The Captains, holding hands with the mascots,
leading the teams out: Frankie Hejduk of Columbus,
and Juan Pablo Ángel of New York
November 23, 2008: For the 1st time in their history, the New York Red Bulls of Major League Soccer reach the Final of the MLS Cup. It doesn't go so well.
The Red Bulls were a founding member of MLS in 1996, using the name of the New York/New Jersey MetroStars until 2005. In 2006, they were bought by Red Bull, the Austrian soft-drink maker, and rebranded as Red Bull New York. The American media, while sometimes using the initials "RBNY," usually sticks to North American convention, calling them "the New York Red Bulls" or just "the Red Bulls," and the initials "NYRB."
Fans of the team's original rivals, Washington-based D.C. United, call them "The Pink Cows." Many New York fans have resisted the rebranding, and still wear their old MetroStars shirts to games, and refer to the team as "Metro" for short, as they always had.
Under any name, they had not reached the MLS Cup Final until 2008. Their closest call was a trip to the Semifinals, in 2000. But, in 2008, under manager Juan Carlos Osorio, with Captain Juan Pablo Ángel, a fellow Colombian, as leading scorer, they finished 5th in the Eastern Conference, beat the Houston Dynamo in the Quarterfinals, and beat Real Salt Lake in the Semifinals.
The Final was to be held on neutral ground, at the Home Depot Center, in the Los Angeles suburb of Carson, California. This is no longer done: Since 2011, the Final has been held at the home of the team with the better regular-season record.
The opponent was the Columbus Crew, another charter member of MLS, also in their 1st Final, winners of the Supporters' Shield for best overall record in the regular season, and seeking the 1st league championship for any major league team from Columbus, Ohio, ever -- unless you count the Columbus Bullies, who won the Championship of the 3rd American Football League in 1940 and '41. (That league folded due to World War II. The AFL of the 1960s was the 4th league with the name. And the NHL's Columbus Blue Jackets have rarely done well.)
The game kicked off at 3:30 PM, Eastern Time. It was scoreless for the 1st half-hour, but Alejandro Moreno put the Crew on the board in the 31st minute, and it was 1-0 Columbus at halftime. John Wolyniec, popular with Metro fans as he was a local boy made good, from Staten Island, tied the game in the 51st.
But just 2 minutes later, the Crew went back ahead, on a goal by Chad Marshall. The Crew's Captain, Frankie Hejduk, put the game away in the 82nd. Final score: Crew 3, Red Bulls 1. Guillermo Barros Schelotto, an Argentine of Italian descent, assisted on all 3 Columbus goals, and was named the game's Most Valuable Player, as he had been for the league in the regular season.
Having previously won it with the Los Angeles Galaxy in 2002, Siegfried "Sigi" Schmid became the first manager to win the MLS Cup with two different teams. Before the founding of MLS, Schmid led UCLA to the College Cup, the NCAA Championship for men's soccer, 3 times.
Born in Germany, and raised in Southern California, Schmid then left the Crew to become the 1st manager of the revived Seattle Sounders, and returned to the Galaxy before heart trouble forced him to retire. He and Bruce Arena, due to both men having "coaching trees" that extend throughout MLS, are known as "the godfathers of American soccer." Sigi died on Christmas Day 2018, at the age of 65. Within weeks, MLS renamed its Coach of the Year award for him.
Schmid remains a beloved figure in the league. The Crew were favored to win the game. And no one has ever alleged that they used unfair tactics to win, or that the referees blatantly favored them. So Red Bull fans don't begrudge the Crew the win, or consider them to be a rival team. (The Red Bulls have enough rivals: In descending order of hate, D.C. United, New York City FC, the Philadelphia Union, the New England Revolution, and the LA Galaxy.) Still, the fact that the MetroStars/Red Bulls have, through 2022, played 27 seasons and reached only 1 MLS Cup Final, and lost it, is galling.
The Red Bulls crashed in 2009, putting together the worst record in the League. It was their last season on the hard artificial turf, and in front of the vast unsold seats, at Giants Stadium in the Meadowlands of East Rutherford, Bergen County, New Jersey. In 2010, they moved to a venue over which they had ownership and control: Red Bull Arena, in Harrison, Hudson County, New Jersey, across the Passaic River from Newark, the State's largest city, and closer to their fan base of Irish, Italians, Portuguese, Brazilians, and various Latin American ethnicities in the Newark-Harrison-Kearny corridor.
