'Goal!'
The New York Cosmos
were the best and worst
'of what soccer in America was.'
We were the first big pioneers where
big stars came to the United States.
'Pel, Giorgio Chinaglia,
Franz Beckenbauer, Johann Cruyff...'
It was my dream at that time
to go to play for the New York Cosmos.
I think it was one of the best decisions
I ever made.
'Goal!'
All of a sudden in that one summer,
summer 1977, the Cosmos took over.
When you saw that stadium
with 80,000 people
'you almost had an orgasm... really!'
It was a happening.
It was an event. It was unprecedented.
'The Cosmos were North America's
soccer ambassadors to the world.'
'We sensed
we were in on something special.'
The world's sport is finally being berthed
right here, right in our midst.
Soccer will be the biggest
big league of all.
'Goal number three!'
We transcended everything.
We were international. We were cool.
We were everything to everybody.
The world's most popular sport
came to its most powerful nation
in the same way the United States
imported many of its people
through the gates at Ellis Island,
imported from almost
every corner of the world.
'This is the cradle
of New York soccer in the early days.'
Ethnic communities playing soccer
on fields like this,
in and around New York
for decades, really.
"Hyphenated Americans"
we used to call them,
German-Americans, Greek-Americans,
but never American-Americans.
From the melting pot came
America's first great soccer team.
'In 1950, a free-spirited band of Yanks'
pulled off one of the most stunning
upsets in World Cup history.
The World Cup,
the Tournament of Nations
held every four years since 1930
is the global game's ultimate event.
The American's second match
in 1950 was against mighty England,
the country where the modern sport
was born.
I was just a teenager at that time,
but it was a great shock to wake up
'to find England had been knocked out
by the United States.'
We just couldn't believe it.
The winning goal was headed home
by Joe Gaetjens,
a Haitian living in New York City
who made his living as a dishwasher.
On the day he became an American
hero, he wasn't even a US citizen.
It would be 40 years before the US
fielded a World Cup team again.
'Americans don't have
the attention span that other people do'
for watching a sport that is
free-flowing and continuous.
'Hot smash! Burleson's
gonna have a long throw. He makes it.'
'That ends the inning.
Bottom of the 7th, 5-3, Cincinnati.'
In our sports there are all these
artificial stops and starts,
'which we use to indulge ourselves in
beer and Cracker Jacks and whatever.'
'Football, baseball,
basketball, hockey,
'all have natural breaks.'
I think that people watching soccer
for the first time wonder what's going on.
It's just up and down, up and down.
'Our football is a game
without stopping,
'where you've got to think for yourself.
'A game that you do with your feet
and not with your hands.'
All these things are totally different
for the American public.
'If you really want to get soccer,
'you have to concentrate on it
for the entire 45 minutes.'
I have sometimes likened it to a play.
If you go to a play in the theatre,
'you are going to pay attention to it
until the intermission.'
'Then you take a break and talk about it,
'then sit down again
and watch the entire second act.'
Soccer's like that.
It's not like the other American sports.
'It's about tradition.
'People in the rest of the world
'are passionate about soccer.'
There's no passion in America about
soccer.
By the 1960s, there was no passion
because there was no soccer.
It was just a country where 99.9%
of the population never heard of it.
No youth leagues.
No amateur teams, nothing.
It was an absolute barren country
in terms of soccer.
And yet the next great
American football club
would change the world's game forever.
The phenomenon known
as the New York Cosmos
would not have happened
without the passion of one man.
My father was a big sports fan.
He loved watching football.
We went to basketball games
and hockey games all the time.
'And I think the idea
of developing a sport'
from basically scratch in
the United States really turned him on.
He was a traveling salesman who
became the world's first media titan.
Long before Ted Turner
and Rupert Murdoch,
there was Steve Ross,
creator of Warner Communications.
'They owned
Warner Brothers Studio which boasted
'some of the great film stars of the day:
'Redford, Streisand, Dustin Hoffman.'
They owned record companies
that featured musicians
like Dylan and the Rolling Stones,
Ray Charles.
He started the first true entertainment
empire with comic books,
and ended up igniting
the cable television revolution.
He also bought
an arcade game company,
and helped create the first name
in home computing.
He was a genius. In the financial world
he was really unbelievable.
And he was also close
to Frank Sinatra, by the way.
He was somebody.
He was fantastic. He was not only
a big businessman.
He was very charming.
He was like a father to us.
He had transformed his father-in-law's
funeral parlor
and a collection of parking lots
into a media empire.
For Steve Ross, anything seemed
possible, even soccer.
It captivated him.
The man owned movie studios.
The man owned six record companies,
cable, you know.
'Company doing $6 billion a year,'
and he's enamored
with going into a locker room.
'But for what reason?
What purpose was he obsessed with it?
'What was that all about?'
The big bang of the Cosmos
began with a backbeat.
And two brothers from Istanbul.
Ahmet and Nesuhi Ertegun are
responsible for more classic vinyl
than Elvis and the Beatles put together.
Ahmet founded Atlantic Records
in 1947.
Warner Communications
bought Atlantic 20 years later,
and the Erteguns went to work
for Steve Ross.
Here we were,
two New York businessmen,
who had this love of soccer.
'My brother decided
to leave Atlantic Records.'
And Steve Ross said, "If you'll stay,
I'll do anything that you like."
So my brother said to Steve Ross,
"What I really would like is
a professional soccer/football team."
Nesuhi Ertegun came to me
and Steve actually and said,
"Soccer is going to be the biggest sport.
It is the biggest sport in the world.
"Clearly it's going to overtake America."
Television viewers in the US
had got their first taste
of world football's potential in 1966.
They saw almost 100,000 fans
pack Wembley Stadium
for the final between
England and West Germany,
as the BBC broadcast
was carried live in America.
In one of the most thrilling matches
ever played,
young Beckenbauer and his team-mates
could not stop England's Geoff Hurst.
'England... it's a goal!'
'Some people are on the pitch,
they think it's all over...
'It is now!'
In the UK alone, 32 million viewers
tuned in to the extra time thriller.
Still the biggest audience
in BBC history.
You can't have a professional league
without having investors convinced.
I think the showing of the World Cup
in 1966 was the turning point.
'That convinced them
that it could happen in this country.'
The American game of the same name
was flourishing
with the birth of the Super Bowl and
the first network television contracts.
The American Football League
franchises had become over the years,
sometimes quite quickly,
worth millions of dollars.
'Soccer franchises were very cheap,
so you had the opportunity'
of getting in on something
on the ground floor.
Emboldened by
the BBC success in '66,
American investors backed not one but
two professional US soccer leagues.
'Trying to find an American
who could play soccer,'
American-born who could play soccer,
it just wasn't there.
By 1968, the two leagues
had collapsed into one-
the North American Soccer League-
featuring five largely failing franchises.
We knew if the league
was going to be a success
'and get the media sponsorship
and television attention,'
that we had to have
a successful New York franchise.
The stars would align for the NASL
just south of the border
in Mexico City at the 1970 World Cup.
