US football(soccer) history, redux

WHAT? Redux you say? Are you stealing from CalBear you say? No, i simply make a homage to him since i dont know how do do the title:)

Part 1: A new beginning 1900-1920

In 1900 there were several leagues of football in the USA and the influx of English immigrants made the game a big thing in British dominated areas. After much debate the USAFA(USAFA(s) as it was called in the USA) was founded in Boston and the guidelines were drawn up.

The most controversially was that the representatives from the northern part wanted a integrated league system but the representatives from the south didn’t want negroes in a white team. That was solved in 1909 when a compromise was made. A team from the former rebel states didn’t have to integrate the teams, but they had to play a integrated team if they were in the same league. Another factor was the long distances in USA and the fact that trains were the main source of transportation. The association was in danger of collapsing without getting of the ground, but the first president of the association, a son of a Swedish immigrant, John Carlsson, made a decision to split the association into several smaller federations with USAFA as the main governing body.

There was one league called New England federation with the New England states. Texas was a own federation because of its size and so on. The season was spring-autum with the games before July interfederation and the games in August and September playoffs between federations. In October the nations east of the Mississippi would have their final games and the federations west of the river would have their final games. In November the grand final was to be played between the East and West champions.

Another new invention for the American sports system was the promotion and relegation system and not a closed league that baseball used and that other sports would have. That together with the opportunity for afro-americans to play made the sport big in many places

In 1910 the first games were played and some states lacked teams altogether, but others had many teams. Teams rose from the ground, especially in the big cities. Some of the clubs that would be big in the future was founded already in 1910. New York City alone had 7 teams the first year:
AFC Queens, Harlem fotballers united, Bronx united, Manhattan cavaliers, Inter Milan(a almost exclusive Italian immigrant club and would remain so for many years), Long Island packmen and the New York Masters.

1910 east victors were the Bronx united and the west victors were the San Fransisco miners with miners taking the title.

1911 east victors were again the Bronx united and this time they won against the Huston Texans.

In 1912 the leaguesystem settled down and became even more organized. Inside the different federation lower leagues grew. The North east federation had the following system:
First division 10 teams, 2 relegated
Second division 10 teams, 2 promoted and 1 relegated, 1 team played playoff to stay in the league
Third division that was the lowest federationrun 10 teams, 2 promoted, 1 playing promotion playoff and 2 relegated.
Below the third division there were divisions from each state.
New York state had the following system:
Forth division New York upstate and downstate
Fith division east, west south and north New York

In 1913 the Washington presidents won the east federation cup and San Antonio FC won the west federation and in the final played in Vicksburg San Antonio won after double over time.

The 1914 season was overshadowed by the beginning of the war in Europe. That led to the all black team of Atlanta Southerners winning the national championship.

The 1915-17 seasons were played under the shadow of war and when USA declared war on Germany in 1917 many German immigrants playing didn’t play the away games due to concerns of their well-being.

The 1918 season was cancelled because many men were drafted into the army, but the negroteams played a championship that the Harlem footballers united won.

In 1919 the teams prepared for the 10th year celebration in 1920 and the prospect of a better tomorrow without war. Many soldiers that never heard of football had come in touch with the game for the first time when fighting side by side with British soldiers that were fanatical about the game. They would mean a great deal to advance the popularity of the sport over the coming years.


Part 2: Building a future 1921-1939
Part 3: War and peace 1940 – 1949
Part 4: International start 1950 – 1959
Part 5: Unification 1960 – 1971
Part 6: A time of crisis 1972 – 1981
Part 7: Reaching for glory 1982 – 1995
Part 8: A truly open market 1996- 2000
Part 9: In the shadow of the towers 2001 - 2010

And i promisse one thing: The story will look better in the coming updates and no major transferrelated stories will happen untill chapter 6 at the earliest to have as few butterflies as possible and the fact that i want a slow start and the fact that i simply know to few players before the 1980ths
 
See the problem is, having an influx of a large group of immigrants to an area doesn't exactly make soccer super popular. Look at all the Italian immigrants who came over in OTL, not to mention the English immigrants who came over anyhow. The immigrants liked the sport, sure, but their kids? Thats the problem. Unless you can have a real professional set up dedicated to pushing soccer forward, it will remain a secondary fringe sport in the US. Look at it now. Soccer has had a league committed to its growth since 1994 and is just now reaching the level of challenging Hockey for Fourth place on the Sports ladder. And that has to do with modern advertising and all. The best way I can figure for soccer to succeed is to have the ALPF succeed in 1894. And its hard to see how they didn't succeed, considering they had the backing of the NL with actual ties to some of its more successful clubs.
 
