame."

The professional and personal life journey of "Soccer Tom" Mulroy ("90 Minutes with the King: How Soccer Saved My Life") virtually parallels the 1970s-to-1990s boom-bust-and-boom-again roller coaster of soccer's early modern history in the US - and today thrives in tandem with the sport's long-overdue cultural acceptance.

In a pro career spanning five leagues and nearly a dozen franchises (including Good Seats bucket-list stops with the MISL Hartford Hellions, ASL Cleveland Cobras, NASL Miami Toros & 1986-87 AISA champion Louisville Thunder) Mulroy's on-field exploits mirrored the chaotic nature of a game still struggling to find its footing among North America's competitive sports landscape. 

After his playing days, Mulroy evolved into the sport's indefatigable go-to goodwill ambassador, bringing Pied Piper-like enthusiasm to the domestic masses yearning for soccer literacy in the wake of breakthrough milestones like World Cup '94, the launch of MLS, and the international success of both the US Women's & Men's National teams.

To understand the life of Tommy Mulroy is to understand the growth of US soccer itself!

90 Minutes With the King: How Soccer Saved My Life - buy book here

EPISODE 331: The NASL's San Antonio Thunder (+ More!) - With Derek Currie

It's the adventure-filled story of how a late-60s-era Scottish top-league footballer helped start the first-ever professional soccer circuit in the then-British colony of Hong Kong - punctuated by an unexpected off-season loan to one of the most forgotten franchises in North American Soccer League history.

Derek Currie ("When 'Jesus' Came to Hong Kong: The Remarkable Story of the First European Football Star in Asia") joins us live and direct from his home in Bangkok, Thailand for an anecdote-rich romp through the international pro soccer scene of the 1970s/early 1980s - including his memorable Texas summer of 1976 wearing the "Stars and Stripes" for the NASL's oft-overlooked San Antonio Thunder!

When 'Jesus' Came to Hong Kong: The Remarkable Story of the First European Football Star in Asia - buy book here

EPISODE 322: The New York Cosmos' "Pelé Years" - With Charles Cuttone

Veteran New York-based sports writer/public relations pro Charles Cuttone has seen just about everything in his nearly 50 years of promoting professional sports across the Gotham sports scene - dating all the way back to 1974 as a fresh-faced elementary school intern with the World Football League's ill-fated New York Stars.

While the WFL gig (and team, for that matter) didn't last long, it was his next experience that following spring - with a rag-tag but ambitious pro soccer outfit called the New York Cosmos - that both solidified a budding career interest in sports PR, and yielded a ring-side seat to one of the most indelible stories in 1970s sports history.

In his new book "Pelé, His North American Years: A Tribute" - visually co-created with the exquisite imagery of legendary sports photographer George Tiedemann - Cuttone recounts the three-season, two-and-a-half-year phenomenon known as Pelé - and how the world's then-greatest player (and arguably, most famous athlete) transformed not only a earnest club and its backwater league, but also a "foreign" game into the mainstream consciousness of American sports.

Pelé, His North American Years: A Tribute -  buy book here

EPISODE 308: Soccer Sojourns - With Thomas Rongen

American followers of the "beautiful game" undoubtedly know the name Thomas Rongen - but can easily be forgiven for not remembering just exactly how.

Of course, there's his current color commentary work for today's Major League Soccer Inter Miami CF - but fans of a certain age will recall the Dutch-born, mop-topped midfielder from his on-field (and in-arena) antics during the halcyon days of the old North American Soccer League alongside international greats like Johan Cruyff, George Best and Alan Willey on clubs like the Los Angeles Aztecs, Washington Diplomats, and two flavors of Strikers - Fort Lauderdale and Minnesota. 

Younger aficionados might place their earliest recollections of a fiery presence on the sidelines coaching a wide array of pro clubs ranging from successor ASL/APSL versions of the Strikers in the late 80s/early 90s, to early MLS sides like the 1996 Tampa Bay Mutiny, 1997-98 New England Revolution, 1999-2001 DC United, or even 2005's version of Chivas USA - not to mention his two stints helming the US Men's U-20 National team before and after.

However, most will undoubtedly know Rongen from his memorable turn as the head coach of the American Samoa national team during FIFA World Cup qualifying in 2011 - forever immortalized in the epically joyous 2014 documentary "Next Goal Wins", and soon to be refashioned as a major motion picture drama of the same name this fall - in which he wills one of the world's perennial soccer minnows into surprising respectability.