'Goooooal!'
'Nesuhi and I gave
a big party at the World Cup.'
We invited Pel,
and all of them came to our party.
'I just happened
to gatecrash into a party.'
And a gentleman there introduced
himself. He said, "Come on in.
"My name is Nesuhi Ertegun."
So right then, that night,
I met his brother as well, Ahmet.
And we arranged to meet
in New York later.
Nesuhi and Ahmet
returned to Manhattan
and held Steve Ross to his promise.
'Steve and I called
eight other executives.'
We got them to put in $35,000 each.
I did it. Steve did it.
What's a million dollars between friends?
They hired Clive Toye
as general manager
before most of them
had ever seen a game.
'Nesuhi said,
"I'm going to take you to St Louis.'
"'The hotbed of soccer.
This is where soccer is really big."
'We got there,
and 340 people were in the stands.
'I counted them. 340 people.'
We watched the game
and I never knew what a header was.
I thought giving great head
was something else!
'I looked at Steve and said,
"We love Nesuhi. We love Ahmet.'
"But this is going to be a disaster!"
'The league was nothing to talk
about. It was really semi-professional.'
And we had a rag-tag team.
They started recruiting players.
All they needed was a name.
The previous New York professional club
had been the New York Mets,
short for metropolitan, so I thought,
"What's bigger than metropolitan?"
I came up with cosmopolitan,
and suddenly it clicked, "Cosmos".
'That's how the Cosmos
became the Cosmos.'
Toye's first hire was an English
player/coach named Gordon Bradley.
Clive was in the office doing his planning
and his thing.
I was out in the field, coaching.
My name is Gordon Bradley
and I'm a professional soccer player.
A lot of you have probably
not seen this game before,
but I think it's
the greatest game in the world.
In the early years, Bradley and Toye
built the team with players
mainly from New York's
amateur leagues.
'The North American
Soccer League was professional.'
But in essence
it was a semi-pro league.
We didn't make a lot of money.
We practiced twice a week.
We all worked for a living.
I worked for an architectural firm.
I was teaching at a high-school and then
playing for the Cosmos on the side.
I'll never forget the first contract
I signed. I was so proud.
I thought I needed an agent.
"How do I negotiate?"
Then the coach Gordon Bradley said,
"I'll offer you $2100 for the season."
I said, "Well, what would you say
if I said no?"
He said, "I couldn't care less."
So I said, "OK, yeah. I'll sign."
I worked at Warner Brothers
Jungle Habitat
which was an open safari
up in West Milford, New Jersey.
Randy Horton was the Cosmos'
first leading scorer.
A chimp named Harold from his day-job
was the team's first mascot.
Horton's boss at the wild animal park,
an architect from Havana, Cuba,
named Raphael de la Sierra,
became the Cosmos'
first vice president.
A friend asked me if I knew
how many people played on each side.
And I had no idea if it was ten or nine.
I don't know, a bunch of guys.
You know?
I mean, it was really a disgrace
of a team in many ways.
When we started with the Cosmos,
it was a small ethnic crowd.
Nobody knew who we were.
And we just played because
we loved the game of soccer.
They played their first game
at Yankee Stadium,
but soon moved 25 miles
east of the city
to Hofstra University on Long Island.
'The fifty people in the stands
were mostly the families of the players.'
We were thinking how can we possibly
draw anything to see this game?
'We'd give away
T-shirts, balls, key chains.'
They would have me call
radio stations of two listeners.
'I felt like Jimmy Swaggart
or Billy Graham at the time'
to spread the word.
It was almost an impossible situation,
you know?
We tried everything. It didn't really work.
In 1972, the Cosmos won
the league championship.
Not that anyone noticed.
But by then the rag-tag team had
hooked the only fan that mattered.
We're in the stands in the pouring rain
with 100 people watching the game.
My father is running down the sidelines
giving the players towels to wash off.
'That's who he was. Anything he did,
he did with a great deal of gusto.'
'It was all his dream of owning
a major league sports team,
'and he tried to believe that this was
a major league sports team
'when indeed it wasn't.'
'I went to Steve and I said,'
"Steve, clearly this is something
that Warner should take, not us,
"because this is going to lose
quite a bit of money."
The ten original investors
sold their stake in the Cosmos
to Warner Communications
for one dollar.
Ross put his empire behind the idea
of American soccer.
When it first was released
that Warners were buying this team,
I don't think anybody
really took it seriously.
Sports editors treated soccer
as if it was a leper colony.
They wouldn't give us the time of day,
so I bought them soccer magazines
so they knew how
to spell the word soccer.
The only magazine willing to publish
a feature on the Cosmos
barely mentioned the sport.
A friend of mine asked me whether
I wanted to pose nude in a magazine.
I said, "Dude, you're crazy."
He said, "No, they pay $5,000.
"They're looking for a professional
athlete in New York."
'I thought it'd be semi-nude. A towel
or dim lighting or an artistic picture.'
Needless to say,
when the magazine hit the newsstand,
there was nothing subtle about it.
'There I was naked, frontal. It was wild.'
'Man, I didn't think anybody would see it.'
But the Cosmos saw it. Clive went nuts.
There was no morals clause
in the contract,
but he said it was disgraceful.
"A professional athlete! We're trying
to be role models, to sell the sport."
I said, "Clive, wait. You told me our
biggest challenge is to get exposure.
"I got you more exposure in one
centerfold than you've got all year!"
In 1974, Ross moved the team
closer to the city
in an effort to attract more fans.
The only available venue was
Downey Stadium on Randall's Island,
just below the Triborough Bridge
connecting the Bronx and Queens
with Manhattan.
It's Randall's Island, a prison and
some guy selling hot dogs. That's all!
The field was like broken bottles and dirt,
but we thought that was a step up.
I remember having great difficulty
getting out of my bed on game days.
'You know, really not wanting
to go to Randall's Island.'
It was not the type of place
that you'd play on purpose.
It's where you've played
all your home games.
You might not like the ground,
but they like it 50% worse than you.
You can do it! But it's up to you.
Randall's Island was quite appropriate
for some of the players we had.
The team's fourth season would be
its worst yet: 14 losses in 20 games.
We were getting absolutely nowhere.
Nowhere. It was hopeless.
Steve Ross would need
more than just the game
to transform the Cosmos
into a major league attraction.
New York,
we talk about Joe DiMaggio,
and we talk about Babe Ruth
and we talk about Mickey Mantle,
and we talk about Joe Namath.
And we said, "You know, what we really
need in this team is a big name player."
'Clive said to me,
"Why don't we talk to this guy, Pel?"'
I said, "Who's Pel? I have no idea."
Pel was Pel, there was no better
player more spectacular
and more famous in the history
of the game than Pel.
As a boy growing up in the slums
of Brazil, he saw his father weep
after their country's loss
in the 1950 World Cup final.
Pel vowed to win one for his father.
Eight years later at age 17,
he became the youngest man ever
to win a World Cup winner's medal,
leading Brazil to victory.
