If you want to talk about the origin of soccer in Southern California, you really need to start with the Greater LA Soccer League.

♪ Ivan Fernandez: Soccer in SoCal didn't start in a stadium.

It started in neighborhood parks, immigrant communities, and in leagues that most people have never heard of.

I'm Ivan Fernandez, aka Afroxander, and I'm exploring how everyday players built one of the most powerful soccer cultures in the whole world.

Let's go!

♪ [Shrieks] Too hard!

♪ Announcer: This program was made possible in part by: a grant from Anne Ray Foundation, a Margaret A. Cargill philanthropy.

Ivan: Haters will deny this, but kids and pros playing soccer today in the USA is as common as them playing baseball or Fortnite.

We caught up with some of the kids playing soccer today to ask them a few questions, like, "Are you ready for the World Cup to come to LA?"

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm excited to see who wins.

My parents are from Mexico and Peru, so I'm going for both of them.

I'm so excited, and I really want to go, but no.

[Laughs] Part of the magic of the World Cup is its cyclable nature.

Nearly 200 teams representing as many nations have the same opportunity to compete for a chance for the final glory of lifting the trophy at the end of the tournament.

Each national team has four years to build, change, adapt, and plan for the World Cup.

Players and coaches who begin the road to the World Cup don't always reach a tournament.

And all but the host nation must show that they are worthy through a regional tournament to prove that they are the best of their region first to represent themselves and their people.

The first time the US men's team qualified for the World Cup was in 1930, just one of 16 teams.

But after the 1950 tournament, they would continually be eliminated for almost 40 years.

It wasn't until 1989 when Paul Caligiuri scored the 35-foot "shot heard round the world" in a qualifying match against Trinidad and Tobago that brought the U.S.

Men's National Team back to the World Cup.

Announcer: ...to Caligiuri, beats the first man.

A left-footed shot!

Paul Caligiuri has scored a goal, and the USA lead 1-0!

An amazing goal by Caligiuri, who made a great move to get by... Paul: I think this is the jersey that I actually wore to score the goal.

I only wore this number one time in history.

This is the "shot heard round the world" jersey.

How I got this, I don't know.

We established ourselves.

We play in the '90 World Cup.

Then we host the '94 World Cup.

How's that possible?

This is an unbelievable moment.

And to think of where we're at, you know, we're playing for something bigger.

We're trying to put soccer etched, engraved forever into American society.

Cobi Jones: To play for the '94 team, I mean, that was a dream come true, you know, because you get to a point where you know you have a shot, you know, to play in a World Cup, and then, you know, let alone for it to be in your home country.

You know, that was a dream.

And to be here in Los Angeles, as well, my home city, that was, like, the ultimate goal.

♪ Ivan: Soccer in LA is as popular as tacos and Dodger flags, and the region's importance in the growth of soccer is undeniable.

What do you know about the history of soccer in LA?

It's growing.

It started, like, a little late, probably, but it's growing a lot now.

Have you ever heard of the Greater Los Angeles Soccer League?

Uh... Oh, wow.

[Both laugh] Ivan: Yeah.

Yeah.

No, not really.

While variations of soccer-like kicking games existed in the U.S.

as early as the 17th century, what we now know and play as soccer made its way from Europe in the mid to late 19th century, when immigrants from across Europe arrived in the U.S.

from ports in the Northeast, such as Ellis Island, and in the Southeast, via New Orleans, Louisiana.

In Los Angeles, immigrants from England and Scotland arrived in the late 19th and early 20th centuries to work at the port.

It was arguably these immigrants who began to play informal games of soccer here in Los Angeles, while the number of amateur teams and leagues also sprang up across the country during this time.

It's a little bit difficult to pinpoint a neat start date.

You see various efforts to build some type of structure, some type of consistency in 1903, 1904.

I would date it probably to around 1907, 1908.

That seems to be the era where we start to see a real drift toward bureaucratization, regular scheduling, consistent teams.

You start to see standings in local newspapers.

The earliest name that I was able to pinpoint was the Southern California Association Football League.

And then, at some point thereafter, it became the Southern Californian Soccer League.

And then it eventually became the Greater Los Angeles Soccer League.

So, early on, you had a lot of immigrants from Britain and Ireland playing the game, and they moved west to Los Angeles for various reasons.

And so, you had early teams like the Thistles, the Victorias, and funnily enough, there was a Los Angeles Association football club that would actually play at Agricultural Park.

The first 60 years of the Greater LA Soccer League's era was home to immigrants who built teams for the diaspora communities from where they hailed from, teams such as the San Pedro Croats, Maccabee Los Angeles, Homenetmen Armenians, the Hungarian Athletic Club, Los Angeles Soccer Club, many others.

I do think that there was a sense of wanting to stay connected to one's roots, even though one had immigrated to a new country.

And so, a lot of the players who would play soccer would also engage in other pastimes that were connected to their homelands.

So, they weren't just soccer players, they were also cricket players and rugby players, and they were embedded in fraternal organizations.

They were embracing a new country and a new life.

In 1961, a team featuring the league's all-stars faced the 1961 Real Madrid at the Expo Coliseum.

When Andy Fuzesi was young, he watched his father coach the LA Hungarians, which allowed him and his family to maintain their Hungarian roots while also assimilating into life here in the U.S.

Andy's father was selected to coach the Greater LA Soccer League All-Star team to face Real Madrid.

The Spanish powerhouse arrived with its star-studded lineup of players like Alfredo Di Stefano and Ferenc Puskas.

You're quite the journeyman in the Greater LA Soccer League, is that right?

It goes back to, like, 10, 12 years old, yeah.

What do you recall from seeing your dad play and coach during those years?

It was wonderful times, because, you know, I was there when they practiced on the weekdays.

I was there Sundays, I was here watching them, you know, so... This field right here.

This field right here.

Ivan: Oh, wow.

This field right here.

Absolutely.

Brings back memories.