Thanks Enigma for your input.

Part 2: Building a future 1921-1939


The 1920ths came and in August of 1921 when the summer was ending one of Mr Carlssons clerks came to the boss with a urgent memo. “How are the second generation immigrants going to like the sport?” In the memo it was stated that the second generation was more interested in playing baseball or American(Gideon) football. The head of USAFA went to the board of directors and they debated for weeks. In September the USAFA proposed that the clubs would have youth teams. On Christmas Eve that year the USAFA announced that every state would be in charge of running youth team leagues instead of the UAFA.
In 1923 10,000 youngsters were playing the sport and there were a few men that saw potential in the sport. One of them was the head of Ford Motor company, Henry Ford, who invested in a local team and became its president and changed the team to Pontiac Tuesday after the day he got the ok to change the name. Another outside influx that year was the bank of Wells Fargo who became the first sponsor of the USAFA and agreed to pay the FA a sum of 1 million per year over 10 years. All bankemployees playing football(124 in total in 1923) got time off to play. A number of small and big sponsors offered the services over the next couple of years and some teams had players that only had to work 75 % of the time if they used the 25 % they didn’t work to exercise. Football would for many years still be a semiprofessional sport making the general population feel sympathy for the players since they still had to work for a living.

Most games were played on Saturday afternoons at around 16.00 in the timezone the game was played in. Some leagues had games on Sunday afternoons also. Very few games in the early days were played Mondays to Fridays because of the players working. The 20ths were also the era of bootlicking and some mobsters had their own teams like the team from Chicago called Al Capone all-stars that rose from nothing to challenge the big teams nationwide, but before it could win a national championship Al Capone himself went to jail.
In 1928 the head of USAFA resigned and the new head of the FA was a 30 year old man called August Wittigstein, son of a German immigrant and he had big plans for the federation. The first one was to be the biggest sport in USA and make the USAFA the best run FA in the world. External events would make his plans burst.

The expansion of football had met obstacles. In Arizona and New Mexico for example it was simply too hot to play football in the summer. Much of the people in the Midwestern states had other plans than watching sports, surviving for one thing. That’s why for example Oklahoma only had 20 teams in 1928.

In the middle of the season of 1929 the stock market crashed and the great depression started. Football was hit very hard. Of the 20 Oklahoma teams in 1928 only 6 remained in 1933 and 2 of them went under before 1940. The rest of the nation also saw a collapse of many teams. One of the biggest clubs to fade from existence was San Antonio FC, winner of 6 national championships, but when half of the team lost their jobs and the club sponsor went under so did the club. It is estimated that 25 % of the clubs disappeared between 1928 and 1938.

The great depression was one of the main reasons that USA decided to take no part in international football until after the second world war. The great depression also showed how fragile the USAFA was when it came to helping teams survive. But everyone with some sort of knowledge of the sport realized that USAFA only could do so much with the meager budget it had and the fact that almost every team in the federation was armature in some degree. The number of schools having a soccer program had risen and the Ivy-league schools had their own teams. Their season followed the school year and ended with a grand finale in May.

During the race for the presidency in 1932 FDR gave a pledge that he would help football teams that wanted it to build new stadiums. After his opponents attacked him on being anti baseball and other sports he changed it to help sport across the nation. In 1933 after being inaugurated as president Roosevelt applied sport to the New Deal. In New York a new stadium located in Harlem was built exclusive for football, capacity of 18,000 spectators and named The Harlem arena. Several other stadiums for different sports were built up until 1939.

USAFA president Wittigstein then negotiated a deal in 1934 with CBS-radio to give them exclusive rights to the championship game in November for 10 years for an undisclosed figure. That was after he had received criticism for not popularization enough of the sport. The championship game was moved to the Thanksgiving weekend. After that the sport started to grow again and there were some talks about unifying the league now that aircrafts could travel faster than trains among journalists but nothing inside of the FA. In December 1938 USAFA started debating if they should send a team to the next world championship but never came to an agreement before Europe broke out in full warfare and the world jumped into world war 2.


Until chapter 7 i will not have any games or transfers written because i am trying to advance ASAP to the modern era of the sport.
 
Shouldn't a PoD in 1900 (or possibly earlier) have much larger butterflies?

The more butterflies i put into the story, the harder it gets to write a story post Bossman than it will be having a story with multimillion dollar US teams competing with the likes of Man U, Milan etc etc and having the full force of US media behind them. Now if i dont make the USA understand the full potential of the sport vs media until the first world cup USA wins after 1970 then i can keep the transfers from Europe to USA at a minimum until the Bosmanverdicts changes the dynamics of trade.

Why wait until 1970 to have USA win the world cup? Because i want Pele to have his 3 gold first and THEN impact USA
 

d32123

Banned
The more butterflies i put into the story, the harder it gets to write a story post Bossman than it will be having a story with multimillion dollar US teams competing with the likes of Man U, Milan etc etc and having the full force of US media behind them. Now if i dont make the USA understand the full potential of the sport vs media until the first world cup USA wins after 1970 then i can keep the transfers from Europe to USA at a minimum until the Bosmanverdicts changes the dynamics of trade.

Why wait until 1970 to have USA win the world cup? Because i want Pele to have his 3 gold first and THEN impact USA

As an American and a huge soccer fan, I find this timeline fascinating. It's just that I don't find it especially realistic since it totally ignores the far-reaching butterflies that this POD would cause. I'll still read it for kicks, though.
 
As an American and a huge soccer fan, I find this timeline fascinating. It's just that I don't find it especially realistic since it totally ignores the far-reaching butterflies that this POD would cause. I'll still read it for kicks, though.

I seem to have created butteflies without knowing it. I checked the history of the mens national team in USA and thought that their history began in 1950 with the win over England and now i know that there was a national team in the 1930ths already that i butterflied away. Thats why i have decided to butterfly the 1948 Olympics in London and have the USA reach the final against Sweden and win it

I have also realised that bigger soccer in the USA that is integrated faster than baseball means that there are tons of Jackie Robinsons in the leagues and that the sport already have impacted baseball. I have a feeling hockeyplayers from the USA are going to be affected as well in the next chapters.
 
A bit of heads up. I am currently writing about the team that wins the championship in 1941 and that they are on hollliday filled with exercises on Hawaii on December 7. I have just created a mega butterfly. I am saving all BB captains and having the following ships empty doing a exercise with the fotball team in the morning around 7 am.

Arizona, Oklahoma and the West Virginia
 
Part 3: War and peace 1940 – 1947

While Europe was busy killing each other’s the US football leagues went on as before. In 1939 a hastily assembled national team had went on a goodwill trip to England and Germany. England thought they would win easy, but in the game against USA on 4th of July England found themselves outplayed by the US national team with 6-0 and England was in shock, but then world war 2 broke out and they all but forgot the game. The game between USA and Germany was played on August 1st with the clouds of war showing in the distance. It was a tie, but looked as a victory for the USA team that showed that they had the potential to be the nr 1 team in the world. The best scorer in the two games for USA was the black Jackie Robinson, something that anti-nazi propaganda would play heavily on during the years of war.

In December of 1941 Los Angeles FC having won the championship went to Hawaii for the victory celebration. On December 6 they visited the naval base of Pearl harbor and while there the team got to go onboard the battleship USS California. At the dinner with the coaches and every battleship captain, captain Bunkley commanding the ship of USS California offered the team to stay the night and join the morning service and breakfast on the day after. Coach Henry thanked for the offer, but said that he had another “gift” for the team. He told the captain that they would run up the hill overlooking the harbor and do trainingearly in the morning. Captain Bunkley laughed and said “Well, the boys will be sorry, but well trained.” The coach offered to have all the captain join since they “seemed to need a good run.” Every battleship captain agreed, some of them even said that they would take their entire crew since there were no danger of war. The ships that had no crew onboard on December 7 were The Arizona, Oklahoma and the West Virginia.

That’s why there were hundreds of shocked sailors and a full squad of football players standing on the cliff overlooking the base when the Japanese attacked and the crew of the battleships felt very helpless and powerless to do something since they hadn’t brought guns. One Japanese pilot reported that there were many sailors standing on the cliff, but the commander of the strikeforce said “Let them watch the power of Japan and tell the tale”. The crew of Arizona was extremely angry when they saw their ship blowing up. Only causalities from the crews was the 10 men chosen for the guard, and of those 30 only 8 died and 4 was wounded. The battleship captains however were causalities in another matter since they were court martialed for leaving their posts and had to leave the navy. USAFA hired them as consultants as they felt that they were responsible for them being thrown out of the navy.

During the war the football leagues were put on hold because the need for the men to be in the army. The USAFA then allowed women to play. The USAFA Women’s league was a purely professional league across the nation with 20 teams. It lasted 3 years before the war ended and the women were pushed out for a few more decades. Many of the top footballers in the USA went into the armed forces and many became causalities of war, half of the team that were in Hawaii when Japan attacked died during the war, all in the Pacific theatre as marines.

In early 1945 the USAFA decided to start the league again, the war was as good as won and not many more men would be drafted into the army. The clubs had many experienced men still in arms and they solved that issue with playing with youngsters. USAFA also decided to have a international squad and appointed 3 coaches. One to scout East teams, one to scout West team and one that would act as a coordinator and game coach. In a pure coincidence the first three coaches were the battleship captains that the navy fired in 1941. They were given a contract until 1951. In October when the war against Japan was finished and peace was established it was also decided that the USA would field a national team in the coming Olympics and the coming world cup.

The first full season after the war was the 1946 season. The average age of the players in that season was 24 in the highest division. In the second division the average age was 21 years and the lower division that a team played in the lower the average wage was. In 1947 the international coaches started choosing their players for the Olympic in 1948. After the war more and more teams became professional. Manhattan cavaliers were the first club to merge with another club in another sport when they in the end of 1947 became part of the New York Rangers organization. That merger didn’t look that intimidating to the rest of the US teams for 10 years and the big clubs in Europe wouldn’t feel threatened for a while longer.

One of the biggest issues in the USAFA was the inability to get good European players. Those who came over from Europe wasn’t the best of what Europe had to offer while good US players would go to the British leagues. That problem would take many decades to resolve. One problem for the American players coming over to Europe was that they were seen as poorly trained. That view would start to change in the 50ths and totally vanish in the 1970ths.
 
Part 4: International start 1948 – 1959

In 1948 the USFDA had to take into account that games would have to be moved because of the Olympic tournament in London. Teams affected by the Olympic games were allowed to postpone their games until the players were back from the games, if they wanted. By 1948 the coaching staff had changed so that only one of them in reality was a national coach while the two others were scouts. In May the national team was assembled. Most players came from the Eastern teams, but not a big majority. Another thing was that the national team was fully integrated. Of the 20 players that traveled to England 5 were non whites. Some of the former exclusive white teams in the south had also begun to integrate at a slow pace.

The team that represented the United States of America had in reality been picked two years earlier at a camp for the youths that had the best chance of becoming top players. Two years ago they were 2000 players, one year ago they were 200 and now they were 20. The first game they played were against Italy. It was a close contest that was decided in the 89th minute when Mike Bartlett scored the winning 3-2 goal for the US team. The next game was against Denmark. A game that the USA had no trouble winning with 4-0. Unfortunally Sweden were to strong in the semi-final and won 4-2. USA managed to get a bronze by beating a combined Great Britain team with 2-1.