The first of a record three
World Cup championships.
Only one player in the world could
break through this crust of antipathy,
'more than just indifference,
'and that was Pel.'
In October 1974,
he announced his retirement
from his life-long club, Santos.
Clive came to us one day and said,
"I think there's a chance of getting Pel."
That's not quite true.
My brother told Steve Ross to sign Pel.
That's the biggest load of nonsense
I've heard today,
maybe this week, maybe this year.
The idea of signing Pel was
either Phil Woosnam's or mine.
The first approach to Pel
was done in 1970.
Long before anyone at Warner,
including Ahmet and Nesuhi
and Steve Ross and everybody else
had ever heard of soccer.
Steve Ross asked Nesuhi,
"Who is the greatest player?"
And Nesuhi said,
"The greatest player is Pel."
I got to tell you that...
I'm going to stop for a minute by saying
this is going to be like "Rashomon".
Everybody's going to have
a different view of everything.
Toye and Woosnam had
in fact approached Pel
about coming to America just one
month after the Cosmos were formed.
Toye even insisted the teams colors
be yellow, the same as Brazil.
The Cosmos, New York, my face,
my name had been registered.
In 1971, Toye could only dream
of signing a World Cup legend.
By '74, he worked for a dream maker
and a risk taker.
People said, "You can't get him."
He'd say, "I don't want to hear about can't.
Let's try."
'Ross didn't just see
the world's greatest soccer player.'
He saw a global brand,
he saw Pel soccer shoes,
'Pel jerseys, even Pel cologne,'
'that Warners could license to every
soccer playing country in the world.'
And he also saw something else.
He saw television.
He saw a path
to what had been promised.
Soccer, as America's
new big league sport.
What'll it cost?
That's always the first question.
That's very much the American mentality.
"'If we can't create it we can assume it,'
"because at the end of the day
it's all about money."
'Nesuhi, myself and Pel,
Raphael and, I guess, Clive
'met in a seaside resort with a fellow
called Shisto, who was into every...'
Pel had 32 advisors.
We played soccer with Pel
on the beach. Can you imagine?
That'll be on my headstone:
"He played soccer with Pel."
'And by then Real Madrid and
Juventus had started sniffing around.
'And so I had come up with:'
"If you go to them, all you can win
is another championship.
"Whereas if you come with us,
you can win a country."
He loved the lure of that.
He was going to open a new frontier.
'And that was America,
the great challenge of America.'
'That night I called Steve Ross.'
I said, "I think this guy's gonna play for us."
And he couldn't believe it!
'I was negotiating with Dustin Hoffman
'for the film called
"All the President's Men".'
Then I got a call to see Steve and Jay
in their office, and they said,
"Norman, we want you to go to Brazil
"and sign a soccer player named Pel."
And I said, "OK."
I was greeted by a number of paparazzi
and other photographers.
People idolized Pel, as they did
all over the world, I suspect.
But in Brazil he was clearly
a national treasure.
And they didn't want to let him go.
Ross was ready to risk $2mn
for three years of play.
Pel wanted $5mn for two years.
Quite a difference.
There was no way we were going
to spend that. So we called Jay.
'They called me about 2:00 A.M.,
saying, "Change the deal a little."'
I said, "Norman, do what you have to do.
We got to get him.
"We want him.
No matter pretty much what it costs."
And he said, "I have one more thing
to tell you."
'I said, "What's that, Jay?"
And he hung up on us.'
I took the phone off the hook,
cos I knew there'd be more calls.
All right, so basically it was up to us.
And we proposed a five-part deal.
Five contracts.
Three years for playing.
Ten years of world-wide marketing rights.
A 14-year PR contract.
A music contract. The total package was,
we owned him, lock, stock and barrel.
Has anybody ever mentioned
the amount we paid Pel?
- He got a lot of money.
- Pel was paid $4.5mn.
- $3mn for two years.
- $5mn.
All together, $2.7mn.
The highest-paid player in baseball
became the home-run king that year.
Henry "Hank" Aaron was making
$200,000 a season.
What Warners came to him with was
like the apple in the Garden of Eden.
'It would've been a very strong and
strange individual who'd turn that down.'
Pel okayed the deal.
His country did not.
Citing his status as a national treasure,
the president of Brazil demanded
he play one more year for his country
rather than go to America.
Pel turned to his suitors for help.
Warner Communications headquarters,
75 Rockefeller Center, New York.
Nelson Rockefeller was
a Vice President of the United States.
'My father worked
for Nelson Rockefeller.'
And they asked my dad to put in a good
word to the Brazilian government
and wouldn't this be a great thing for
both countries to have Pel come here.
'Like three or four days later,
Nelson called back
'and says he's no idea who Pel is.'
He couldn't care less
if he comes and plays here or not.
But that there is a guy in the cabinet,
who thinks it would be a fantastic idea,
and his name is Henry Kissinger.
'In my dealings
with all the Brazilian government,'
I tried to convince them that
having Pel play in the United States
was a tremendous asset
for Brazil.
'Pel got a phone call from
'the Secretary of State of Brazil,'
'begging him to sign the contract
with the Cosmos'
for the good of the relationship
of Brazil and the United States.
Well, when Pel received that call,
he said, "My God, you guys
can do anything, you know?
"I'm going with you, no matter what."
Steve Ross announced the signing
at the legendary 21 Club in Manhattan.
The Cosmos held
their press conference there
in a room aptly named the Hunt Room,
as if Pel was the prize catch.
'The Press Corps got there
before the conference'
and nailed their cameras
into the floor.
'These people would never cover
the Cosmos or show up to anything.'
And the sign said
"Capacity 143 people".
There must have been 300 reporters
from all over the world.
No cameras right in front!
And Pel was on Pel time
which means that he was two hours late.
Steve and Jay were waiting.
"Where the hell is he?"
"He's coming. He's coming."
And on my immediate left
Steven J Ross,
chairman and president
of Warner Communications.
And now at the door, the legend,
the great one, the king, Pel.
'When Pel finally came out,
people rushed up to meet him.'
It was unbelievable.
I had never seen such a thing.
Behave yourselves!
'So all the reporters
turned into fans.'
We finally calmed the press corps down.
One person was heckling us.
It was Dick Young talking about
the denigration of professional baseball,
how soccer would ruin
the sport of baseball.
He was heckling the entire time.
"Soccer is for foreigners.
"Shouldn't be played in America."
Everything negative.
'Dick Young was a crusty,
conservative man.'
He believed if you didn't love everything
about America, you should get out.
'Young was probably the best read
sports writer in the United States'
and held a considerable
amount of power.
'To him the only story was that
Warners was shelling out'
this obscene amount of cash
for somebody he never heard of.
You can spread out the news
to all the world
that soccer arrived finally in USA!
Within ten seconds, the time it took Pel
to sign his contracts, it all changed.
'Finally, something about
an extraordinary man from Brazil...'
- '... the soccer superstar Pel.'
- 'Today in New York City, Pel...'