We cover all of it - and more - with one of the country's most endearing soccer personalities!

EPISODE 305: "Goodbye Oakland" - With Andy Dolich

If anyone's qualified to weigh in with authority on the current Oakland A's relocation imbroglio, it is our guest this week - long-time professional sports marketing executive and Bay Area-based industry consultant Andy Dolich ("Goodbye, Oakland: Winning, Wanderlust, and A Sports Town's Fight for Survival").

Dolich spent 15+ years in the Athletics' front office from 1980-94 during the Walter Haas era - inheriting the remnants of Charlie Finley's parsimonious ownership, ushering in "Billy Ball", nurturing a promising farm system, and ultimately, reaping the rewards with a 1989 World Series championship over the market's "other team" - the San Francisco Giants.

But before we get there, we take an important introductory detour into Dolich's other exploits, replete with notable stops of keen interest to a certain little podcast - like the NASL's Washington Diplomats, the original National Lacrosse League's Maryland Arrows, and the NBA's Vancouver Grizzlies.

Goodbye, Oakland: Winning, Wanderlust, And A Sports Town’s Fight For Survival - Buy Book Here

EPISODE 285: The Rise & Fall of Admiral Sportswear - With Andy Wells

In 1974, a small Midlands underwear firm changed soccer forever when it won the contract as official kit supplier for England's national team - featuring a tradition-busting combination of bright colors, definitional striping, and, uniquely, prominently positioned manufacturer's logos on both shirt and shorts.

Admiral Sportswear’s bold designs and distinctive branding - soon outfitting storied club sides like Manchester United, Leicester City, Norwich City, West Ham, and Sheffield United - quickly caught fans' attention with their detailed "replica" versions, which offered the most ardent supporters a novel opportunity to literally dress like their favorite pro players.

Sports documentarian/author Andy Wells ("Get Shirty: The Rise & Fall of Admiral Sportswear") tells us the story of how Admiral unwittingly invented today's now-multi-billion-dollar replica jersey industry - while revolutionizing the worlds of sports commerce and street fashion alike.

If you followed any of the franchises from the late 1970s/early 1980s North American Soccer League or Major Indoor Soccer League (or even the American Soccer League's Columbus Magic) - chances are you remember (or even owned) an Admiral shirt!

Get Shirty: The Rise & Fall of Admiral Sportswear - buy book here

EPISODE 274: "Absurd" Pro Soccer History - With Pablo Maurer

The Athletic Major League Soccer staff writer Pablo Maurer steps into our vortex of what-used-to-be in professional sports this week, with a look back at some of the more confounding and overlooked stories of the not-so-distant past of US pro soccer.

It's our deepest dives yet into memorable North American Soccer League gems like 1977's one-year wonder Team Hawaii; 1983's divisive US Men's National Team-as-pro-franchise Team America; the curious Stateside detours of world greats like Bayern Munich superstar Gerd Müeller, Dutch legend Johan Cruyff and Manchester United icon George Best - plus, of course, the NASL's inventive ahead-of-its-time 35-yard-line Shootout tie-breaker.

We also tackle some of the already forgotten early days of Major League Soccer - including its own version of the Shootout; LA's ill-fated "first" second franchise Chivas USA; and impossible-to-forget franchise monikers like Wiz, Burn, Clash, and MetroStars.

PLUS: the unheralded pre-MLS rules experiments of the mid-90s USISL minor league pyramid.

AND: the incomparable (if not incomprehensible) Socker Slam!

EPISODE #270: US Soccer's "Generation Zero" - With Hal Phillips

It wasn’t easy being a soccer fan in the United States in the 1980s. 

While the 24-team North American American Soccer League ushered in the decade with an air of stability and momentum (the league even sold a pennant proclaiming the game the “Sport of the 80’s”), it wasn’t long before big-time American pro soccer was dangerously on the ropes (the NASL shrank to just nine franchises by 1984) – and then seemingly gone for good when the league officially sank into oblivion in early 1985.

For a nascent generation of US fans newly hooked on the world’s “beautiful game,” it felt like an abandonment – and an air of disillusionment beset the American soccer scene in the immediate years that followed. 