Ivan: Yeah.

So, it was a wonderful time.

The Greater LA League was-- it was serious competition.

Some of the players were paid.

Now, they weren't making a living at it... [Man yells, blows whistle] But they were paid on the side.

But these were serious players, serious amateur players.

How many teams did your dad coach after playing?

He coached the Hungarians.

He also coached the LA Soccer Club... Ivan: Oh, wow.

And then, a year or two, he also coached the Maccabees, so it was three different teams.

He would also do international games they would sponsor, and they would put together an all-star team, and he was the coach for it, and then he would gather players from the Greater LA league to play, you know-- The most famous one or infamous one was against Real Madrid in 1961.

Yeah.

Yeah, I recall that one.

I mean, just, I remember-- I believe you sent us the photos of, even, like, I think the LA "Times," like, "Los Angeles" magazine covered the game.

And I thought, wait, Di Stefano was in LA?

If you look at the lineup, it was incredible.

It was their full team.

Yeah, and Di Stefano, Puskas, all these guys, I'm like, "Oh, they were at the LA Coliseum," which, again, just more layers of history.

It was part of a tour that they were doing, and LA is one of the stops.

Ivan: Mm-hmm.

LA was the only time they actually played an all-star of local players.

Okay.

I mean, did you know, sitting there watching LA United versus Real Madrid, that this is, like, history in the making?

Or was it just like, "Oh, cool, a team from Spain"?

Well, you know, I certainly knew because my father knew some of the-- like Puskas, she knew him from Hungary.

Ivan: Oh, wow.

So, I knew the background of the team and the players, and that sort of thing from my dad.

I don't think I understood the full gravity of it as a 10-year-old, but I knew this was a big team and big players, and that sort of thing.

Yeah.

What are some of your fond memories of playing, you know, with all these teams in the Greater LA Soccer League?

You know, I think my greatest overall memory is just the intensity and the seriousness and the comradery of all the different teams and the ethnic groups that are playing here, you know?

A couple times, they got into a couple of fights.

Soccer is not known to have fights.

[Laughs] Particularly, like, when the San Pedro Croats played the Yugoslavs together, you know, so it was a lot of intensity in the league.

Oh, wow, so there were a lot of the old nationalist tensions.

Oh, absolutely.

Absolutely.

Because I think they were-- each of the team was sort of representing their country and their culture and the way they play.

So, it was sort of a mini World Cup, all the different countries.

People were playing against each other.

But they weren't exclusively, so that players would play for other teams, not necessarily-- if they were Croatian, they didn't necessarily just play for a Croatian team.

They could play for someone else, you know.

People were moving around.

They were competitive.

Ivan: The 1960s and 1970s were the league's peak.

Global migratory patterns also changed during this time, and the league's diasporic teams began signing and fielding U.S.-born and immigrant players from other countries.

Immigrants from Latin America joined the Greater LA Soccer League teams before eventually creating their own teams.

♪ Have you ever heard of the Greater LA Soccer League?

No.

Greater Los Angeles Soccer League?

Yeah.

No, I haven't.

No, I don't know.

How much do you know about the history of soccer in LA?

Not much.

Not much at all.

Ivan: Okay.

One individual who was part of the early days of soccer here in LA is Hugo Salcedo.

Originally from Mexico, he eventually played for the U.S.

soccer team in the 1972 Olympic Games.

And he's worked in a number of executive positions within the U.S.

Soccer Federation, and with FIFA three decades.

♪ Out here at Daniels Field with the living legend himself, Mr.

Hugo Salcedo.

[Laughs] Okay, I like that.

That the right amount of praise?

I like that.

I noticed when you walked in that this goal right here started trembling in fear of you when it saw you.

Hugo Salcedo: [Laughs] I scored a couple here.

I scored a couple here.

Ivan: How many goals was that, do you think?

You know, I was a midfielder, so I only scored three or four, you know, a couple of penalty kicks, basically.

Ivan: Hmm.

I was pretty-- pretty good touch with the ball.

And that was with-- which team was that?

It was San Pedro Croats.

Oh.

Yes, it was one of the top teams at that time.

And it was very amazing the way that, you know, they brought players together from different nationalities.

Well, let's go back.

What brought you to play for the San Pedro Croats of the Greater LA Soccer League?

You know, I was thinking about it as to really how I came to play with them, because I basically started my career in the California Soccer League, which was based in East Los Angeles.

And I remember that, once a year, the All-Star team from the California League used to play against the All-Star team from the Greater Los Angeles League.

And I believe, you know, that's my only memory that I have about someone seeing me play for my money, and I-- they asked me to come, and I was still in college.

Ivan: Okay.

Hugo: You know, and they offered me $15 a game.

So, I said, you know-- $15 for a student, it was a lot of money.

So, I came to San Pedro to play.

Ivan: Okay, okay.

You said the California League.

That was in East... Hugo: East LA, East LA.

Are you from East LA, or...?

I'm very proud to say that I was born in Mexico, and I came to the United States-- actually, I came to Los Angeles at age 14.

Ivan: Oh, okay.

Okay?

There were no youth leagues, so I had to play with the adults at that time.

So, I was the youngest player in the whole league.

We came here in December 1960, and I started playing in '61, and I played with San Pedro in '67.

And I only played one year here, because I had to go back to college, and so on.

And it was very difficult for me to come every week to play over here, yeah.

Ivan: Taking a look at this field, what are some of the first memories you have that just come up when you look around you?

Hugo: You know, it is amazing, the good memories of the friendship, you know, within our team.

And, basically, the rivalry against the opponents.

It was literally a war every time we played anybody else.

And at that time, it was mostly the Italians, the Germans, and the Croatians, the Yugoslavs, you know.

It was basically teams with those names.

So, when you played against them, you thought that you were playing really more than a game.

I played here basically 60 years ago on this field, okay?

Ivan: Wow.

And I still remember, and I still have a few friends around, you know?

