The Aztexan

I wrote recently about Dave Brett’s archive of old soccer videos. I received a copy of one of Dave’s DVDs since then: the 1977 NASL Soccer Bowl, New York Cosmos vs. Seattle Sounders. This was the league championship, complete with the “bowl” name, a clear attempt to place it on par with NFL’s Super Bowl (which itself is kind of a dumb name, if you think about it).

This was the Cosmos of Pelé, Beckenbauer and Chinaglia (and Shep Messing in goal – I’m not sure he’s quite the legend that those guys are, but he’s still around American soccer today, so that’s pretty cool). It was the Sounders of, well, nobody you’ve heard of unless you were a NASL fan in the late 70s.

Which I was not. I don’t remember hearing or seeing the slightest bit of soccer of any kind back then, when I was a kid. I therefore have zero nostalgia for the original NASL. I’m interested in it, fascinated, even; I have both seen and read Once In A Lifetime. I’m not knocking NASL nostalgia, I’m just putting it out there that I have none of my own. (One bonus this afforded me: I didn’t know who won this match.)

Nevertheless, watching this DVD was an absolute blast. The soccer itself is fun to watch, and it’s certainly bizarre to see those legends play a full game. And of course it’s not “just” a regular-season game, it’s the championship, as well as Pelé’s last game as a Cosmo (excepting the farewell match vs. Santos). This is the match that Brian Phillips wrote about on Run of Play during his recent “Pelé Week”. So it’s epic, but I’ll be honest: it was the retro aspects of the broadcast, the short shorts, the big mustaches, etc., that really made it for me.

These screenshots are a bit fuzzy — they’re not exactly from an HD broadcast — but I think they’ll give you a flavor of the game.

Title Screen!

U.S. National Team Coach Walt Chyzowych, right
(yes, really, the right)

Hey, who’s that guy?

At halftime, they showed the presentation of league MVP Franz Beckenbauer with a brand new Celica liftback. He was “very happy to drive so beautiful car.”

League MVP and Celica liftback owner Franz Beckenbauer gets a yellow card

Pelé again. Beckham sure wasn’t the first to get an inordinate amount of camera attention in his U.S. games

The commentary that accompanies this game is great, too. Like the game itself, it’s pretty good overall, but has quite the retro quaintness (quaint retro-ness?). Like the announcers explaining that the player can go out of bounds but the ball can’t, for example, or just the same kind of corny chit-chat that we hear today, but rewound a few decades.

And there are commercial breaks! The actual commercials are edited out (which from a time-capsule standpoint is unfortunate), but there are clear breaks. There’s even a goal scored during one of them.

I highly recommend checking out at least one of Dave’s videos. You’ve seen clips and plays and highlights of these players on YouTube, but seeing a full game, whistle to whistle, is a whole ‘nother thing. The site is davebrett.com. You can email Dave for ordering info; I believe he charges $20 per disc. It’s worth it; chip in with a few buddies if you want to lower the cost. (And speaking of buddies, if you know me in real life, let me know if you’d like to borrow this one.)