August 17, 1996: A new season begins in England's Premier League. North meets East in a London derby, as Arsenal FC defeat West Ham United, 2-0 at the Arsenal Stadium, a.k.a. Highbury, in North London. John Hartson scores the 1st goal, and wins a penalty for the 2nd, converted by Dennis Bergkamp.
This was the 1st match for West Ham for Portuguese winger Paulo Futre, who had starred in his homeland for FC Porto, and in Spain for Atlético Madrid. He had spent the previous season with Italian giants AC Milan, but was injured, and made only 1 appearance. The Hammers picked him up on a free transfer.
He was given uniform Number 16. This was only 3 years after English football stopped assigning squad numbers based on position, 1 through 11, with substitutes wearing numbers 12, 14 and 15 -- rarely 13, as it was seen as an unlucky number. So 16 was still considered an unusual number for a footballer to wear in club play, as opposed to international play, where squad numbers went from 1 to 23. Under the new format, if a player was wearing 16, it was because 1 through 11 were already taken up by starters, and 16 was available, and he would have to wait his chance; or, he wanted it for some reason.
Futre didn't want to wear 16. Depending on whose story you believe, either his English was bad, and he responded to every argument with, "Me Futre. Me wear Number 10"; or, his English (if not his perception of his own talent) was very good, and he said, "Futre 10, not 16. Eusébio: 10. Maradona: 10. Pelé: 10. Futre: 10, not fucking 16."
Harry Redknapp, then the Hammers' manager, later said, "At first, we tried to tell him that we had sold so many replicas with 'FUTRE 16' on the back that it would be impossible to change, but he called our bluff.
"'How many?' he asked. 'I will pay £100,000.' And that was when I knew this was an argument we could not win: Futre was willing to spend £100,000 just to be Number 10. In the end, he got it a lot cheaper: John Moncur, the Number 10, agreed to swap, and Paulo let him have two weeks in his villa in the Algarve, which is about the best one there, on the cliffs overlooking the best golf course."
For the record, £100,000 in 1996 is equivalent, with inflation, to roughly £211,000 in 2022, or about $286,000 with the current exchange rate. And it had only been 33 years since the abolition of the Football League's £20 maximum wage. Yet Futre wanted the number badly enough to show that it wasn't about the money, already a rarity for a major footballer. The Algarve is southernmost Portugal, where the Gulf of Cádiz flows into the Atlantic Ocean.
And what did West Ham, and Futre, get out of all of this? Competitively speaking, a fiasco: Between injuries, insubordination, and benching due to poor performance, "Me Futre" (as he will forever be known in the East End) played just 9 matches for the Hammers, scoring exactly zero goals. He was washed up, and was dumped back to Atlético Madrid after the single season. The Hammers finished 14th, and were knocked out of the FA Cup in the 3rd Round, and the League Cup in the 4th.
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August 17, 1996 was a Saturday. These Major League Baseball games were played:
* The New York Yankees lost to the Seattle Mariners, 10-3 at Yankee Stadium. Jamie Moyer was the winning pitcher, while Kenny Rogers, the weak link in the Yankee rotation with David Cone still sidelined, couldn't get an out in the 4th inning. The M's got home runs from 3 expected sources: Ken Griffey Jr., Alex Rodriguez and, 8 months after an episode of Seinfeld helped make his 1988 trade away from the Yankees look even worse, Jay Buhner. The Yankees got a home run from Bernie Williams. Rookie Derek Jeter went 0-for-4.
* The New York Mets beat the San Diego Padres, 7-3 at Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego. Tony Gwynn went 3-for-5 with 2 RBIs.
* The Boston Red Sox beat the California Angels, 6-0 at Fenway Park in Boston. Roger Clemens pitched a 7-hit shutout. Two months later, Sox general manager Dan Duquette would refuse to offer Clemens a new contract, saying Clemens was in "the twilight of his career."
* The San Francisco Giants beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 8-4 at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia. Barry Bonds hit a home run.
* The Atlanta Braves beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 7-1 at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium.
* The Cleveland Indians beat the Detroit Tigers, 6-3 at Jacobs Field (now Progressive Field) in Cleveland.
* The Cincinnati Reds swept a doubleheader from the Colorado Rockies, 5-3 and 9-5 at Cinergy Field (formerly Riverfront Stadium) in Cincinnati.
* The Chicago Cubs beat the Houston Astros, 12-3 at Wrigley Field in Chicago.
* The Chicago White Sox beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 6-2 at Milwaukee County Stadium.
* The Minnesota Twins beat the Toronto Blue Jays, 11-1 at the Metrodome in Minneapolis.
* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Florida Marlins, 4-3 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis.
* The Kansas City Royals beat the Texas Rangers, 4-1 at The Ballpark (now Choctaw Stadium) in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas.
* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Montreal Expos, 7-6 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.
* And the Oakland Athletics beat the Baltimore Orioles, 3-1 at the Oakland Coliseum. Cal Ripken went 0-for-4.
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