So, that's what soccer does for you, friendship for our life.

Coming to San Pedro Croats, it was a great experience.

They taught me more of the game.

You know, they helped me to grow up, because I wanted to-- if I was not going to make it as a professional player, I wanted to go to the Olympics.

Ivan: Mmm!

Hugo: So I wanted to go back to Mexico to play for the Olympics in 1968.

Did not happen.

Thanks to this experience that I had in playing against top professional players in this league, I keep going, and I try now for a 1972 U.S.

Olympic team.

I was so, so blessed that I made the Olympic team.

So, I played for the U.S.

Olympic team in 1972 in Munich.

♪ If I threw out the name Greater Los Angeles Soccer League, does that sound familiar?

No.

No.

A little bit, yeah.

Ivan: Really?

Yeah, yeah.

I'm trying to learn as much as I can.

Ivan: Oh, very cool.

Back in the day, yeah.

Ah, well, you're going to learn a lot when you watch this documentary.

Yeah.

It's easy to deride amateur or semi-professional league as nothing special.

However, even a small league, such as the Greater LA Soccer League, can have a huge impact in local soccer that can make waves on the national stage.

Teams from the Greater LA Soccer League made historic runs in the U.S.

Open Cup, a national tournament that features teams from every level of the U.S.

soccer pyramid since its founding in 1913.

It's the perfect setting for an underdog story with amateur and semi-professional teams taking on the big professional teams from the major leagues.

After the league-- the Greater LA Soccer League was actually founded as its own independent league-- split off from the San Francisco chapter, which was part of the California Football Association, that was 1951.

Up until that point, no team from west of the Mississippi River had ever won the U.S.

Open Cup, which was the big amateur semi-pro championship.

The first team to even play in that championship game from west of the Mississippi was a team called the LA Danes, and they played and lost in the final in 1955.

But by then, the Greater LA Soccer League had begun to enter a new stage.

There was a guy by the name of Albert Ebert, and he came and founded a German-American team in Los Angeles, and he started to bring players from around the country, German-American players, primarily players who had been born and learned to play in Germany.

He began bringing them to Los Angeles to play for his team.

That team was called the LA Kickers, and that became the very first super club in Los Angeles soccer history.

The next super team was a team called Maccabee of Los Angeles, and this was a team that was made up largely of Jewish immigrants.

Some of them had played professionally in Israel.

And they won the U.S.

Open Cup five times during an 11-year span.

The U.S.

Open Cup is the oldest, most traditional soccer tournament in the United States, and it's open to all clubs-- professionals, amateurs, semi-pro teams.

So, it-- especially in the time before MLS, it was a pretty big deal.

So, this is Maccabee, the 1977 Maccabee team.

They were the U.S.

Open Cup champions.

They were one of the best teams, obviously in the greater LA Soccer League's history, also one of the best teams in the country at the time.

They won their five during an 11-year period.

Ivan: Benny Binshtock remembers those days.

He joined Maccabee Los Angeles in the 1970s as a striker and was an important and instrumental part of the team that dominated the Greater LA Soccer League and the U.S.

Open Cup.

Benny helped the team win four of its five U.S.

Open Cup titles, a record shared by only one other team-- Bethlehem Steel Football Club of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

I'm sitting here at Daniels Field in San Pedro with Mr.

Benny Binshtock, the living legend of the Maccabees.

I'm so grateful to have you here with us.

Thank you very much.

It's my pleasure.

Ivan: Yes, yes.

Tell me one-- well, I'm sure you have a lot of good memories from Daniels Field, but what's the first one that comes to mind for you here?

We had a game against the Montebello Armenians, and it was a very tough game, and I scored a very pivotal goal that advanced us to the U.S.

semi-final, because we needed to win the Southern California first.

All the games we played against those, the teams, you know, the more ethnic teams, as you know.

And, you know, the Armenians, the United Armenians, the Gauchos, they were all tough.

All the players were very good players.

So, there are many, many, many good memories in Daniel's Field.

And one bad one, which I tore my Achilles tendon over there.

Ooh.

When I was researching the Greater Los Angeles Soccer League and the Maccabees name came up, your name came up a lot, [Laughs] many times.

Why is that?

[Laughs] Benny: [Laughs] Thank you, thank you very much.

I'm very flattered.

Actually, I'm looking at the soccer field, and it looks like there's a lot more grass when I played on it.

[Laughs] There's a lot more grass?

Oh, okay.

So, it's an improvement now today.

Okay, that's good.

How many years did you play with the Maccabees?

Benny: I came to play professionally in the United States, but then in '68, the professional teams folded.

I went-- I was supposed to play for Atlanta, Georgia, the team called the Chiefs.

Ivan: Wow.

And when I came to the United States, the team folded, and... There was a team in Los Angeles called the Toros.

So, I got in touch with them, and they said they want me.

So, I came to Los Angeles, and then all the professional soccer league collapsed.

Ivan: Yeah.

Benny: So, I met some friends, and they asked me to join the Maccabees Los Angeles.

What did it mean for you personally to be able to play with the Maccabees?

Well, I got offers from other teams to play for them.

But me being Jewish, I could not betray the Maccabees and not play for them.

They didn't pay much.

If I can say, they paid $15 a game.

Oh.

You got paid.

Okay.

[Laughs] Not everybody got paid, from what I've heard.

Benny: Being a Jewish team, we were very proud that we have players from different countries who were not Jewish.

We had a player from Ethiopia, we had a player from El Salvador, we had a player from Mexico, we had Argentina.

So, the team was very mixed.

I played with them.

I came here at the age of 20, and I believe I finished... The last game when we won the cup... Ivan: Oh, okay.

Benny: We won it-- we won it two-nothing.

I was the captain of the team all those years, and I came to the dressing room, and I said this was my last game.

[Ivan laughs] Benny: So... Ivan: While working as an actor, Eric Braeden spent his weekends playing in the Greater LA soccer League with the Maccabee Los Angeles Soccer Club.

