New York Red Bulls

Team information

Inaugural season: 1996

Home field: Red Bull Arena

Owner: Red Bull GmbH

Team colors: Red, blue, yellow, white

Overview

The New York Red Bulls men’s professional soccer team is based in Harrison, New Jersey, rather than the state that gives the club its name. It is one of two MLS teams in the New York metropolitan area; the other is New York City Football Club. Owned by the Red Bull beverage company, its home is Red Bull Stadium. This Major League Soccer (MLS) club is a member of the Eastern Conference. It has made more than twenty playoff appearances and one MLS Cup appearance. The Red Bulls are six-time conference champions.

The club has a long history. It was first established as the NY/NJ MetroStars. From 2002 to 2005, the team was simply MetroStars. In 2006 it was rebranded to reflect new ownership and the team crest of two red bulls charging toward one another was introduced. It is one of several soccer clubs around the world owned by Red Bull; some others are in Austria, Brazil, and Germany.

History

While soccer has been a professional sport in the United States since the late nineteenth century, only in the late twentieth century did it become a national sport. The North American Soccer League and the American Professional Soccer League are among the most notable professional men’s leagues. It was not widely known or watched until 1988, when the United States won the right to host the 1994 FIFA World Cup. More Americans became interested in the sport, and organizers set out to capitalize on this interest by forming a new national league, Major League Soccer (MLS).

The New York Red Bulls is one of the original MLS clubs. The franchise is one of ten that competed in the inaugural season in 1996. Others were centered around Boston, Massachusetts; Tampa Bay, Florida; Washington, DC; Los Angeles and San Jose, California; Dallas, Texas; Columbus, Ohio; Denver, Colorado; and Kansas City in Kansas and Missouri. MLS teams are owned by the league rather than individuals or groups. Investor-operators who are league shareholders run the clubs.

The New York Red Bulls club was created in 1994. John Kluge and Stuart Subotnick were the investor/operators. The business moguls were partners in Metromedia Company, which at various times owned multiple television and radio stations, Orion Pictures, the Ice Capades, and the Harlem Globetrotters. Forbes reported in 1987 that Kluge, an immigrant from Germany, was the richest man in the United States. Subotnick, president and chief executive officer of Metromedia Company, Inc., as of 2021, was reported to be one of the country’s four hundred richest people in 1999. The team name was a reference to the operators’ company.

The club called Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, home until 2009. Then known as the New York/New Jersey MetroStars, the fledgling club drew tremendous interest thanks in part to its respected coach, Eddie Firmani, and famous athletes. Among these were Tab Ramos, who had played in Mexico and Spain; Tony Meola and Peter Vermes, who had World Cup experience; Giovanni Savarese from Venezuela; and Italian players Nicola Caricola and Roberto Donadoni.

Fans of the sport believed the club would be the star of the league. The first game on April 13, 1996, pitted the East Coast team against the Los Angeles Galaxy in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. The MetroStars lost 2–1. The next game was at home in New Jersey against the New England Revolution in front of forty-six thousand fans. The match was tied 0–0 as the clock was running out. If neither team was winning at the end of regulation play, the game would go into shootout to break the draw. A shootout is a penalty kick competition. Each team gets five shots, or attempts to kick the ball into the net, which is defended only by the opposing team’s goalkeeper. The team with the most goals wins the match. With only seconds left, a New England player aimed a shot at the MetroStars’ net. Defensive player Caricola attempted to kick the ball away, but instead it rolled into his team’s net. This “own goal” gave the game to the Revolution. This disaster seemed to determine the course of the season. As 1996 wore on and the MetroStars piled up losses, fans began to refer to “the Curse of Caricola.” Coach Firmani resigned in the middle of the season. His replacement, Carlos Queiroz, left in December to coach in Japan. The club finished the year with a record of 15–17, enough to make the playoffs, but were eliminated early. Years passed, and the club missed championship victories over and over. The NY/NY club did not win any sort of award until 2013, when the team received the Supporters’ Shield for having the best regular season record based on the league’s points system.

Red Bull GmbH originally tried to create an MLS expansion club that would be based within New York City. This would have entailed buying out MetroStars’ regional territorial rights. Further complicating the effort was the lack of available land to build a stadium in the city. Purchasing MetroStars was the most logical decision. With the sale in 2006, the club’s territorial rights to a second franchise in the area reverted to MLS. The new owners fired coach Mo Johnston in the middle of the season and brought in Bruce Arena, a native of Brooklyn. Arena most recently had been head coach of the US national team, and soon brought national team captain Claudio Reyna and Colombian football star Juan Pablo Angel into the Red Bull fold. Arena took the club to the 2007 MLS playoffs only to be defeated in the first round. The coach resigned two days later.