Slowly and awkwardly, Americans slowly got wise – miraculously qualifying for the 1990 World Cup in Italy, hosting the event four years later, and re-birthing the pro game with Major League Soccer in 1996 – and ultimately evolved it into one of the most popular sports in the country.

Sportswriter/author Hal Phillips ("Generation Zero: Founding Fathers, Hidden Histories & the Making of Soccer in America") joins the podcast this week to help trace the timeline of events that led to this epic transformation in American sports, by spotlighting the national team players and fans - raised on the game and tempered by hardship - who made it happen.

PLUS: Your chance to win a free copy!

Generation Zero: Founding Fathers, Hidden Histories & The Making of Soccer in America - buy book here

EPISODE 268: Behind the Scenes - With Charlie Evranian

Chicago sports fans of a certain age may remember the name Charles Evranian atop the masthead of the executive suite (behind inimitable owner Lee Stern, of course) of the 1981 outdoor version of the North American Soccer League's Chicago Sting - when that club delivered the first major pro championship to the Windy City since 1963's NFL Bears.

(Not to mention the team's first two barn-burning indoor NASL seasons at the former "Madhouse on Madison".)

But Evranian's time leading the Sting of the early 1980s was merely a brief mile-marker along a fascinatingly peripatetic 20+ year journey across a litany of (mostly forgotten) teams and leagues in both the majors and minors of professional sports management - laden with unbelievable twists and turns that only a podcast of a certain genre could love.

Charlie takes us on a wild ride alongside the likes of legendary front office figures like Bill Veeck, Ted Turner, Pat Williams, and Earl Foreman - for memorable stops including:

• leading baseball's Class A Greenwood (SC) Braves to two league championships;

• co-founding AHL hockey's minor league Richmond Robins;

• reinventing the mid-70s' Chicago White Sox; AND

• cleaning up an endless array of messes as the Major Indoor Soccer League's deputy commissioner.

EPISODE 255: Minnesota's Metropolitan Stadium - With Stew Thornley

Baseball historian, Minnesota Twins official scorer and Episode 114 guest Stew Thornley ("Metropolitan Stadium: Memorable Games at Minnesota's Diamond on the Prairie"), returns for a fond look back at the semi-iconic structure that helped secure "major league" status for the Twin Cities in the early 1960s.

Known simply as "The Met" by area locals (or even the "Old Met" to distinguish from the downtown Minneapolis Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome that effectively replaced it in 1982), Bloomington's Metropolitan Stadium opened in April of 1956 with the stated hope of luring a Major League Baseball franchise to the region - just as the sport was beginning to chart its modern-era manifest destiny.

While ultimately luring Calvin Griffith's Washington Senators to become the Twins in 1961 - as well as the expansion NFL football Vikings that same year - the Met was mostly the exclusive home of the minor league American Association Minneapolis Millers for its first five years of existence, save for a handful of annual NFL preseason exhibition games and two regular season Chicago Cardinals matches in 1959.

In 1976, it also became the popular outdoor home of the North American Soccer League's Minnesota Kicks - and its legions of young tailgate-crazy fans.

Ahead of its time in the mid-50s, Met Stadium was nearly obsolete by the end of the 70s - decent for baseball, not so much for football - and rumors of at least the Vikings absconding for another to-be-built stadium in the area (including concepts for a domed enclosure or a new football-only facility between it and the nearby indoor Met Center) swirled around the community as early as 1970.

Alas, after only 21 seasons each for the Twins and the Vikings (six for the Kicks), Metropolitan Stadium succumbed to poor maintenance and the allure of a new, winter-proof Metrodome. Demolished in 1985, the Met gave way to what is now the country's largest shopping center - the Mall of America.

Metropolitan Stadium: Memorable Games at Minnesota’s Diamond on the Prairie - buy book here

EPISODE 249: New York Cosmos Soccer - With Werner Roth

It's another bucket-list conversation with one of Tim's favorite players from the legendary New York Cosmos of the original North American Soccer League - defender extraordinaire​ (and de facto club keeper-of-the-flame) Werner Roth.

A childhood émigré of his native Yugoslavia in the mid-1950s, Roth spent the bulk of his youth in New York City - cutting his semi-professional teeth in the heavily ethnic, regionally competitive and historically influential German American Soccer League with German-Hungarian SC - where he eventually caught the attention of the new local NASL expansion franchise in 1971.