His time with the team was a life-changing experience on multiple levels.

I and a German friend of mine, Mike Meyer-- he played midfield, I played defense-- and we were asked by a guy called Joe Schwarz, who was Hungarian-Jewish, he said, "Boys, do you want to play for a team?

I'll pay you $15 a game."

Now, I had been in the country for about two or three years.

I'd just seen a documentary about Nazi Germany, a Swedish documentary called "Mein Kampf."

Ivan: Oh, wow.

Eric: I left Germany in 1958.

At that time, we didn't discuss the Holocaust in school.

Ever.

I mean, how old were you then?

I was 19, 20, 21.

I mean, when the war ended, how old were you?

When the war ended, I was four.

Oh, so you have, like, no recollection, really.

Well, yes, bombings.

Every night.

Oh, I have vivid recollections.

Ivan: Oh, wow.

If people tell you children don't remember, they do remember.

I was born in 1941.

Hospital I was born in was bombed, smithereens, a day after.

The town I was born in, Kiel, on the Baltic Sea, was 98% destroyed.

Ivan: Wow.

Eric: So, we moved to the countryside.

So, I had not learned about the Holocaust.

We just learned that Germany had lost the war.

Ivan: Wow.

The Holocaust was discussed in Germany in the 1960s for the first time.

I had left by that time.

Ivan: Mm.

I began to play for the Maccabees.

And I suddenly became aware of all that stuff.

Ivan: Yeah.

The management of the Maccabees were mostly German Jews.

Fred Laser, Sam Brave.

Many of them had numbers on their arms.

Ivan: Wow.

Yeah.

So, I was determined to prove that, as a German, I didn't share those feelings.

I'd never heard of them before.

Ivan: Mm-hmm.

So, I then made it a mission to play for the Maccabees.

A Star of David on my chest.

And during the week, I played Nazis on television.

"Combat!," "Rat Patrol."

To the consternation of a lot of people who couldn't figure this out, they said, "Wait a minute, he's German, but he's playing for a Jewish team."

It sounds like it was very-- I mean, obviously very important for you to play for the Maccabees.

Eric: Yeah.

So, were the Maccabees founded by survivors?

German-Jewish survivors.

Eric: Yeah.

Wow.

I played for them with pride, with a sense of defiance, you know?

Yeah.

And I took them from the second division to the first division.

They had divisions in the Greater LA Soccer League?

Eric: Yes.

Oh, wow.

I will never forget the day in 1973... My son was three years old then.

Ivan: Mm-hmm.

My wife was in the stands, friends were, it was packed, and we won the U.S.

Championship, the Open Cup... Ivan: Yeah, the U.S.

Open Cup.

Eric: 1973.

Happiest moment in my life.

♪ Nothing like sports.

♪ The Greater Los Angeles Soccer League was a prelude to soccer in Los Angeles today.

It's very common to see children, teens, and adults play some version of soccer all over the region, including recreational and amateur leagues similar to the Greater LA Soccer League.

♪ [Whistle blowing] You're in the middle now, okay?

♪ Ivan: What do you like about playing soccer?

Soccer is, like, really engaging.

You can make, like, really good, like, friends, like, for a lifetime.

I usually get on a team with a lot of my friends.

You can work with a team, and you run around and play, and you could be active.

The city of Torrance is the birthplace of AYSO, the American Youth Soccer Organization, the oldest national youth soccer program in the country.

It was founded in 1964 by a group of businessmen and German-born Hans Stierle, who was also a member of the LA Kickers.

The LA Kickers eventually rebranded to the LA Soccer Club, or Los Angeles Soccer Club, LASC, who are still around today.

When I first started playing in the first grade, I remember a boy in my first grade class, I think I said something like, "I have soccer practice after class."

And he said, "Girls don't play soccer."

And I ran to my backpack, and I pulled out my cleats-- which you had to buy boys' cleats at the time, by the way, because there were no girls' cleats-- and I said, "Yes, we do."

And I was so proud of that moment to just kind of put my hands on my hips and say, "Yeah, we do what you do."

So, I was right around seven years old, and it was probably one of the first AYSO teams for girls in the South Bay, and I think my first team was the Mallards, my second team was the Sunflowers.

When I started playing soccer in the '70s-- that's how far back it was in Los Angeles-- it was a very suburban sport.

You know, it was-- AYSO was just starting out.

I got involved with soccer just by the fact that my cousin happened to play.

And I was, you know, that five-year-old kid, seeing my cousin playing in the park and then screaming at my parents, "I want to play with Cory!

I want to play with Cory!"

So, they stopped, pulled over, went over to the coach, asked if I could play, and the coach said, "Sure, why not?"

Threw me a jersey, and I just went out and started playing.

Didn't have to sign any papers or anything.

It was just like, "Hey, go play and have fun."

For soccer, it's funny-- when I started, I learned about the sport when I was in middle school.

I brought this one out.

This was hilarious, because this was my first year playing soccer, and I had no idea.

I bought these big, huge knee pads, thinking that everybody wore them.

And I was the only one who did, with the exception of the goalkeeper.

In the beginning, just playing AYSO, I played my first year, and then my sisters got to join the second year, so it became a family affair, and we all went to the field.

First, I was doing AYSO with my older sister.

My dad was the coach.

I feel like that's kind of relatable to everyone.

I joined AYSO Diamond Bar, and my father actually became one of the assistant coaches, but this is me and my brother, okay... 1972, brother John.

AYSO, and this is the Mustangs, first year of soccer.

'71-'72.

Still got all the information on the back.

Parents used to do that, you know, they used to write the stuff down.

My mom was more traditional, like, "You're gonna be a song queen or a cheerleader or an ice skater or play the piano."

And I can tell you, that is not Shelly.

Yeah, and I started begging, and she had heard some girl broke her arm, so I was not allowed to play, and then she just kind of gave up.

And so, I went and played for AYSO my very first time at, like, 11 years old.