The club reached the playoffs many times without ever winning the league championship. The only seasons the Red Bulls missed the playoffs were 1997, 1999, 2002, and 2009. The club advanced again in 2021 after ending the regular season with thirteen wins, twelve losses, and nine draws.

The club appeared in the MLS Cup in 2008 when it qualified as the final team. The Red Bulls defeated the defending champion Houston Dynamo and made the semifinals, where the club defeated Real Salt Lake 1–0. In the club’s single trip to the MLS Cup as of 2020, New York fell to Columbus Crew 3–1.

In addition to winning the Supporters’ Shield in 2013, New York carried the trophy home in 2015 and 2018. The club started strong in 2015 with seven straight wins, faltered midseason, and finished strong, ending the regular season in first place in the Eastern Conference. In the Eastern Conference Final, Columbus Crew defeated New York 2–1. In 2018, the club ended a sporadic season with a league record seventy-one points. In the conference final, Atlanta United FC finished the Red Bulls 3–1.

Supporters have a repertoire of chants to rally the Red Bulls, including “Call 2 Arms” and “As Long as I’m Breathing.” Supporters’ groups occupy sections in the South Ward of Red Bull Arena. The Empire Supporters Club is older than the club itself. This group occupies Section 101, right behind the goal. Many of the members are long-haul supporters who sport MetroStars jerseys. The Garden State Ultras, who favor black attire and cheer from Section 133, originated in 2005. The Viking Army is concentrated in Section 102. Some wear Viking helmets and smear on face paint. Red digital camouflage pants are also popular. This group was formed in 2010 when the club gained players of Scandinavian heritage.

The established New York metro area team gained a rival when the New York City Football Club was added to the league. The Hudson River Derby, established in 2015, is the traditional battle. Some enthusiastic supporters on both sides have come to blows during these events. The club also counts DC United, the New England Revolution, and Philadelphia Union as rivals due to some extent to longstanding rivalries between teams in other sports.

Notable players

Some athletes who have played with the club have been discussed as being among the greatest in MLS history. Forward Thierry Henry was with New York from 2010 to 2014. He led the club to its first trophy, the 2013 Supporters’ Shield. Forward Bradley Wright-Phillips (2013–2019) was eighth in goals scored and named to the MLS Best XI, the league’s list of the year’s best eleven players, twice. The club earned three Supporters’ Shields during his tenure. He has two of the top-ten best goal-scoring seasons in league history. Tony Meola, goalkeeper from 1996 to 1998 and again in 2005 and 2006, had his best seasons with the Kansas City Wizards, when he was the 2000 league MVP among other honors. He was inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame in 2012.

Eddie Pope, another Hall of Fame honoree (2011), was a MetroStar from 2003 to 2004. He was league Defender of the Year in 1997 and a three-time MLS Cup winner. Defender Jeff Agoos, inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame in 2009, was with the club in 2005. He was the league defender of the year in 2001 and a five-time Cup winner. Dwayne De Rosario, a Red Bull in 2011, was the season’s league MVP. He is a two-time league Goal of the Year award winner and four-time Cup winner. Forward Jaime Moreno, a MetroStar in 2003, was fourth all-time in goals scored. He was the first in the league to achieve 100 goals/100 assists and is a four-time MLS Cup winner.

MLS observed its twenty-fifth anniversary in 2020. As part of the celebration, the league produced a list of its twenty-five all-time greatest players. Agoos, De Rosario, Meola, Moreno, Pope, and Wright-Phillips were included in this all-star list.

Bibliography

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Minetor, Randi. “Red Bulls Finally Change Their Luck.” Cursed in New York: Stories of the Damned in the Empire State, Rowman & Littlefield, 2015, pp. 149 – 151.

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“Red Bull New York.” Sports Ecyclopedia, 2019, sportsecyclopedia.com/mls/metros/redbullny.html. Accessed 18 Nov. 2021.

Reineking, Jim. “Opinion: Landon Donovan, Chris Wondolowski, Jaime Moreno Top Our List of the Top 25 MLS Players Ever.” USA Today, 8 Mar. 2020, www.usatoday.com/story/sports/soccer/2020/03/08/major-league-soccer-25-greatest-players-all-time/4909555002/. Accessed 19 Nov. 2021.

Straus, Brian. “MLS at 20: Epic Original Branding, Logos for the League’s First 10 Teams.” Sports Illustrated, 25 Feb. 2015, www.si.com/soccer/2015/02/25/mls-original-logos-crests-20th-season. Accessed 18 Nov. 2021.

West, Phil. “2017 MLS Supporters’ Group Field Guide: New York Red Bulls.” Major League Soccer, 28 Feb. 2017, www.mlssoccer.com/news/2017-mls-supporters-group-field-guide-new-york-red-bulls. Accessed 19 Nov. 2021.