The Red Bulls, more often than not, have reached the MLS Cup Quarterfinals. But, since 2008, they have only reached the Semifinals in 2014, '15 and '18, and never again reached the Final. Nor have they ever won the American version of the FA Cup, the U.S. Open Cup, losing the Final in 2003 and 2017. They have won the Supporters' Shield, for best overall record in the MLS regular season, in 2013, '15 and '18, so they are not without trophies.
But they are known for their postseason collapses, losing games to teams they were favored to beat. Of the original 10 MLS teams, 9 are still in existence, and 6 of those have won at least 1 MLS Cup. The Red Bulls are not one of them.
To make matters worse, there are teams that have been founded since that lone Finals appearance that have won it, including, to Metro fans' horror, New York City FC, an expansion team that began play at Yankee Stadium in 2015, and winning it in 2021. The Red Bulls have dominated the regular-season series between them, but don't have an MLS Cup. "The Smurfs" (for their light blue uniforms) have one.
With all the resources at their disposal -- they are owned 80 percent by Manchester City, and 20 percent by the Yankees -- they should have reached more than 1 Final by now. But then, with all the resources at their disposal -- Red Bull aren't exactly hurting for cash, and they're also in the New York market -- so should the Red Bulls.
*
November 23, 2008 was a Sunday. Baseball was out of season. These NFL games were played that day:
* The New York Giants beat the Arizona Cardinals, 37-29 at University of Phoenix Stadium (now State Farm Stadium) in the Phoenix suburb of Glendale, California.
* The New York Jets beat the Tennessee Titans, 34-13 at LP Field (now Nissan Stadium) in Nashville.
* The Baltimore Ravens beat the Philadelphia Eagles, 36-7 at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia.
* The Atlanta Falcons beat the Carolina Panthers, 45-28 at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta.
* The Minnesota Vikings beat the Jacksonville Jaguars, 30-12 at Jacksonville Municipal Stadium (now EverBank Stadium.)
* The New England Patriots beat the Miami Dolphins, 48-28 at Dolphin Stadium (now Hard Rock Stadium) in Miami Gardens, Florida.
* The Houston Texans beat the Cleveland Browns, 16-6 at Cleveland Browns Stadium (now Huntington Bank Field).
* The Tampa Bay Buccaneers beat the Detroit Lions, 38-20 at Ford Field in Detroit.
* The Chicago Bears beat the St. Louis Rams, 27-3 at the Edward Jones Dome (now The Dome at America's Center) in St. Louis.
* The Buffalo Bills beat the Kansas City Chiefs, 54-31 at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City.
* The Oakland Raiders beat the Denver Broncos, 31-10 at Invesco Field at Mile High (now Empower Field at Mile High).
* The Indianapolis Colts beat the San Diego Chargers, 23-20 at Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego.
* The Dallas Cowboys beat the San Francisco 49ers, 35-22 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco.
* The Washington Redskins beat the Seattle Seahawks, 20-17 at Qwest Field (now Lumen Field) in Seattle.
* The preceding Thursday, the Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Cincinnati Bengals, 27-10 at Paul Brown Stadium (now Paycor Stadium) in Cincinnati.
* And the next night, on ESPN Monday Night Football, the New Orleans Saints beat the Green Bay Packers, 51-29 at Lambeau Field in Green Bay.
There were 5 games played in the NBA:
* The Philadelphia 76ers beat the Golden State Warriors, 89-81 at the Wachovia Center (now the Xfinity Mobile Arena) in Philadelphia.
* The Boston Celtics beat the Toronto Raptors, 118-103 at the Air Canada Centre (now the Scotiabank Arena) in Toronto.
* The Minnesota Timberwolves beat the Detroit Pistons, 106-80 at The Palace in the Detroit suburb of Auburn Hills, Michigan.
* The Denver Nuggets beat the Chicago Bulls, 114-101 at the Pepsi Center (now the Ball Arena) in Denver.
* And the Los Angeles Lakers beat the Sacramento Kings, 118-108 at the Staples Center (now the Crypto.com Arena) in Los Angeles.
There were 2 games played in the NHL. New York wasn't more successful in either of them, but New Jersey was: The New Jersey Devils beat the Tampa Bay Lightning, 7-3 at the St. Pete Times Forum (now the Benchmark International Arena) in Tampa. Dainius Zubrus scored 4 goals for the Devils. In the other game, the Nashville Predators beat the Carolina Hurricanes, 5-2 at the RBC Center (now the Lenovo Center) in Raleigh, North Carolina.
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