And was this in Torrance or...?

Shelly: Mm-hmm, in Torrance.

And I had a really good coach who had a background in the game.

I think he was German.

So, I kind of, you know, had a great experience there.

Ivan: Professional soccer leagues in the U.S.

were established as early as the 1920s, but Southern California did not make its debut until the 1960s.

A group of entrepreneurs, including Canadian-born Jack Kent Cooke, established the United Soccer Association, which only lasted a year before it merged with a rival league, becoming the North American Soccer League.

When we think about pre-MLS soccer, we tend to gravitate to the North American Soccer League of the late '60s to the early '80s.

And that was a league that generated a lot of buzz, primarily through the acquisition of some real star players.

LA famously played in the NASL-- Franz Beckenbauer, Johan Cruyff, Giorgio Chinaglia, I mean, the list goes on and on.

There's another interesting story when you talk about professional football, soccer in Southern California.

The LA Wolves, they played one of the first iterations of professional soccer in Southern California and in the United States.

The LA Wolves played in that league.

They played one year.

They won the championship.

The league lasted one year.

But the team was owned and managed by a guy named Jack Kent Cooke.

Jack Kent Cooke owned the Washington Redskins.

He owned the Lakers.

He started the LA Kings.

A lot of deep history and involvement in professional sports.

He had an in-house lawyer that worked for him named Alan Rothenberg.

And Jack Kent Cooke didn't know much about soccer.

Alan Rothenberg knew even less.

But Jack Kent Cooke had the idea of, "Look, you're my in-house lawyer.

You go be general manager of the LA Wolves."

And Alan Rothenberg did.

The team lasted one year.

Alan came out knowing probably even less about soccer than he knew going in.

But the important thing is, when the LA Aztecs came about ten years later, that was the North American Soccer League.

That was the league that went bankrupt, but after bringing players like Johan Cruyff and George Best and Pele to the United States.

So, when that league started, Alan Rothenberg, with his vast soccer knowledge, decided that he would be an investor in the LA Aztecs.

But there was always the concern that if you don't grow the game at the grassroots, and you rely heavily on, you know, star players from abroad, you're not necessarily setting yourself up for long-term sustainability.

And so, I think there's been a concerted effort in the MLS years to try to grow more homegrown players in addition to acquiring some prominent players from-- from abroad.

Are you excited for the World Cup?

Yes!

So excited!

More than excited!

Oh, absolutely!

Oh, yeah!

Yeah... [Laughter] Yeah, for sure, 100%.

[Laughs] We were looking at tickets early on, but I have three kids, and, you know, I can do that, or I can send one of them to college.

[Ivan laughs] I got tickets for the third USA game.

Do you want to say how much you spent?

[Ivan laughs] June 11.

Yeah, we'll see how that goes.

Ivan: Soccer at the collegiate level in the U.S.

started in the 1800s, but the rules were all over the place and at one point abandoned for rugby, until they gained traction again.

By 1911, here on the West Coast, programs were starting to pop up.

Stanford's team was one of the first playing outdoors amateur teams, followed by the University of San Francisco in 1932, and by UCLA in 1937.

I think when we look at the soccer landscape then, and especially from a Black or African-American family, where my parents are from, Mobile, Alabama, where there really wasn't any talk of soccer so much, my thought was just, like, "Well, I'm just playing soccer for fun, and I'm done."

You know.

"That's it."

There really was no thought of, "Oh, I'm gonna go beyond," but then, once I got to UCLA and heard about it, it was just like, "Oh, there's an opportunity to play here at another level."

So that's when I walked on there and made the most of it.

Ivan: In 1977, UCLA Hall of Famer Ole Mikkelsen joined the men's team.

How did your time with the Maccabees come to an end?

Basically, it came to an end because I got drafted into the pros at UCLA.

Ivan: Oh!

There we go.

Ole: That was it.

Yeah.

So, I finished my senior season at UCLA and was drafted and went and signed a contract and moved away and played in the NASL.

And so, that was it.

I did actually have a break of about eight months when I transitioned from the NASL over to the major indoor soccer league.

Ended up signing with the LA Lazers.

Ivan: Okay.

Ole: The Buss family.

And during that eight-month window, I really wanted to continue to play and stay fit.

Ivan: Right.

And so, I did approach the Maccabees, but the Homenetmen offered me more money.

[Ivan laughs] So that's how I ended up playing about-- I think I ended up playing about 10 games with them at the tail end of the season, and actually played in a game against the Maccabees.

[Ivan laughs] Ole: And two of my former teammates at UCLA were playing for the Maccabees at that time.

So, that was, uh-- that was fun.

[Laughs] Can you show me where on this field you scored your favorite goal?

Oh, yeah, well, it's over there where the guy's blowing the whistle.

[Laughs] Actually, I would have to say that the favorite goal was a long strike from way outside that just happened to elude the goalkeeper because it was knuckling.

But the one that I scored to win the semifinal game was in that goal down there.

What other wonderful memories do you have of playing with the Maccabees, and what else do you recall that stood out to you during those days?

One of the most interesting things about the sport of soccer and the World Cup's coming here, you really get to see on the soccer field cultural expression.

That's the way I look at it.

Brazilians play like Brazilians live.

Germans play like Germans live.

I really do think that, you know, for the U.S.

to be successful here, they really have to find a way to harness the culture, right, which is, I think, hardworking, determined, you know, "Don't say no, just say go" type of, you know, uh, intensity.

That was not something that I had ever been exposed to, and being exposed to, in my case, the Israeli culture, was a very, very gratifying learning experience.

I've never been to Israel.

It's on my list of things that I would like to do sometime in my life.

But every time we stepped on the field, it was against another culture, whether it was the Hungarian team or the Croatian team.

And I think that that was one of my biggest takeaways from the time I spent in the Greater Los Angeles League.

Ivan: In 1965, the first college women's varsity soccer team was organized at Castleton State College in Vermont.

