Memphis Rogues (1978-1980)

North American Soccer League (1978-1980)

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Memphis Rogues NASL
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The Rogues, Memphis’ first proper pro soccer team, were arguably more popular as an indoor soccer team at the Mid-South Coliseum for one glorious winter during the winter of 1979-80 than they ever were playing outdoors at the Liberty Bowl. 

This was the Golden Era of dopey cartoon logos in American soccer and the Rogues really went for it with their crazy-eyed, cleat-wearing pachyderm.

 

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Background

The Memphis Rogues were North American Soccer League (1968-1984) club that lasted for three outdoor seasons and one indoor campaign between 1978 and 1980.   The NASL added six expansion teams added during a fit of exuberance in the winter of 1977-78.  League investors later came to regret the expansion push as all six of the 1978 expansion clubs, including the Rogues, either folded or moved by the end of 1980.

The Rogues were notably weak as an outdoor club with a 30-62 record over three seasons, including a league-worst 6-24 record during the 1979 season.  But the Rogues did find an unexpected niche playing indoor soccer.  The NASL experimented with a winter indoor season in 1979-80 and the Rogues were the surprise of the league, going 9-3 and advancing to the championship series, where they lost to the Tampa Bay Rowdies.  Memphians, by and large disinterested in the Rogues’ outdoor matches at the Liberty Bowl, packed the Mid-South Coliseum to the tune of 8,200 fans per game for indoor matches.

Unfortunately, the Rogues’ indoor phenomenon would last for only one winter.

Move To Calgary & Aftermath

In 1980, original owner Harry Mangurian sold the Rogues to Avron Fogelman, owner of the Memphis Chicks minor league baseball team. Fogelman ran the club for just one season and then sold it to Vancouver real estate speculator Nelson Skalbania in September 1980. Skalbania moved the team to Calgary, where the franchise lasted one more season as the Calgary Boomers before folding in September 1981.

Soon after the Rogues left town, the rival Major Indoor Soccer League moved in and placed a franchise in the Mid-South Coliseum, hoping to recapture the enthusiasm from the Rogues one and only indoor season.  The MISL’s Memphis Americans lasted for three seasons from 1981 to 1984.

Voices

“I flew down to Tennessee around New Year’s 1978 and met the guy who was running <the Rogues> – Bill Marcum. Marcum was from Tampa, where he helped get the NFL to expand there in 1976. He convinced a guy named Harry Mangurian, who was a horse breeder and owned the Buffalo Braves of the NBA, that he should buy the soccer team in Memphis. Marcum hired me on New Year’s Eve for the Rogues marketing and PR job, but he was drunk. When I called him a couple days later to get my airplane ticket, he’d forgotten who I was. Which gives you a hint of what was to come.

The Rogues were out of control. In Memphis I was constantly getting calls from the police to come down and get the boys out of jail. We had a theme song called ‘The Rambling Rogues of Memphis’. The theme of the song was Off the field and on the field, we’re the Rambling Rogues . The English players in particular were just wild.”

-Rudi Schiffer, VP of Operations & Public Relations 1978-1980 (2012 FWiL Interview)

“The biggest moment in Memphis Rogues history – and one of the best in soccer history, really – was when the Cosmos came to town with that All-World Cup team of theirs, Franz Beckenbauer, Giorgio Chinaglia, Carlos Alberto.  They came down here just expecting to beat the hell out of us.  It was the Rogues first season and we were something like 1- 10 at the time.

What the Cosmos didn’t realize was that the Liberty Bowl pitch was only 56 yards wide.  It wasn’t the 70 yards that they were used to. We packed it up in the back and just played defense and frustrated ‘em.  They were getting angry. We had an English player named Phil Holder who was about 5’ 6”. Carlos Alberto was so frustrated he came up kicked Phil right in the groin and got thrown out.

Late in the game, we had a young kid from Chelsea named David Stride. Speedy kid with a great left foot. The key of the game was Stridey took off down the left wing, took it deep in the corner, and crossed it into the middle. At the top of the box was Tony Field who had played for the Cosmos the year before. They didn’t want him any more and we got him in a trade. He put a one-timer right in the back of the net and we beat the Cosmos 1-0. It was shocking.”

-Rudi Schiffer

Memphis Rogues Shop

Editor's Pick

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Rock n' Roll Soccer

The Short Life and Fast Times of the North American Soccer League

by Ian Plenderleith

The North American Soccer League – at its peak in the late 1970s – presented soccer as performance, played by men with a bent for flair, hair and glamour. More than just Pelé and the New York Cosmos, it lured the biggest names of the world game like Johan Cruyff, Franz Beckenbauer, Eusebio, Gerd Müller and George Best to play the sport as it was meant to be played-without inhibition, to please the fans.

The first complete look at the ambitious, star-studded NASL, Rock ‘n’ Roll Soccer reveals how this precursor to modern soccer laid the foundations for the sport’s tremendous popularity in America today. 

 

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In Memoriam

Goalkeeper Bob Stetler (Rogues ’80) died in a car accident in July 1990. Stetler was 38 years old.

Original Rogues owner Harry Mangurian passed away on October 19, 2008 at age 81.

Downloads

2012 Fun While It Lasted interview with former Rogues exective Rudi Schiffer

Links

Andy Northern’s Memphis Rogues History Blog

North American Soccer League Media Guides

North American Soccer League Programs

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