Generation Zero

Founding Fathers, Hidden Histories
and the Making of Soccer in America

Generation Zero

Founding Fathers, Hidden Histories
and the Making of Soccer in America

Listen Up, U.S. soccer fans: Generation Zero now Available via Audio Book

By |2024-05-22T14:02:33-04:00May 22nd, 2024|GZ blog|

The audio version of Generation Zero, the best-selling U.S. soccer history from author Hal Phillips, is now available via Amazon, alongside its print and eBook editions. Published by Dickinson-Moses Press and released in July 2022, Generation Zero: Founding Fathers, Hidden Histories & The Making of Soccer in America details the game’s unlikely modern ascent, during the 1970s and ‘80s, after a century of false starts. Featuring period imagery from USMNT photographer Jon van Woerden, GZ is the definitive account of [...]

Irresistable Grant Wahl Delivers Billion Dollar Goal, From the Grave

By |2023-12-12T09:24:21-05:00December 11th, 2023|GZ blog|

It’s been exactly a year since Grant Wahl was taken from us, so the timing of his posthumous Paramount+ project, The Billion Dollar Goal, which debuts tonight, could not resonate more strongly with fans of U.S. soccer. That goes double for me, because this docuseries covers much the same ground showcased in my July 2022 book, Generation Zero: Founding Fathers, Hidden Histories & The Making of American Soccer. Grant was one of GZ’s first readers and in many ways its [...]

Like Riding a Bike: Garnacho Stirs Memories of Wonder Strikes Past 

By |2024-01-10T09:14:46-05:00November 30th, 2023|GZ blog|

Garnacho’s wondrous overhead golazo against Everton on Nov. 26 reminded the world soccer community of why we find the bicycle kick so damned compelling. It remains the most dynamic, daringly athletic maneuver in a game replete with them, and it doesn’t matter where on the pitch they might happen. Check out the images attached here. Defenders of all skill levels react similarly when someone goes up for a bike: They back away slightly, because recklessly contesting may mean a boot [...]

Emma Hayes Will Preside over Massive USWNT Change. Expect Fireworks

By |2023-11-28T14:48:06-05:00November 20th, 2023|GZ blog|

Color me extremely curious when it comes to Emma Hayes’ pending tenure as head coach of the U.S. Women’s National Team. She won’t take the helm until spring, when her season with Chelsea FC has concluded. Still, the timing of her hire drips with big-picture import, none of which has anything to do with pay equity (though it IS diverting to note that, because she will make exactly the same as her USMNT counterpart, we ‘ve learned that $475,000 [...]

Greenland to Join CONCACAF? Someone Should Warn Them

By |2024-02-29T16:09:05-05:00September 4th, 2023|GZ blog|

Welcome, Greenlandic soccer players, supporters and administrators! Your May 2022 application to join the Confederation of North American, Central American and Caribbean Association Football is duly noted here and across the diverse climatic environs of CONCACAF. Yes: The acronym is unfortunate. Perhaps because those letters had never before been thrown together, in such a poorly branded sequence, until Sept. 18, 1961. That’s when the North American Football Confederation merged with the Confederación Centroamericana y del Caribe de Fútbol. Still, [...]

USWNT Fends off Alumnae Expectations ahead of Swedish Encounter

By |2024-01-21T10:29:52-05:00August 5th, 2023|GZ blog|

Soccer and the national team movement, here in the United States, have stumbled into very new territory Down Under, and I’m not talking about a lackluster group-stage performance. Not entirely. While the U.S. Women’s National Team (USWNT) has failed to win World Cups and Olympic titles in the past, their rare missteps have never produced such widespread carping from former national team players. I’d frankly prefer Carli Lloyd talk more about how World Cup debutante Portugal — ranked no. 21 [...]

RIP, Hubie Vogelsinger: Youth Soccer Revolutionary, Icon & Enabler

By |2024-01-05T11:29:28-05:00June 28th, 2023|GZ blog|

Video evidence of the 1974 World Cup was not made available to me until July 1977. That was the summer I first attended overnight soccer camp, a veritable rite of passage for me and so many fellow members of Generation Zero, those American boys and girls born in the 1960s, then raised in the 1970s as this country’s very first soccer natives. The Puma All-Star Soccer Camp, where I matriculated three straight summers, was owned and operated by Hubert Vogelsinger, [...]

Only Now Recovering from ‘Berhalter Fatigue’? Time to Buckle Back Up

By |2023-06-29T15:53:14-04:00March 27th, 2023|GZ blog|

My own case of Berhalter Fatigue kicked in around Dec. 17, 2022 — a day before the World Cup final, 10 days into the Berhalter-Reyna Family Barbecue, and two weeks after Holland dumped the U.S. Men’s National Soccer Team (USMNT) out of the tournament. The tawdry nature of Berhalter’s unprecedented bust-up with the Reynas could not be fully understood until last week, when the U.S. Soccer Federation released its third-party report. No one emerges unscathed from this full and seemingly [...]

USMNT Progress Plan: Keep Crowd-Sourcing Roster Development. In Europe

By |2022-12-30T15:08:18-05:00December 19th, 2022|GZ blog|

When America plays host to the next World Cup, alongside Mexico and Canada, it will likely field the most talented men’s squad ever trotted out by the U.S. Soccer Federation. And yet, to hear many American soccer fans tell it, our competitive place in the world game remains shamefully uncertain. Ambiguity, it seems, is a poor fit for cultures accustomed to hegemony. Internationally, futbol observers do agree the U.S. has finally amassed a bumper crop of young, potentially game-changing talent. [...]

GZ: The Modern Creation Epic American Soccer Didn’t Know It Had

By |2023-02-02T15:15:57-05:00July 10th, 2022|GZ blog|

Baseball has its Knickerbockers and the 19th century National League, while basketball traces its roots back to Dr. John Naismith and his peach baskets. With Generation Zero, the new sociological/sports history from author Hal Phillips, American soccer finally has a Creation story to call its own — a modern one, befitting the extraordinary growth the game has undergone since 1970, after a full century in the wilderness. Generation Zero: Founding Fathers, Hidden Histories & The Making of Soccer in America (Dickinson-Moses Press, [...]

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