And in 1972, a federal civil rights law passed as part of the education amendments, paving a long road ahead that would elevate women's sports.

Kevin Baxter: Title IX, you know, forced schools, colleges, to give opportunity to women, and even to trickle down to the high school level, and we saw the explosion of sports.

If you offered a men's cross-country team or boys' cross-country team in high school, you had to offer that for the women.

Well, because of my good friend Julie Foudy and Billie Jean King, just a reminder that Title IX wasn't all about sports.

It was actually about equality in funding education for women, and opportunities were really limited.

So, once that was settled on the education side, it sort of was natural that it would spill over into equality in sports.

And, so, way back then, it was really a financial issue.

The schools weren't forced to invest, but also maybe didn't even have the money to invest in, you know, new and upcoming women's sports.

So, Title IX really helped even the playing field along those lines.

Woman: When I was at Santa Barbara my senior year, we're number two in the country, right?

The only one is UNC better than us.

And we had... Woman 2: Well, we must have graduated by then.

Yeah, you had, because I was a senior then, right?

We went up and played University of Oregon, right?

And Oregon State.

We had to drive up, right, had to pay for all our own meals, because they kept telling us our budget wasn't ready, right?

Then we flew back, played UNC and NC State and paid for all our own meals, right, because our budget still wasn't ready.

And we drove most places, right, because we couldn't afford flights.

And then at the end of the year, they finally-- they gave us $100.

Title IX really hadn't kicked in yet, right?

Yeah.

Shelly: Well, it just didn't seem important, you know?

It took people like you to tell people, "No, this is important.

We deserve a chance at this."

You know, and now, I mean, it's big business, women's soccer.

Big business.

I went to junior college first and then down to San Diego State and played, and it was club level sport.

It wasn't NCAA-sanctioned.

There were many teams that were just starting to become NCAA connected, but it wasn't widely supported at that time.

The younger generation has more opportunities for all ranges of age and skill level.

We went and traveled to China back in '83.

We ended up playing men's teams, because there weren't women's teams to play, and boys' youth teams that were more senior.

So, it was different.

When I went to Cal in '82, it was literally just becoming a varsity sport or Division I sport.

So, it had shifted from club, and most college programs now are basically sanctioned.

Varsity sports could be Division 1, Division 2, Division 3, et cetera.

And we did end up actually going to the final four, where we lost in overtime two to one.

I think it was in 1984.

By the time I got to college, we should have been more compliant than things were.

So, I would say that Title IX was an accelerator.

What Title IX gave me was, inadvertently, mentors that I could look to who would then have experiences of participating in team sports.

It was a slow grind to get the things that we needed, and even today, we still talk about them.

And so, we're still in the battle, and for-- for a good reason, but Title IX has clearly changed the lives of so many young women.

The beautiful thing is so many young girls have an opportunity to, you know, go to college, get some financial help, and get to play the sport that they love.

And once women had the opportunity to play, you know, we saw how good they are.

And you can look at the California system.

Soccer, the United States women's soccer, is really bi-coastal.

You look at the college programs in North Carolina, for example, very, very good.

Florida, Abby Wambach played there, very, very good.

And then California.

And the California youth program is really the incubator for a lot of this.

When you look at the players that came out of California, you know, Julie Foudy, Megan Rapinoe, Alex Morgan, Christen Press, Whitney Engen, all came out of the California system.

♪ Ivan: Who is your favorite player?

My favorite professional soccer player is Ronaldo.

He's my favorite player, because he's just really fast, and he scores a lot of goals.

My favorite soccer player is Lamine Yamal.

Robert Lewandowski, Barcelona.

My favorite soccer player is Abby Wambach.

Messi.

Yeah, Messi.

I like Lamine Yamal and Alyssa Thompson.

Teams from all over the world routinely play friendly games during their off-seasons here in the United States.

Sometimes, U.S.

soccer fans get the opportunity to watch some of the world's best and exciting teams compete in official competitions here at home.

Many club and national teams have competed in friendly competitions and international tournaments at the Memorial Coliseum and BMO Stadium in Exposition Park, Dignity Health Sports Park in Carson, and other stadiums throughout LA County.

In 2025, soccer fans filled the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, the home of the Men's 1994 World Cup final and the 1999 Women's World Cup final, to watch teams from Spain, France, Mexico, Japan, and Brazil compete in the Club World Cup.

♪ Back in the day, you're talking, like, this is the mid-'70s to late '70s-- '77, '78-- when we started playing travel ball.

We'd play against teams in El Monte, we'd play teams in Riverside, we'd play teams in the South Bay area, Manhattan Beach.

You know, we always had these rivals that you didn't know the team, but they became the rival because of the standings.

And, you know, Manhattan Beach Hurricanes, or Torrance United, or South Bay United.

These were top-level teams that came out of pretty much the South Bay area.

This team, Diamond Bar Kickers, in 1978 went to the final, and we lost to Sao Paulo, Brazil, and there was a crowd of 22,000 people in Bislett Stadium, Oslo.

We were signing autographs.

I mean, this was the most fascinating thing I've ever seen in my life.

I'm 14 years old, signing autographs.

And we had parents at our games here playing, but we didn't have fans.

And now I really understood how big soccer was.

Soccer in SoCal today is as diverse as it's ever been.

The Greater LA Soccer League helped pave the way by providing an avenue for people from all over the world to join in the game.

There are plenty of fans and aficionados who still recall the early days of soccer in Los Angeles.

One such fan is Far Farshad.

Originally from Iran, he moved to the U.S.

and quickly became a diehard fan of local soccer and can attest to personally watching long-since defunct teams such as the LA Wolves, the LA Toros, and the LA Aztecs when they were still around.

Announcer: ...on side.

Here's a drive and a shot.

Rebound, a score!

Dewsnip scores for Los Angeles.

They tie it up.

When you look at this field, Jackie Robinson Field, what kind of memories does it conjure?