'... greatest soccer player ever...'
Everywhere people knew
there was a Cosmos soccer team in
New York and that Pel played on it.
'We're practicing at Randall's Island
with broken glass on the field'
and cuts
on our legs
when a guy comes onto the field
spray painting the dirt.
We had to spray paint the mud,
because there was so little grass.
We're going, "This dude is nuts.
I don't know what he's doing."
And then we see a helicopter flying over.
'The image was irresistible,
it was a Greek piece of theatre.'
Pel was stepping in to save this league
from being trite and ordinary.
He was going to move it into the realm
of a big-time league.
The Cosmos were already nine games
into the '75 season
and last in their division
with just three wins.
Nevertheless CBS agreed to broadcast
Pel's American debut.
'Pel is the most
famous player in soccer.
'Today at the age of 34
he began a new career
'playing for the New York Cosmos
in the NASL.'
The first game that Pel played here
on a Sunday afternoon against Dallas,
'the place was filled.'
- What brings you out today?
- Curiosity.
He's worth $4mn, I got to see him.
I've never seen soccer in my life.
We could have got in three times
as many. It was a huge game.
'Pel's magic drew
the largest crowd in Cosmos' history.'
Mr. Ross calling up,
"How many have we sold?"
- 'I came to see Pel because...'
- 'He's the Muhammad Ali of soccer.'
'One minute the place is dead,
the next minute the whole place is alive.'
He doesn't know what the field is like.
Could be up, down, in, out.
But he played in it. He could've said,
"I'm not playing in that field."
He played 90 minutes... enough said.
When the camera pointed to the field,
it was green and beautiful.
The world's greatest player
did not disappoint,
rescuing his new team
in dramatic fashion.
'With the Cosmos trailing
by two, his perfect pass made a goal...
'Then he soared above the Dallas
defenders to head home
'powerfully, unstoppably,
the equalizing goal.'
When the game was over,
Pel was in the shower.
'The locker room was packed
with reporters.'
He gestured me from the shower.
He goes, "Psst, psst, psst!"
'I go to him and he says,'
"Raphael, this is the first
and the last game I play here."
"How can you say this to me?
"I mean, don't you see
it's a big success?
"How can you possibly say that to me?"
He says, "The most important thing
in my life is my feet.
"Look at my feet. I have a fungus
that I have contacted here.
"I'm not playing with you any more."
I said, "Pel, this is green paint.
"We painted the field green."
He could not believe it.
His first season would be
the Cosmos' last on Randall's Island.
I had to get Pel in the stadium
which he could play in,
he should play in:
the stadium, Giants Stadium.
Less than seven miles
from Times Square,
construction in East Rutherford,
New Jersey,
had been underway since 1972.
Giants Stadium,
with more than 75,000 seats,
was scheduled to open for American
football in the fall of 1975.
Ross was banking that by then America
would be ready for professional soccer.
But in the summer of '75,
Pel could hardly save his team
much less his sport.
'He thought we were passing him
the ball too often.'
We thought as long as we got
the ball to Pel, he'd take care of it.
'It was hard not to be in awe every day.'
You think you'd get used to it.
But everyday there's Pel on a field.
'I mean, come on, it's Pel.'
'I'm learning so much just by being
around the guy, and how he plays.'
The biggest challenge for us on the field
was not stopping and watching him play,
'because he still had these
incredible moves.'
Every place we went,
and we're straggling along, there's Pel!
We're just like, "We're with him!"
'I don't think any one of us
ever felt entitled. We were honored.'
We knew we were experiencing
something...
I always said there could've been
a hundred goal keepers as good as me...
I had a hard time, as well,
thinking I belonged there.
He was a superstar in a strange land.
But he knew his role.
I come to play in America
because I believe in soccer in America.
'Kids here love the sport. The American
people love sport naturally.'
I come to play here
because I know, in a few years,
we will have a good team in America.
I think his challenge
was really figuring out
how best to fit in to a team of
journeymen that were trying their best.
He talked to me a couple of times,
"Play like you're playing
a game of chess.
"Be two moves ahead of the ball."
He would finish the season
with five goals and four assists,
leading his new team
to seven wins in nine games.
Although the Cosmos missed
the playoffs, Pel had done his job.
We look at the world of the Cosmos
as before Pel and after Pel.
His mere presence shattered
attendance records
in Boston, Los Angeles
and Washington, DC.
When I'd visit my grandmother
in Washington,
you'd hope that when you were there
the Dips were playing the Cosmos
so that you could see Pel.
After he pulled a hamstring
late in the season,
more than 20,000 fans in Philadelphia
came to see him in street clothes.
'Now that the world's most famous
athlete was in New York City,'
the media could no longer
ignore the sport.
'At the White House,
President Ford found a soccer ball
'a lot more illusive than a football.'
Maybe I'd do it better with my hand
than with my foot!
While most of the press was positive,
there remained one powerful skeptic.
Dick Young wanted to meet Pel,
one-on-one, at a baseball game.
They attended a Mets game
late in the season at Shea Stadium.
'No one knows
we're at the game.'
End of the first inning,
we get a cluster of people around us.
By the third inning, we were
absolutely besieged by people.
'We couldn't control the fans.
The umpire had to call play.'
'And the security couldn't control
the stadium any more.
'It was absolute pandemonium.'
Dick Young is almost crying.
Weeping openly.
His heart is breaking that
his baseball fans recognize Pel
'who he had come to take down.'
As a reporter, he had only one recourse
and that was to write the truth.
'This game was truly a spectators' sport
and truly global.'
By the bi-centennial year of 1976,
foreign football was encroaching
even further on the American pastime.
The Cosmos moved
into Yankee Stadium.
Pel, playing just half the season in '75,
had tripled their average attendance.
Pel brought instant credibility
to the NASL.
'Because of him,
other stars came over here.'
From Gordon Banks
to Rodney Marsh to Geoff Hurst.
Even George Best touched down
in Los Angeles.
Because every other franchise thought,
"Well, if the Cosmos can do it, we can."
'When I arrived, one question
the American journalists asked me was:'
"You've been described
as the white Pel."
'And I said, "That's not quite true.
Pel is the black Rodney Marsh."'
And that didn't seem to go down too well.
For Steve Ross, the world's
greatest player was not enough.
New York likes winners.
You could have God himself
as a striker for the Cosmos,
and if you lost, nobody cares.
'I scored, I think, in
So I was the man to put the ball
in the back of the net.
Giorgio Chinaglia was the leading
scorer of the Italian club Lazio in 1975.
I was the highest paid player in Italy
and that was pretty unhealthy.
When I first met him in Rome,
'I was in his car and he had a gun
in the glove compartment.'
I said, "What the hell am I doing here?"
He thrust himself upon us.
His time in Italy was running out.
It was the easiest signing of a name
player that anyone could ever have.
'My first wife was American,
like my second wife is American.'
Therefore I said, "Let's go to America."
He talks a lot, but half of it
is not worth listening to.
The other half I wouldn't listen to either.