Roth joined the Cosmos the next year as one of its precious North American players, helping the club secure its first-ever league title and quickly establishing himself as a reliably solid defensive back whose presence could be counted on - especially as the team's ambitions grew.

By 1977, Roth had become captain of a high-wattage international superstar lineup featuring the likes of Pelé, Franz Beckenbauer, Carlos Alberto, and Giorgio Chinaglia - winning back-to-back Soccer Bowl titles and a global following.

We talk about all of it - plus Roth's time on the US National Team, his role in the cult classic WWII soccer movie Victory, thoughts on the current state of soccer in the US, and the potential for a Cosmos television miniseries in the not-so-distant future.

Victory - rent movie from Amazon Prime here

EPISODE 237: Pro Sports in Atlanta - It's Complicated (With Clayton Trutor)

By the time you hear this week's episode, the Atlanta Braves just may be celebrating their second-ever World Series trophy since moving from Milwaukee in 1956. 

If so, it would be the team's first title in 26 years, and only the second time in the region's modern sports history - or fourth, if you include the titles won by the now-defunct NASL's Atlanta Chiefs in 1968 and Major League Soccer's Atlanta United three years ago - that "The ATL" has been able to boast of any true major pro sports championship. 

That kind of futility can make any sports fan question their sanity, and as this week's guest Clayton Trutor ("Loserville: How Professional Sports Remade Atlanta―and How Atlanta Remade Professional Sports") tells us - in Atlanta's case, that self-doubt dates all the way back to the mid-1970s when one of its major newspapers dubbed the city "Loserville, USA".

As Trutor describes it, Atlanta's excitement around the arrival of four professional franchises during a dynamic six-year (1966-72) period quickly gave way to general frustration and, eventually, widespread apathy toward its home teams.  By the dawn of the 80s, all four of the region's major-league franchises were flailing in the standings, struggling to draw fans - and, in the case of the NHL's Flames, ready to move out of town.

While that indifference/malaise has dissipated somewhat in the decades since then (save for a second attempt at the NHL with the short-lived Thrashers), the dearth of team titles continues to loom over Atlanta's pro sports scene.

The resurgent Braves and their paradigm-changing Truist Park complex may just help change all that.

Loserville: How Professional Sports Remade Atlanta - And How Atlanta Remade Professional Sports - buy book here

EPISODE 234: "Big-Time Soccer" - With Rachel Viollet

We take another crack at the history and mythology of the late, great North American Soccer League - this time through the eyes of sports filmmaker Rachel Viollet, whose new documentary "Big-Time Soccer: The Remarkable Rise & Fall of the NASL" makes its US debut at New York's Kicking + Screening film festival later this week.

If that surname sounds familiar, it won't surprise you that Rachel is also the daughter of the late Dennis Viollet - one of the legendary Manchester United "Busby Babes" of the late 1940s & early 1950s - who later went on to become one of the pioneering coaches in the 1970s-era NASL.

With managerial roles overseeing Washington, DC's Diplomats and two flavors of Tea Men in both New England and Jacksonville, the elder Viollet unwittingly provided his young daughter with a bird's-eye childhood purview into a vibrant and hugely entertaining pro soccer circuit, whose influence is still felt in today's MLS and beyond.

Featuring dozens of first-person interviews, rare video footage, and a mountain of exhaustive research, "Big-Time Soccer" is a love letter to both the best and the worst of the NASL - and the legacy it left behind.

EPISODE 226: The New York Cosmos - With Steve Hunt

Your humble host does his best this week to tamp down his inner fanboy as he sits down for a bucket-list conversation with one of his favorite players from the legendary New York Cosmos of the original NASL - winger extraordinaire Steve Hunt ("I'm With the Cosmos: The Story of Steve Hunt").

Abruptly transferred into the star-studded orbit of North America's burgeoning super-club at the tender age of 20 from his hometown (Birmingham) England First Division Aston Villa side in the spring of 1977, Hunt unwittingly arrived just in time to grab a seat on the rocket ship breakout season that vaulted the Cosmos into the stratosphere of soccer not only across the US, but also worldwide.

Joining an array of international greats like Franz Beckenbauer, Carlos Alberto, Giorgio Chinaglia, and the incomparable Pelé, the speedy Hunt quickly became an instant sensation and vital offensive cog - not to mention a huge fan favorite - for a Cosmos unit that would soon break records both on and off the field, including an iconic MVP star turn in the club's historic Soccer Bowl '77 championship-winning match.

While he only played three seasons in Gotham, Hunt was a crucial component of NASL championships achieved in each of them (1977, 1978 & 1982) - a springboard to a triumphant return to England's top tier and national team caps.

I’m With the Cosmos: The Story of Steve Hunt - buy book here

EPISODE 221: Can the MASL Recapture Indoor Soccer's Glory Days? - With Michael Lewis

FrontRowSoccer.com's Michael Lewis returns after a two-year absence to help us dig into the news of the Major Arena Soccer League's hiring of three marquee names from pro indoor soccer's 1980s heyday - as it attempts to translate the sport's past glory into interest for a new generation of fans.

The additions of Shep Messing (Chairman), Keith Tozer (Commissioner) and Episode 66 guest JP Dellacamera (President, Communications/Media) to the MASL executive suite signals a major effort to stabilize the long-wobbly league and elevate the indoor game back to the level of its legendary predecessors - like the original Major Indoor Soccer League and even the old North American Soccer League.

Besides weighing in on what might happen in the months ahead, Lewis mines nearly forty years of soccer reporting to recount some of the most memorable indoor matches from his sportswriting career, including:

• The MISL's epic 1981 "Championship Weekend" at the St. Louis Checkerdome, where the hometown Steamers outlasted the Wichita Wings in a logic-defying 8-7 shootout semifinal, but lost a nail-biting 6-5 final to the New York Arrows two days later;

• 1975 NASL indoor tournament matches at Rochester's War Memorial, where goals measured only four feet high x 16 feet long;

• The MISL's 1981 All-Star Game - played at the World's Most Famous Arena, Madison Square Garden;

• A January 1985 Cosmos MISL home loss to the San Diego Sockers that portended the team's folding just two weeks later; and

• US National Team goalie Tony Meola's indoor debut with the New Jersey Ironmen of the one-year Xtreme Soccer League in 2008.

EPISODE 219: Graham "Buster" Tutt

We knock out a bunch of previously unexplored US soccer franchises of yore with the delightful Graham "Buster" Tutt ("Never Give Up: The Graham 'Buster' Tutt Story") - whose tragically derailed, but ultimately persevering pro soccer journey across three continents serves as the backdrop for intriguing tales of the modern-day American pro game's formative years.

A promising young goalkeeper for England's Charlton Athletic in the early 1970s, Tutt turned pro with the London club the day after graduating high school at age 17, ultimately making 78 first-team appearances and helping the Addicks vault from the FA's Third Division to the precipice of the First in just three seasons.

However, during a promotional bid game against Sunderland in 1976, Tutt suffered a brutal kick to the face that broke his cheekbone and nose, internally damaged his right eye, and permanently damaged his right eye - effectively ending his playing career.

Yet, after two eye operations and 18 months of difficult recovery, Tutt found redemption as a two-time Goalkeeper of the Year in the rough-and-tumble South African League - before springboarding to the burgeoning American pro soccer scene in 1980.

Join us for Tutt's Stateside adventures with the ASL Columbus Magic, outdoor/indoor NASL Atlanta Chiefs, ASL Georgia Generals & the AISA/NPSL indoor Atlanta Attack - and the sport’s legacy he’s still helping build today.

Never Give Up: The Graham “Buster” Tutt Story - buy book here

EPISODE 215: "Toffee Soccer" - With David France & Rob Sawyer

We admit that when our friends at Liverpool's deCoubertin Books reached out recently with an advance look at their upcoming title devoted to the history of one of England's most venerable top-flight soccer clubs, we weren't immediately sold on the premise, nor its applicability to our (admittedly) odd brand of sports curiosity.

But after just a few minutes with the meticulously detailed "Toffee Soccer: Everton and North America," we became not only intrigued by the rich, storied saga of Everton F.C.'s 143-year journey into what is now known as the English Premier League - but downright fascinated with its surprising contributions to the development of the game in North America.

Toffee co-authors David France and Rob Sawyer join the podcast this week to shine light on the little-known, but undeniable connection between the "Blues" and the rise of the modern-day pro game in the US & Canada.

From the club's unexpected 1961 runner-up finish in the influential International Soccer League, to its subsequent supply of dozens of top players to the foundational North American Soccer League of the 70s/80s, to its recent embrace of world-class American players like Landon Donovan and Tim Howard - the "People's Club" has been an unwittingly integral part of soccer's Stateside history - far beyond Goodison Park.

Toffee Soccer: Everton and North America - buy book here

EPISODE 214: The Boston Minutemen & New England Tea Men - With Steve Gans

American soccer insiders know Steve Gans as one of the sport's leading domestic corporate attorneys, with a long track record of legal representation from all sides of the ball - including as a former candidate for the US Soccer Federation's highly contentious presidential election in 2018.

Few, however, are aware that the Boston-born-and-raised Gans - who also spearheaded the Foxborough, MA venue bid for the US-hosted 1994 World Cup - began his long professional association with the 'beautiful game" as a teenaged marketing/PR intern with two of the most regionally peripatetic franchises in North American Soccer League history: the Boston Minutemen (1974-76) and the New England Tea Men (1978-80).

The Minutemen played two successful and one dismal outdoor seasons in the NASL spread across six different home fields - including a hodgepodge of 1976 venues completely outside of Boston proper (Quincy, Foxborough, New Bedford).  Star players like brash American goalkeeper Shep Messing and Portuguese international legend Eusebio dotted early lineups, but team owner John Sterge's sketchy and ultimately criminal business dealings soon undermined the club's fledgling success.

After a year's absence, the NASL returned to the area in 1978 with the expansion New England Tea Men - owned by the Lipton Tea Company and domiciled in Foxborough's Schaefer Stadium.  The composition of the team belied its nickname, as a largely British-flavored roster - led by Charlton Athletic loanee and eventual league MVP Mike Flanagan - topped its division and even knocked off the mighty Cosmos twice.  But the wheels started coming off in 1979, when Charlton refused to loan Flanagan again, and a dispute with nearby Foxboro Raceway forced the club to hastily move to Boston University's Nickerson Field, where attendances dropped precipitously. By 1981, the club had fled to Jacksonville, and the region was bereft of pro soccer until the MLS Revolution in 1996.

EPISODE 192: The Oakland/California Clippers - With Derek Liecty

For the first time since Episode 47 with Dennis Seese, we dial back to US pro soccer's optimistic but tenuous late 1960's reboot, with Derek Liecty - the founding general manager of one the period's most successful (yet historically overlooked) teams, the Oakland (née California) Clippers.

One of ten inaugural franchises in the renegade National Professional Soccer League - one of two competing attempts to launch true "Division One"  soccer in North America (the other being an officially FIFA-sanctioned 12-team United Soccer Association) in the spring of 1967 - the Clippers were unquestionably the NPSL's best club.

Stocked with a pipeline of top Yugoslavian imports (including NPSL All-Stars Ilija Mitic and Mirko Stojanovic), the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum-based club captured the regular season title with 19-8-5 record (23 points better than the second-best Baltimore Bays), and were undefeated at home.  The Clippers bested the Bays in the two-game NPSL championship final (4-2 on aggregate) and also claimed an unprecedented "treble" by defeating the division runner-up St. Louis Stars for the league's post-championship "Commissioner's Cup."

Survivors of an off-season NPSL-USA merger, the Clippers continued their winning ways in the new 17-team North American Soccer League - tying for most wins (18), scoring the most goals (71), posting the second-best point total (185), and sending five players to the 1968 NASL All-Star team. But due to a quirk in the league's distortional divisional points system, the club oddly missed the four-team playoff cut - and were denied a chance to defend its NPSL title.

When the NASL contracted to just five clubs at season's end, Oakland owners Joseph O'Neill and H.T. Hilliard opted instead for a more lucrative series of independent international exhibitions; renamed again as the California Clippers, the team played top teams such as Atlas, Chivas, USSR champion Dynamo Kiev, and Italian champion Fiorentina at stadiums across the state (including LA's Memorial Coliseum).

O'Neill and Hillard pulled the plug for good in June 1969, when the US Soccer Federation refused to sanction further matches.

The Rebirth of Professional Soccer in America: The Strange Days of the United Soccer Association - buy book here