I don't remember the football lines.

Yeah, I think those are new.

[Laughs] Basically, the same, not much has changed.

There were some rough times in the stands and maybe in the field, especially with, you know, some fights and things going on.

That was a competitive league.

But the biggest crowds that we would see were when they had some visiting teams come in.

Ivan: Really?

I remember... I think a team from Finland somehow came and played there, and then the San Pedro Croats, I think, hosted a Croatian team, and I remember the-- the field in San Pedro was packed, about probably around seven, eight thousand people, whatever the capacity was.

But other than that, most, you know, Sunday games that they had were maybe less than 100 people in attendance.

How long did you follow the Greater LA Soccer League and the teams when it was active?

Probably about 10 years or so.

The good thing is it was a decent level of soccer and also getting a chance to see some of the players.

Oh, so were there a couple of U.S.

national team players that would play in the league?

Well, both of those guys, Hugo Pérez and Marcelo Balboa, naturally did play big roles with the national team.

They were stars, as far as I'm concerned.

And then, '94, and Hugo Pérez was probably the best left-footed player we ever had.

Ivan: 50 cents plus tax for a ticket, wow.

Yeah.

Ivan: I wouldn't mind paying that today.

The program, yeah.

Uh-huh.

But the thing is, I didn't know anything about them.

I just had heard, and, of course, I was still trying to, you know, get acclimated, and having just moved to the country and all that, and the language wasn't quite there.

And so, I'd always wondered what the LA Toros were.

And, of course, being a student of the history of the game in here, I went back and kind of found out what was going on.

The two teams merged in the next year, basically be one of the founding teams for the North American Soccer League and under the name of LA Wolves, and they actually went belly-up right after that, so it was a short live.

[Laughs] But anyways, this is what kickstarted the whole thing for me as a fan.

It was the first time I actually experienced the professional game and was part of a championship game with a lot of excitement and enthusiasm.

And then, fast forward to 1976, that's when the first superstar for LA came in, and that was George Best, the Northern Irish player of Manchester United fan.

Fast forward to 1986, and these are all seminal moments as far as I'm concerned, but the evolution of, let's say, pro soccer in LA, and those are the ones that I witnessed myself.

Indoor games had come and gone, the LA Lazers, you know, and we used to go down to San Diego soccer, because the Lazers weren't that good.

But anyways, in between that stuff and watching the local games, going to a lot of UCLA games, good soccer being played over there.

♪ Ivan: What attracted you to Angel City?

Woman: Women's League.

The energy here, like, the energy here is great.

Everybody's welcome.

You feel safe.

Really positive vibes.

Everyone's really nice.

This would not have been possible 70 years ago.

Soccer's always been a part of my life.

That's how I met my husband.

And now I have my own little young soccer player who cheers her little booty off too.

[Both laugh] ♪ Ivan: So, what happened to the Greater LA Soccer League?

Sadly, it came to an abrupt end around the time the World Cup arrived in Los Angeles.

Gabriel Cucuk, founder and president of the San Pedro Yugoslavs, took over as president of the league in 1989 and saw it through its end.

At about the time the Greater LA Soccer League was becoming independent from its Northern California partners, there was a whole debate in global soccer about whether soccer should be amateur or professional.

That, in fact, is how the World Cup started.

In 1930, there was a dispute with the International Olympic Committee.

Soccer was played in the Olympics then, still is now, and a lot of countries said, "Our players are professional now.

We want them to get paid to play."

So, they broke off from the Olympic movement and started the World Cup.

I didn't have the dreams that players have today to someday play in a World Cup, to represent your country.

I didn't know what that was.

I found that out at 18 years old, where I did a walk-on tryout.

I wasn't invited.

And 90 days later, I'm the captain of the youth national team.

I just went to the tryout.

And I signed my name on the waiver form because I just turned 18.

So, I go up to the field, and the middle coach asks, you know, "I need a defender."

He kind of did it under his voice, you know?

And as I raised my hand, "Hey, coach, I could play defender."

He said, "Oh, great, grab a yellow."

And right before I get to that yellow penny, he asked my name.

He's shuffling through the papers, "I don't see your name on the list."

I go, "No, sir, my name was not on the list when I checked in.

I've signed the waiver form, I turned 18, I'm good to go."

And he literally looked to his right, and the coach kind of shrugged his shoulders, like, "It's up to you."

Looked to his left, to the other coach, the coach turned away, like, "I don't want any part of it."

I didn't play one minute as a defender.

And he goes, "Well, put it on the jersey, you're good."

And 90 days later, I'm the captain of the under 20 national team playing in a youth World Cup as a defender.

You know, it's anything to get on the field.

I didn't like defender.

I wanted to play midfield.

I wanted to play forward.

But it wasn't my choice at the time.

It was the coach's choice and the team's choice, and I did what I could, and that was a big break.

I have a letter here that I dug up, because I brought some things to share.

And this is a letter literally from, like, 1983, and it's inviting me to the Central American tour.

And this is the step-up plan to make the World Cup qualifying team for the 1986 World Cup, which ultimately I did.

Okay, so 1984, the LA Olympics are coming, and Peter Ueberroth, the mastermind behind the LA Olympics, needs someone to manage the soccer tournament.

"Hey, Alan Rothenberg, with your vast history of soccer, would you manage the soccer tournament?"

He did.

The final at the Rose Bowl, do 103,000.

The largest crowd in-- for a soccer game in the United States for decades, was a huge success, the soccer tournament.

10 years after that, Alan Rothenberg brought the World Cup to the United States.

But soccer would finally get its due here in the U.S.

The FIFA Men's World Cup arrived in 1994 in a watershed moment for the sport here at home.

Training for the World Cup beforehand, getting ready for it, and knowing that you're going to have at least two games here in Los Angeles at the Rose Bowl, you know, that is an iconic stadium in and of itself.

It meant a lot.

It meant a lot, not only to me, but to all the other players on the team, and I think for everybody in the Los Angeles area.