When the season resumed the players that had been away showed signs of wanting a vacation after all the travels and playing for their country. The USAFA also saw the problem and began a discussion about change the season to match the bigger leagues in Europe. Start in August or September and end in May with a break between the middle of December and January when it was too cold for football.

The next year the decision was made to change the season after 1950 and there would be a half year break before the 1951/52 season started. The Alaskan delegation got a deal that every division consisting of atleast one team from Alaska would start the springseason in February.

1950 was the first world cup after the 2nd world war and USA faced England in the opening game. England expected to win easy. But it was a game that would shatter their confidence that they were the supreme nation with regards to football. USA won 3-1. USA won their group and went on to the final stage that was played like a group. USA finished second behind Uruguay. The second place made the sport even bigger in the USA and it was now a clear third behind baseball and Gideon football(OTL American football).

In 1951 the head of the USAFA retired and the new head was the former presidential contender Thomas Dewey that played football in his youth and had promoted the sport whenever he had the chance. He would spend the majority of the decade to get big sponsors for the league and transportation deals.

In 1954 the ending wasn’t what the USA wanted when they finished third in their group and in 1958 they didn’t even qualify for the world cup. In 1955 the USAFA began discussing a unification of the league and when they brokered a deal with Pan Am in 1957 the dream of a unified league might come true. USAFA spent the entire 1958 discussing a new leaguesystem and in October 1958 they announced that starting with the beginning of the 1960/61-season the top two divisions would be unified. The lower leagues would unify over the coming decade. The top two divisions would have 20 teams each. Since there were 10 leagues within the USAFA the top two teams would qualify for the new US first division and the third and fourth placed team would qualify for the second divison. The last team to win the national championship was Harlem united. USAFA hoped that unity would mean international fame and a new spike for the interests, but as always reality and dreams didn’t coexist.
 
Well, I certainly like this as a first cut, but I noticed some big problems too. If you don't mind some constructive criticism:

The most controversially was that the representatives from the northern part wanted a integrated league system but the representatives from the south didn’t want negroes in a white team.

While you have an interesting premise, this was simply not going to happen in the early 1900s, and is an oversimplification of racial relations in America at the turn of the century. In short, integration wasn't going to happen and would likely sink the league in a few short years; rich white people wouldn't support the sport and the poor ones wouldn't care to see the competition from the blacks.

That was solved in 1909 when a compromise was made. A team from the former rebel states didn’t have to integrate the teams, but they had to play a integrated team if they were in the same league.

This is an oversimplification of racial tensions in the US in the early 20th century. See the post above.

The association was in danger of collapsing without getting of the ground, but the first president of the association, a son of a Swedish immigrant, John Carlsson, made a decision to split the association into several smaller federations with USAFA as the main governing body.

I need a little clarification here; are the several leagues united under the USAFA in one giant league, in which case they would splinter and go their separate ways once the USAFA collapses?

There was one league called New England federation with the New England states. Texas was a own federation because of its size and so on. The season was spring-autum with the games before July interfederation and the games in August and September playoffs between federations. In October the nations east of the Mississippi would have their final games and the federations west of the river would have their final games. In November the grand final was to be played between the East and West champions.

This season structure is good, although the play off structure seems a little... inorganically evolved and overly broad for this point in history. After all, MLB was pretty much concentrated in the Northeast (St. Louis was the furthest team west until the 1950s after all) until the advent of the highway system and television; until then, baseball was still a very regional sport. I'd see soccer suffering from similar hurdles and having to fight regionalism (which was pretty strong until the end of WWII) to really acquire a broad organization.

A better example for the development of sports leagues in the US would be MLB or the NFL. Both began as regional leagues which, over several decades, grew in prominence through a combination of start-stop play (which lends itself to radio broadcasting, crucial in a country with a low population density) and fixed franchises which gave professional-level teams very clear boundaries for their fanbases and marketing. Soccer in Europe, with it's high population densities, didn't have as many technical hurdles or as strong demand for regional monopolies that has been customary in the US.

Another new invention for the American sports system was the promotion and relegation system and not a closed league that baseball used and that other sports would have. That together with the opportunity for afro-americans to play made the sport big in many places

One of the reasons fixed franchises have been popular in American sports is the early rise of professionalism, which created a very strong financial incentive for keeping fixed pieces of turf. Fixed franchisees is probably the main reason that the sports infrastructure in the US is so extensively developed across several different sports. If a promotion and relegation system is used, it will encourage regional confederations more, certainly, but also create a downward pressure of teams unlike what happened with baseball.

In 1912 the leaguesystem settled down and became even more organized. Inside the different federation lower leagues grew. The North east federation had the following system:
First division 10 teams, 2 relegated
Second division 10 teams, 2 promoted and 1 relegated, 1 team played playoff to stay in the league
Third division that was the lowest federationrun 10 teams, 2 promoted, 1 playing promotion playoff and 2 relegated.
Below the third division there were divisions from each state.
New York state had the following system:
Forth division New York upstate and downstate
Fith division east, west south and north New York

This many divisions, at the regional level, is going to really strain the expansion of the league.

A final note:
I realize that English isn't your first language, so it would be a good idea to get a beta reader to help fix grammatical and spelling mistakes. It can make a story hard for English speakers to read, doubly so for non-native speakers.

Anyway, I'll read through the remainder and hope to see what you'll be doing to make soccer wildly successful in the US :).
 

FDW

Banned
I concur with Hunam here, your premise just does not fit at all with the realities of North American Sports in the early 20th Century, for the reasons stated above. Still, I congratulate you for at least trying to make the effort.
 
i appreciate the inputs, and you are right. I dont know enough about the racial tentions even in the EU as it is. I am trying to have the sport work in the USA.

With leagues i mean that they are integrated once it was time for playoff, but for logistical reasons they were separate in the regular play.

I think i know to little about US sports history in general, but i will continue this until today.

Who knows, might we see hooligans turn up during the Vietnamwar and firms deciding the presidential race in 1980? Will gans have their own firms?
 

FDW

Banned
i appreciate the inputs, and you are right. I dont know enough about the racial tentions even in the EU as it is. I am trying to have the sport work in the USA.

With leagues i mean that they are integrated once it was time for playoff, but for logistical reasons they were separate in the regular play.

I think i know to little about US sports history in general, but i will continue this until today.

Who knows, might we see hooligans turn up during the Vietnamwar and firms deciding the presidential race in 1980? Will gans have their own firms?

If you do a third version of this, you should try and look at the histories of the MLB, NFL, NHL, and NBA to get a better idea for how N. American Soccer (Association Football) will develop.
 
If you do a third version of this, you should try and look at the histories of the MLB, NFL, NHL, and NBA to get a better idea for how N. American Soccer (Association Football) will develop.

I think that if i continue this to the end i will not make another one since this took more time than expected and that my ideas are starting to run out
 
I felt that i was way in over my head and have decided to end the story with this post

Part 5: Unification 1960 – 1971
During the 60ths the unification of the league went smoothly, but some minor teams quit when the gap between the top and the bottom became to much. During the Vietnam war protest were also in the stands and the first acts of hooliganism began in Chicago during the DNC convention when the Chicago FC had a home game in the second division. Gangs all over the usa began to support teams and started firms.


Part 6: A time of crisis 1972 – 1981

The oilcrisis ment that some teams had financial troubles and just as during the great depression many teams were lost. in 1978 USA reached the final in the world cup only to loose to Argentina.


Part 7: Reaching for glory 1982 – 1995

In 1984 the top league was made the Coca-Cola Championship. In 1986 USA hosted the world cup and won after beating Argentina in the final and injuring Maradona when he tried to repeat the Hand of God. In 1990 they won again. Competition grew between Europe and USA as the money flowed


Part 8: A truly open market 1996- 2000

The Bossman verdict ment that players without contract could go to other teams for free. Many players in South America choosed USA over Spain, England and Italy.

Part 9: In the shadow of the towers 2001 - 2010

The attacks ment that the league had to deal with players choosing military over football.
 

FDW

Banned
Still, I hope you do come back to this idea some day, it would be interesting to see what you could with this if you try again with more knowledge N.American sports.
 
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