Giorgio Chinaglia is Italian,
speaks English with a Welsh accent,
scored a lot of goals...
And those are the only positive things
I can think to say about him.
- A very disagreeable fellow at times.
- He was a back-stabbing individual.
They probably can't stand me.
I don't give a shit.
Why don't these people judge me
for what I did on the field?
That'd be a nice thing, wouldn't it?
Steve Ross brought in five new players
that year, three from overseas.
None more prolific
than Giorgio Chinaglia.
I was demanding on the field,
but at the end of the day
nobody else scored more goals
in the history of the NASL than myself.
'Giorgio was extremely passionate
about soccer,'
And I think he found a like-minded
individual in my father.
Pel was his prize catch,
but Giorgio became his confidante.
Giorgio and Steve Ross
had a very strange relationship.
I don't know what it was, but he did
have Steve Ross. He had his ear.
That's absolutely the truth.
Giorgio had won a soft spot
in the heart of Steve Ross.
'I remember Ross wearing
a pair of Cosmos sweatpants
'with the number nine on it,
Chinaglia's number.'
He was wearing Chinaglia's pants.
'That was sort of a metaphor
for their relationship.'
'Giorgio was
the opposite of Pel.'
He wore his emotions
on his sleeve.
'Dynamic, big, good looking, long hair.'
'An idol like a movie star in Italy.'
'Walking down the street with Giorgio'
was like walking down the street
with Joe DiMaggio or Mickey Mantle.
'Pel reached the whole world
and got New York's attention.'
'Giorgio put it over the top
because people wanted to come'
to boo him or cheer him or yell at him
or throw things at him.
That's the kind of passion
you expect in New York.
He scored 19 goals in 19 games,
while Pel led the league in assists.
Together they took the Cosmos kicking
and screaming into the playoffs.
Giorgio was a little jealous of Pel.
He wanted to be Pel.
'I just wanted to score goals.
I didn't care who played beside me.
'I never did.'
Sometimes I wasn't liked,
but I don't care about that either.
He's the only professional player
I've ever heard who'd criticize Pel.
Off the field,
he was a loveable person.
On the field,
we had some problems, yeah.
'There was a memorable episode
in the Cosmos' locker room'
when Chinaglia said
that he was disgusted
that Pel wasn't giving him the service
that he needed to score goals.
Pel, you can imagine, is not used
to team-mates criticizing him.
He fired right back and said,
"You shoot from no fucking angle."
And Chinaglia jumped off his stool
and shouted, "I am Chinaglia!
"If I shoot from someplace, it's because
Chinaglia can score from that place."
'And Pel was near tears.'
He shook his head
and walked out of the locker room.
'I didn't want him to do bad.
I wanted him do well.'
But he kept coming inside of me, and
I said, "One guy'll mark the two of us.
"So try to stay wide because you'll be
more effective and you'll score goals."
'All great goal scorers
have an ego.'
"Give me the ball.
Why are you giving it to Pel?"
He wants the ball. He wants to score.
'If you don't have egos in life, especially
in sports, you're not going to go very far.
The two huge personalities
did have one thing in common.
Giorgio had his locker room with his
blue velvet robe and his Chivas Regal,
pack of cigarettes, sunglasses,
he had it all.
The women went wild.
They just went wild.
I remember one night, there was Pel
with a blonde on each arm.
He looked at me, smiled and said,
"Not for the book, my friend."
He'd sit in the lobby doing the old
winky-winky,
like he was on the cruise.
Their shared passion for life may have
cost them a shot at the championship.
In the second round
of the 1976 playoffs,
the heavily favored Cosmos
faced the Tampa Bay Rowdies
and Rodney Marsh.
We knew about the Cosmos team
and the personnel,
'so we had a limo
that met them off the plane
'with two girls in the limo
and two bottles of Chivas Regal.'
And 24 hours later at the game,
they both came out onto the pitch
looking very much the worse for wear.
Tampa Bay won the match 3-1.
Steve Ross was not happy.
He didn't like to lose games.
No, he didn't like to lose in anything.
He didn't like to lose in board games.
A soccer game?
He hated to lose a soccer game.
And championship games?
You didn't want to lose one of those.
Immediately following the loss in '76,
Ross took his team
where it could be truly appreciated.
We went on tour playing all over Europe.
'France and then Belgium
and Switzerland and Italy.'
They went on two exhibition tours
in the span of seven months.
We became like the ambassadors
of good will.
Steve Ross wanted them
to be treated like great stars.
'We traveled first class,
five-star hotels, unlimited budgets.'
No such thing as per diem.
They were spending
shareholders' money!
The publicity that we generated
for Warner was enormous.
Publicity that they couldn't buy.
One little stockholder said to us
at the annual meeting,
"What does this cost?
Do you lose money?"
He says, "Well, we lose some."
"How much do you lose?"
He looked at her straight in the eye
and said, "Two cents a share."
And the whole audience applauded.
What a wonderful venture this is!
Not recognizing that
two cents a share was $5mn!
In 10 years,
American soccer had developed
into a different game
than world football.
The league had tailored the rules
for American fans.
'There had to be a winner.
If it ended 2-2, it went into a mini-game.'
'If it stayed at 2-2 or even became 3-3,'
it had to go to what was called
a NASL shoot-out,
'going one-on-one with the goal keeper
from 35 yards out,
'and having five seconds
to get your shot off.'
- And I loved it.
- I thought it was fantastic.
It makes the game more emotional.
I still think in Europe they should try it.
In the spring of '77, Steve Ross
was at last able to move the Cosmos
across the Hudson River
to Giants Stadium
for Pel's final season.
While the League had
Americanized the game,
Steve Ross wanted to take it
a step further.
He asked me to prepare a plan
which included
the Cosmos cheerleaders.
The half-time show.
Bugs Bunny, who I was able to get
from Jungle Habitat.
Americanizing the game.
'Americans like putting
their own twist to things.'
That's what they were trying to do-
to have more of the American fans
come in and embrace it.
At the same time, he continued
internationalizing his team,
surrounding Pel and Chinaglia
with 14 new players
from seven different countries.
We were the first team to have
a totally international squad.
'It was like Noah's Ark.'
There was something to please
everybody.
Nevertheless, they lost three
of their first five games,
averaging little more than 20,000 fans
in their new giant home.
Here we're putting up a lot of money
on the field and we're not drawing.
So he wanted to make a change.
Raise the bar.
They sent me to Germany.
They sent me to sign
Franz Beckenbauer.
Turned back by Geoff Hurst in England
in the classic World Cup final of 1966,
the Kaiser would lead his country
to glory eight years later.
He was the ultimate team leader-
the one that organized in the back,
who is just so calm and collected
on the ball.
'You never got the sense that he was
in any sort of state of panic,
'regardless of whether he was up
by four goals or down by four goals.'
Twice voted European
player of the year,
Franz Beckenbauer was lured
to America at the height of his career.
I knew Pel and Giorgio Chinaglia
were there,
but the rest I didn't know
so it was an adventure.
'Giorgio was berserk, "Why
do we need to hire Beckenbauer?"'
"Why do we need Beckenbauer here?
We don't need him at all!"
'Now he was the third banana.'
Beckenbauer's first game was
a 4-2 loss to arch rival, Tampa Bay.
The following week, they beat Toronto
at home in front of 31,000 fans.
Steve Ross wanted more.
Steve was what you would call
a star-fucker.
Every time, somebody was in New York
shooting a film or doing an album,
they got dragged to a Cosmos game.
'Warners owned a movie
company and six record companies.'
- You can get celebrities. That's easy.
- Actors, actresses, politicians.
You name it, we had them all
at the stadium.
I don't know who they were.
The locker room was littered with people.
- It was becoming a joke.
- Henry Kissinger never missed a game.
I have a passion
for what we call soccer.
I remember once Gordon Bradley looked
over in the corner and saw this guy
with longish hair,
skinny as a rail,
looked like he was on drugs.
He told our security guy,
"Get that guy out of here."
"Who is this guy?" Everybody came
to him and said, "Mick Jagger."
But he didn't recognize him
because he looked so terrible.
Jagger and Kissinger were
welcomed on a weekly basis,
while the first two men on the Cosmos
team were quietly shown the door.
I came in May '77. After three weeks,
Clive Toye, the president, resigned.
'Gordon Bradley, the coach, was fired.'
I said to myself,
"Oh, my God, where am I?"
Just weeks before he was fired,
Bradley had dropped Chinaglia
from the first team.
They didn't like me, so the only way
to get rid of this guy's to drop him.
But they have little minds.
They thought I'd ask for a transfer.
Some people push the buttons.
On Giorgio's recommendation,
Ross hired coach Eddie Firmani
away from Tampa Bay.
He brought in Eddie Firmani to coach
the team knowing he'd do his bidding.
Just put the balls in front of Giorgio.
Giorgio wants the ball in front not behind.
'He flowered under Eddie
and scored many goals.'
Knock all those beautiful balls
just in front of him.
- They'll go straight in the goal.
- I try.
It is unquestionable that
Giorgio Chinaglia had a malign influence
'over Steve Ross,
and therefore over the Cosmos.'
No question about it.
And I say "malign" advisedly.
I can think of stronger words but maybe
women and children are watching.
What they don't understand,
if you do your job good
I'm going to give you a lot of credit.
I have my credit on the field.
Why do I need anything else?
My goal was to have
the world's best team,
and it was good for the company,
that was my goal, nothing else.
The lunatics took over the asylum.
He was always pleasant to me.
You know, he's a suck-up guy.
'When Pel scored,
he never looked at us,
'when Bobby Smith scored,
he never looked at us,'
'but every time
that Giorgio scored a goal,'
he would run back in front of Steve
and bow down and suck up to Steve.
By the last week of June 1977,
Chinaglia had eight goals
and the team had ten wins.
They avenged two straight losses
to the Rowdies in front of 62,000 fans.
'Pel scored a hat trick.'
'When I look at games I played
in America,'
that would definitely be
the top of the heap.
Then they dropped five
of their next seven games.
Steve Ross said, "Now we have Pel,
we have Beckenbauer and Chinaglia.
"But the rest, you need more."
I went back to Sao Paolo.
In my opinion,
the most important signing
from a team point of view
was Carlos Alberto.
As captain of the Brazilian
national team,
he had helped Pel win
his third World Cup title in 1970.
With only four games remaining
in the '77 season,
Carlos Alberto came to America
to help his old team-mate win
one last championship.
'It was unforgettable.'
The day I arrived in New York
was the day of the blackout.
'At 9:34 last night,
it all went black.'
'... a wild outburst of crime.'
'... a night of no lights, elevators,
subway trains, airports,
'air-conditioning,
traffic signals, television.'
'... looting, mugging
and a thousand false fire alarms.'
In the darkness, July 13th,
it seemed as if the world
was turning upside down.
'We had the criminal
Son of Sam, a serial murderer.
'Riots in the blackout.'
The major problem was the bankruptcy
of the City of New York.
'It was really quite a year.'
When the power returned, the lights
came up on soccer in America.
'Soccer is fast becoming as popular here
as it's been in the rest of the world.'
It was like an explosion.
'It was a whirlwind.
It was like a meteor taking off.'
One day we were nobody, and the next
day we're playing at Giants Stadium
and limos picking us up
to take us to Studio 54 after the game.
'A big table there
was reserved for the Cosmos.'
Not only for the players,
also for the bosses.
'The doorman looked me up and down
and gave me a hard time,'
until I uttered the four magic words:
"I'm with the Cosmos."
'I remember people
making out there in full view of you.'
Celebrities walking in and out.
Every Monday night,
they had a party at Studio 54.
This was a part of the development
of football also in the United States.
Soccer in the United States.
Everybody was invited to the party.
'I was the first one
on the field every game and you felt it.'
You walked out there and
all of a sudden, one by one,
these giants of soccer, international stars,
bigger-than-life players
'were coming out of this tunnel
like gladiators coming out to do battle.'
August 14th, four days after police
arrested David Berkowitz,
the self-proclaimed Son of Sam,
the Cosmos sold out one of the biggest
football stadiums in the world.
It was a playoff against Fort Lauderdale.
The first time in history sold out.
Giants Stadium was sold out
with 77,000 and something else.
Soccer is a game that
everybody is involved with.
It takes stamina, speed, strength.
...something going on all the time.
It'll be right up there with baseball
as the national pastime.
Soccer is not only here to stay,
but will be perhaps the ultimate,
the biggest big league of all.
It was just unexpected,
unbelievable glory.
Basking in the glory
high above the masses
sat the king of American soccer,
Steve Ross.
He would sit on the second level
of Giants Stadium,
which is fairly high up because
he thought he'd see the action better,
'he'd see the whole field
and what was going on.'
We had to put chains on him because
from the mezzanine at Giants Stadium
he was always arguing with the referee
and everybody was afraid he'd fall down.
A remarkable sell-out crowd of 76,000
last night at Giants Stadium.
The Cosmos, the new darlings in town,
beat Rochester 4-1
'to make their way to the final,
the Soccer Bowl in Portland,
'which will be seen here on Channel 4
on Sunday starting at 4:00.'
Ross watched his one-time
rag-tag team become champions.
'What I remember most
about the championship game in 1977
'was how excited the players were.'
They wanted to win
a championship for Pel.
We all felt responsible.
It was Pel's last game, competitive.
'We wanted to do it for him.'
We'd like Pel to leave the way
he deserves: as a champion.
That was not marketing.
That was not PR.
That was genuine
and it was very touching.
'It just fell into place
on the day for me.'
I scored one of the most memorable goals
in Soccer Bowl history.
But the game winner
in the 81st minute
belonged to Pel's locker room rival,
Chinaglia.
We had a good year. He left on a
winning note - he won the championship.
I think today was one of my best games.
Win the World Cup, but there were
eleven Germans on the field.
You win the European Cup, there were
nine Germans and two foreigners.
With the New York Cosmos,
we had 14 different nations.
So it was like a family. It was fantastic!
It was really an experience
I will never forget.
'This was an incredibly fun
few years in my father's life.
'It was a big joy for him.
'And in Jay's life and Pel's life and
Giorgio's life. They were having a blast.'
And Warner Communications was
in its prime. My father was in his prime.
'It was huge amounts of fun.
There was nothing that wasn't fun.'
Pel left the league with a parting gift,
hope for the future.
As he stepped aside,
ABC Sports began negotiating
to broadcast NASL regular season
games on network television.
'Steve believed that
television was the key'
to the Cosmos' or soccer's success.
No professional sport in the US
makes it without a television contract.
'We're at Giants Stadium
in East Rutherford, New Jersey.'
By 1978, the Cosmos were giving
network executives
every reason to believe that
American soccer had a lucrative future.
'Already it's been filled
to its capacity of 77,000
'several times for another sport,
for soccer.'
'Every game was like a party.'
Even in Brazil we don't play
every game with the stadium full.
People would be arriving
three or four hours before kick-off
'with their tailgates open at the back,
barbecues going, flags waving.'
Great atmosphere outside the ground
long before we started the game.
Steve Ross signed a new slate of
international stars for the '78 season.
They won their first seven games
and 15 out of 17.
The team got more and more stabilized.
The team got better and better.
But the competition had also
been diluted due to expansion.
In '78, the NASL added six more teams
for a league high of 24.
All of them chasing
Steve Ross and the Cosmos.
It was a negative impact. People
owned teams that couldn't afford it.
'Players that should not have
been playing a professional sport'
'were playing professional soccer.'
And the quality itself wasn't what it was.
We had no business
being in San Antonio, Texas,
Jacksonville, Florida,
Memphis, Tennessee, Las Vegas,
'Hawaii, Calgary, Edmonton.'
All became stops on the Cosmos'
traveling circus.
It was like traveling with
the Rolling Stones. I mean, it was big.
The whole thing was lightning in a bottle.
It was a huge, huge aphrodisiac.
'It wasn't even behind closed doors.
'On the flight out to the Cosmos'
championship game in 1977,'
there were two sex acts
performed right on the plane,
headed for the championship game.
I was 27 years old and my editor said,
"Would you like to cover the Yankees?"
The most coveted beat in this country.
I said, "No, thank you.
I'll stick here with the Cosmos.
"I'm having too good a time.
Just too good a time."
The Cosmos' entourage included
a huge press contingent,
translators for more than a dozen
languages, even personal assistants.
All on the road
at Warner Communications' expense.
Giorgio's philosophy of life is that
he needs people to do things for him.
He doesn't have to do anything for them.
He's allowing them to be with him.
So Giorgio befriended Peppe.
'I wanted success.
I wanted to be there, on top.'
I wanted to succeed, and most of all
I wanted him to succeed.
'I felt that his success was my success.'
He became like the rug of Chinaglia.
Chinaglia stepped on him all day.
"Peppe, get me a pack of cigarettes!
Peppe, get me a lighter!"
That was Peppe Pinton.
'We were in the hotel
and heard some noise at 4:00 A.M..'
And it's Peppe carrying a television set
wearing a woman's pink nightgown.
So after we stopped laughing, we said,
"Peppe, what are you doing, man?"
And Peppe starts cursing. He goes,
"I'm busy. I'm in my room having a party.
"Giorgio called me,
the reception was no good on his TV.
- "He wanted me to bring his TV up."
- I wanted to watch television.
I had a bad one. He got to give me
his TV! What's the big deal?
The '78 Cosmos rolled into the playoffs
with a record of 24 wins and 6 losses.
They shattered league records for
points, goals and average attendance.
And in the first game of a two-game
playoff series against Minnesota,
they were stunned, 9-2.
'When we came back
to New York, Firmani our coach said,
"'After lunch just wait. Steve Ross
is coming to say a few words."'
He said, "I was on the West Coast
when we played Minnesota
"with 750 of our delegates,
"'and they didn't want to talk
about our latest project.
"'All they wanted to talk about
was that the Cosmos had lost 9-2."'
He said, "I felt a little bit embarrassed.
And I don't like to feel embarrassed."
And then he went on to say virtually,
"We are the best.
"We pay the best for the best.
We want the best performances.
"'If you don't want to be a part of that,
see the coach and you can go now."'
It was a fantastic motivational speech.
The 4-0 victory tied the series and
forced a sudden death mini-game.
'The Cosmos have
but one last chance.
'Five seconds and 35 yards separate
the Cosmos from elimination.
'The shooter, number 5, Carlos Alberto,
'has never before participated
in a shoot-out.'
'It was so tense.
Talk about excitement and build-up.'
That matched anything I've been
involved with in the whole of my career.
'If he misses, the season's over.
'Lettieri out. Shot! Goal!
'The Cosmos have won it!
An incredible comeback!
'The Cosmos are going to Portland!"
The win would carry the Cosmos to
a second straight NASL championship.
And the league to the Promised Land.
'ABC Sports presents...
'the North American Soccer League.'
We put a tremendous effort
behind the NASL package in 1979.
We had top-flight production.
We had tremendous promotion.
'And we assigned Jim McKay.'
'I'm Jim McKay and this is a moment
that I will remember
'because we're about to do something
we've done many times at ABC Sports.
'We're going to begin something
brand new to us.'
We wanted to give it our best shot
and I think we put everything behind it.
'I was the television expert.
'I had a very different view
of our television potential.'
Rather, I wanted us on anthology shows
like the "Wide World of Sports",
with standings, players, saves, goals,
player of the week,
to build all the extrinsics of the sport
and only put the championship game
on television.
- 'That was a marvelous half of soccer.'
- 'Beautiful half indeed. Wonderful play.'
'And I said
we will go on television and fail.'
Then they will blame soccer.
I got out-voted.
The Cosmos would be the cornerstone
of ABC's coverage.
With the team's success under
Chinaglia's handpicked coach Firmani
and without the guidance of Clive Toye,
the Cosmos' brash leading scorer
began calling the shots.
'When Giorgio said, "I can put
together this team better than you,"'
everybody said OK, because
they didn't know what to do.
'Giorgio ran a shadow
government on the Cosmos.'
He was the man behind the curtain.
In 1979, the team matched
its own league record
of 24 wins and 6 losses.
They'd again be pushed
to the brink of elimination
in the conference finals,
this time by upstart Vancouver.
Like the year before, it would come
down to a beat-the-clock shoot-out.
'The Cosmos have
one final chance to tie the shoot-out.
'Morais' shot... is in! It's in!
'But it's too late. The goal does not
count. The five seconds is up.
'The Cosmos' reign is over!'
Time ran out for the Cosmos.
Little did they know the clock was
also ticking down on the league.
After just one year,
ABC had seen enough.
'We did everything possible
to make it work.'
And unfortunately
we had a 2.7 rating in 1979,
'and roughly that was about on average
Television was handled
very poorly by ABC
and certainly by the league itself.
Nobody wanted to watch it on TV.
Absolutely nobody.
'I remember a very important game,'
nationally televised
at 12:00 in the middle of July,
and they wondered
why the ratings weren't there.
Unnecessary to say it failed.
Soccer failed. It didn't have to.
League attendance
would peak in 1980.
New York would win its third title
in four years.
But without a network television deal,
the dream of soccer as a national sport
was all but gone.
'1980 came and Chinaglia
started to mingle with things.'
And I didn't want to put up with it.
'I resigned.'
Ultimately Giorgio became the president
of the New York Cosmos.
He wasn't loyal to us.
He wasn't loyal to the game.
'He was loyal to himself.'
Just because you are a carpenter
doesn't mean that you are an architect.
Giorgio was almost single-handedly
responsible for the death of the Cosmos.
He didn't run it to the ground. It was
running to the ground before that.
I heard that Giorgio started to pay
high salaries to his friends.
And I heard that he ran the losses
of the team in the millions of dollars.
High millions.
What are you talking about, millions?
No, I don't think so.
'You don't believe that
Giorgio Chinaglia ran the Cosmos?'
I can tell you, when I was there
from 1970 to '81,
Giorgio Chinaglia didn't run anything.
That's why we got rid of him, too.
Maybe he fired me and I didn't even
know it. Wait a minute, maybe...
Does everybody substantiate all
of these nonsensical quotes of his?
He didn't like the Cosmos. I know that
because... it's a very simple reason.
Because Steve loved the Cosmos
and he became involved.
He thought that was distracting Steve
from other major issues of the company.
Now this is going to shock you
and maybe the audience.
I was probably closer to Steve
than maybe even Giorgio.
I'm not sure about Peppe.
Was that his name? Pinton?
But maybe even Peppe Pinton.
Peppe Pinton would become
vice president.
The Cosmos won their fifth
Soccer Bowl in 1982
as the league began to collapse.
Every time you would walk
into the NASL headquarters,
this guy would be there with his head
in his hand and saying,
"Does somebody want to buy Seattle?
Does somebody want to buy LA?"
'The Cosmos were the best
thing that happened to the league.'
But in another sense
they were the worst thing,
because they scared other owners
with soaring costs of operating.
'They just wanted to win things.'
There's nothing wrong with that, but
the aftermath was complete devastation.
Cosmos. Good afternoon.
But the Cosmos bloated budget
was only part of the equation.
'Now it's Pacman's turn
to get eaten up.'
Atari, once the fastest-growing
business in American history,
came crashing down
under Warner Communications,
nearly crippling Ross' empire.
'For investors
in Warner, zonk!
'A one-day paper loss of around $1 bn.'
'Steve Ross had doled out
millions to make his dream team.'
But in the end he was left with a tsunami
of red ink that he couldn't ignore,
'especially when other parts of Warner
were hemorrhaging.'
When hard times hit,
you have to start cutting fat.
Steve Ross would seize one final
unexpected opportunity
to give soccer a permanent foothold
in America.
'The World Cup for 1986
had been awarded to Colombia.'
And in 1982, the word was out
that Colombia was going to withdraw
and that other countries would have
an opportunity to stage it.
Steve Ross, unbelievable...
He was like a kid.
'He was very excited to bring
the World Cup to the United States.'
They made a plan.
He would call on all his soccer
connections to win the bid.
'Steve Ross was working
everywhere on our behalf.
'He was a fanatic.'
And when we actually went over there,
Steve came to make the presentation.
In May 1983,
FIFA, global football's governing body,
awarded the '86 World Cup to Mexico.
Why they give again to Mexico,
not to the United States?
And I say, all the time, FIFA killed
the best market in the world at that time.
And then Steve Ross, I remember it
like today, he said, "Finished."
In 1984, the team was dissolved.
The league disbanded within months.
'It started out as a circus,
became a three-ring circus.'
Became a ten-ring circus,
then the tent collapsed.
'In effect, mainstream
professional soccer here is dead.'
At the end, everybody sort of jumped
overboard for one reason or another.
The league folded.
We sold some players, some retired,
some did not play any more.
'So I was left pretty much
to run the ship all by myself.
'And I went down with the ship.'
Because I went down with the ship,
I'm still there, underwater with the ship.
Really. What ship? Is there a ship now
that's sailing on the Cosmos' name?
- The Cosmos ship? What is that?
- Peppe Pinton was never a big player.
He may have been
a big player in the pizza parlor,
but he was never a big player
with the Cosmos, trust me.
He took the name,
because he worked for the Cosmos.
He worked for Warners which was good.
He deserved it. He wanted it.
God bless him, take it.
Have you seen the Cosmos play lately?
No, neither have I.
So Peppe owns...
What we're saying is, let's be very clear:
Peppe owns the Cosmos.
The Cosmos are nothing today.
So Peppe owns nothing.
'Him, like many others,
thought they were the Cosmos.'
The Cosmos belong to everyone,
the players, the executives,
the managers, you know, the fans.
'That's what made this whole thing
so beautiful.'
'The legacy of the Cosmos
would be that they laid the seeds'
for every player
that plays in this country today.
'There's a wonderful photograph
I came across.'
When Franz arrived at JFK, we called up
a local youth soccer club and said,
"Can get a bunch of kids with a banner
to welcome Franz to New York?"
'Many years later
I looked at the photograph again
'and realized that the kid in the center
looking up at Franz Beckenbauer'
was in fact Mike Windischmann,
who captained the US team
at the '90 World Cup in Italy.
That US team was the first
to qualify for the World Cup finals
since Joe Gaetjens shocked England
and the world in 1950.
'I mean, there was that clear
transference of excitement'
from the Pel time
to the young players that came after.
'You look at global football now,'
and the Cosmos were 20 years
ahead of their time.
A team like the Cosmos today, with their
talent, would be worth a billion dollars.
'Talk about Real Madrid and Man United.
In those days, the Cosmos were it.'
If you continue to talk about that,
maybe I cry here.
Because so beautiful memories
from that time.
The Cosmos team was something
that no one had ever seen before.
People cried when they went through
the turnstile to see the Cosmos.
'And even the American people.'
'If it wasn't for the Cosmos,
if it wasn't for the devotion'
of Steve Ross
and Ahmet and Nesuhi Ertegun,
I really don't think soccer
would be where it's at today.
The World Cup Finals finally came
to the US in Giants Stadium in 1994.
But Steve Ross didn't live
long enough to see it.
'It was ambitious
to bring in the world's best players
'and to make the game more attractive
and to recognize the game.'
When I came in '77 and you take
your car and drive to the countryside,
'to Long Island or to New Jersey,
no one played the game.'
'Now if you drive there, you see
the goal posts of football fields.'
I think that says a name,
and that's the Cosmos.
This was the cheer they used to make.
Cosmos.
Cosmos.