So, MLS comes into being in the mid-1990s, and, in some sense, it's an outgrowth of the 1994 World Cup.

There had been discussions about having a viable professional men's league after the dissolution of the North American Soccer League in the early 1980s.

So, FIFA wanted the U.S.

to have a viable pro league.

So, you go back to Alan Rothenberg in the mid-'60s getting involved with the LA Wolves-- There's a direct line to the World Cup coming here in 1994.

Still the most successful World Cup in history from attendance, revenue, everything else.

And then, now we have the World Cup coming back.

So, there's a direct line from the Greater LA Soccer League through the LA Wolves to the Olympics to the World Cup to the World Cup coming back.

♪ Ivan: What do you like about playing soccer?

I like soccer because it's fun, and you can play and score goals.

You get to play a bunch of different positions.

You get to learn what you're good at.

I like scoring goals and defending.

We're trying to work on more passing, dribbling.

When, like, you learn how to shoot from angles, and it's fun.

Like, the tournaments, we have a lot of them.

I was reflecting back, why did I quit soccer?

You know, I had another year of eligibility at Cal, and I didn't take it.

Oh, really?

I got a really good job offer, so I decided to take it.

But then I thought back.

The biggest reason, I think, was they had just announced again that we couldn't be an Olympic sport.

So, you know, because I graduated in 1989, and they kept promising it.

Even in '93, I played in this-- we were in the sports festival.

We'd have the sports festivals, which were kind of precursors to Olympic, right?

And then, in '93, that's the last one I played in-- we still didn't.

It wasn't an Olympic sport.

They didn't have it until 1996.

And so, I was like, I gave up, because, what are we gonna do?

We're gonna just keep training on the promise that there might be an Olympic team in four years from now?

You know, '99 World Cup, that was epic for a lot of us, because women's soccer, like, officially got on the map in such a big way and-- fun story-- I'll try not to get choked up sharing it-- but '99 World Cup where the Blue Angels fly over, like, oh, my gosh, the national anthem, 90 some-odd thousand people, and you're like, "Oh, my God, this is-- it's made it."

It was just awesome.

And the game was epic.

Oh, my gosh.

Hearing what you're saying, it's like we felt seen.

Yeah, totally.

All our passion, all our hard work.

Even though we weren't on the field, we felt seen.

Yeah, totally.

And I think that's when so many of us felt like women's soccer really made it.

And then the game was just epic.

So, the final was against China.

Briana Scurry made her amazing save at the end of the game.

Brandi is clutch.

Like, I have to give it to her.

She's an incredibly talented player, and she is the one to step up and take a PK when everything's on the line.

You couldn't have a photo finish any better than going down the PKs.

Brandi: Being on the U.S.

women's national team is a privilege.

It is something that is to be, I think, cared for and respected with the utmost consciousness.

The amount of work to get to the point where we are today with a full-blown professional league with, you know, players from around the world and television and the fact that these-- these players are earning salaries that they make a living doing is remarkable.

Los Angeles made soccer history in both tournaments as the Rose Bowl in Pasadena was selected as the host venue for the final match of each tournament.

And then, after the '99 World Cup, that's when we basically had our first professional soccer league, which was the Women's United Soccer Association, which was sort of forming in 2000, and I think our first games were in 2001.

LA is the sports capital of the world, and it deserves to have a women's team.

We have the best athletes in the world to play for the U.S.

Women's National Team and in the National Women's Soccer League, and we want to bring the best athletes to the best city.

Ever since I was a little girl, I wanted to play professional soccer, and at the time when I, like, made the choice that that's what I wanted to pursue, there was no women's soccer team here in LA.

And so, I think it was, I was in high school, and there was a team, Angel City was here.

And so, ever since that was happening, I knew that this is exactly where I wanted to be at some point in my career.

When you're thinking about 32 odd years later, you know, the World Cup is coming back to the United States, and we're gonna be hosting the U.S.

team again at least two games here, you know, in Los Angeles.

It just shows everyone around the world understands that soccer has a place here in Los Angeles and that Los Angeles is a sports city.

You know, that it can host and maintain any sport out there, that LA is the place to be.

Soccer's growth in the U.S.

couldn't have happened without a boost from foreign-born players.

Beyond bringing attention to Major League Soccer, many international players who represented countries from Europe and Latin America in the World Cup have also placed a personal and financial stake in the growth of sport here in the U.S.

Players, coaches, owners, investors, MLS, the United Soccer League, Major League and Soccer League, so many levels of the U.S.

soccer structure.

This is a great picture, sort of shows what we're talking about, the-- what LA, the Greater LA Soccer League, how it was the foundation for what became professional soccer in Southern California.

Here's Eli Marmur, obviously in his post-playing days, at a Laker game with David Beckham, who was the first designated player in MLS, came to play for the Galaxy, and was responsible for sort of changing the direction of MLS.

Well, guess what?

David Beckham's not here in LA playing for the Galaxy if Eli wasn't here first playing for Maccabee.

So, here's the history meeting right here, courtside at a Lakers game.

♪ Kevin: Without the Greater LA Soccer League, there's certainly-- MLS probably is not in Los Angeles, certainly not with two teams.

We probably don't have Angel City, the women's professional team in the NWSL.

We certainly don't have a second World Cup, probably not even a first.

Are you ready for the World Cup?

Come back to LA.

Brandi: I just fell in love.

It was love at first kick, really.

And I would say the rest is history.

I love the game.

You just put me on the field, wherever, but I'm not a very good goalkeeper.

I've made so many sisters on the team and, like, such close friends, like, you can't really compare that to anything else.

It's a very simple and fun game.

Kick the ball in the back of the net.

Once I step onto the soccer field, whether it's practice or a game, everything else melts away.

I love the adrenaline of going into a game.

I love just everything about being an athlete.

Announcer: This program was made possible in part by: a grant from Anne Ray Foundation, a Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropy.