did you watch the original nasl

well your poll/ thread ask three different questions.

I remember the old NASL and I watched a couple NASL games as a kid but only when I visited my family in Tampa. I wouldn't really considered myself as a fan though.

so not sure how to anwser

 

I answered like the poll asked, I do remember NASL, I went to maybe 2 Diplomats games, I wasn't a fan.

 

I was born right after the league folded. But growing up playing soccer I always heard about the Strikers and how Pele used to play in the league etc. etc.

 

I went to Chiefs games, a couple each of indoor and outdoor. I watched them on TV and listened on the radio. I also watched NASL games on TVS and ABC, and CBS, when they would show games. We didn't have cable, so I couldn't see the games on ESPN and USA.

 

Had season tickets for the Strikers and used to watch televised league games on TVS and ABC. I followed the NASL a lot more closely than I do MLS, probably because I had a local team.

 

i was a young kid when NASL folded but i wouldn't have been a youth soccer player and now a soccer fan if it wasn't for the NASL...

 

No, because I grew up in Europe and over there they did not really care about the NASL

 

I don't remember ever going to an NASL match. Too young, I guess. What league were the LA Salsa in? I think they were in the first soccer match I ever saw on TV.

 

The first sporting event I remember going to was the Whitecaps vs. Dallas Tornado in 1978 at Empire Stadium.

 

went to the Old Toronto Blizzard games at Exhibition Stadium then Varsity stadium before the league went under..If was great soccer for the time
the league just spent way too much on players salaries.

 

I was 11 when I saw Pele come into the league in 75. I never went to any games but i watched all the Cosmos games on TV until 1984.

I missed the league until MLS was born in 1996.

 

Yes. I was a teenager in Detroit. I followed the Detroit Express for their short existence... Trevor Francis, Gus Moffat, Keith Furphy. I went to a couple games at the Pontiac Plasticdome. I still have one of the Kick magazine game programs - circa 1979ish (it's in a box, so I'm not sure of the exact date).

I even played a few pre-game youth exibitions with my U-16 team prior to some of the indoor games also played at the Silvedome.

With the NASL, there was no real predecessor to comapre to, so I thought it was great. In reality, the quality of play was probably close to the current NASL. MLS is liekly a better level of play.

I also remember the game being played on that awful, produce-department-like, astro-turf. The field was little more than 55 yeard wide... the ball would run out of touch often on that fast, narrow pitch. The English players, and there were plenty on loan from the English 2nd and 3rd division, would try a slide tackle on that fake turf and wind up with huge rug burns. They would do that once, then never again... so the player's fear of a painful rug burn may have also detracted from the style of play.

It was amusing. It's nastolgic to look back. Ultimately, I'm happy that we've upgraded since then. Still, the old NASL helped put soccer on the map in the US.

 

What I remember from interviews with the european players is that the paychecks were very good and the astroturf very painful

 

I was a big Aztecs fan. Heck I even got plastered a time or two with George Best. I used to drink at his bar in Hermosa Beach. At the time it was called Besties. Now it is called the Underground. BTW the day Bestie died the Best Coat of Arms which was on the wall fell off. True story

 

BTW the LA Salsa was one of the original USL teams in the old A League

 

I went to a few Atlanta Chiefs games at Fulton County Stadium. I couldn't have been more than 5, but I remember going there and thinking it was a big deal. I have a poloroid somewhere of me on a very mustached George Nanchoff who I thought was the greatest player in the universe because he took a picture with me. I had an NASL lamp in my bedroom, that was basically a plastic NASL ball with a lampshade through it. I remember going with my mom to the mall and getting it at either Richs or JCPenney. I didn't pick it out or say I wanted it, my mom was just decorating my room and figured the room needed a lamp and that was the one to have. I think I had it for about 15 years. I wish I still did!

 

Aztec fan and loved our other LA Darby vs California Surf.. Managed to catch some SD Kickers games and went to the Soccer Bowl in SD , which I think was the Cosmos vs. Seattle..
Watch the Aztecs move to the ROse Bowl, then to the Colisseum , where they then died.
Always good teams, but never drew really well except for the 4th of July game and could never make the finals in the time I watched.
Shootouts from 35 yard line etc..
I prefer MLS by a landside

 

Another big Aztecs fan. Saw them at ELAC (East LA College), the Coliseum, then the Rose Bowl, but boycotted the team the last year in '81 when they moved back to the Coliseum & got rid of orange as the team color. They tried to go Brazilian & went tits up instead. Even got to be part of the color guard in '78 when Best presented Pele with an award. Got Best's & about seven other Aztec players' autographs & got to shake hands with Beckenbauer, which was a dream come true for a 12 year old kid back then.

The Aztecs had Rinus Michels as coach for the '79 & '80 seasons, and players like George Best, Steve David, Charlie Cooke, Bob Rigby, and then Johan Cruyff, Javier Aguirre, Poli Garcia, Mihalj Keri, Chris Dangerfield, Wim Suubier, Luis Fernando, John McGrane, & Bobby Sibbald put on the orange (& blue).

 

I remember coming home from work and my Dad says " who is Johan Cruyff?"
He was on the front page of the paper. I went to his first game, I believe it was against Rocherster Lancers ( gets blury now) his first 2 shots on goal were goals...