He was revered around the planet for his wonderous ability to play the game of futbol as well as transcend his sport with his profound values and inspirational personality. Whether he played during regular season in his league overseas, or during his time playing for the futbol league here in the United States or on his game’s greatest stage where the entire world would tune in every four years, this international football legend brought his best to the pitch each time he took the field. The world said goodbye at the close of this week to that legend who is credited with expanding the game of futbol here in the U.S.
On Thursday, world renowned soccer legend
Pele, who full name is Edson Arantes do Nascimento, who became known simply as
“The King of the Beautiful Game” passed away from complications from multiple
organ failure from colon cancer. He was 82 years old.
Just six days earlier, the Albert Einstein
Israelite Hospital in Morumbi, Sao Paulo, Brazil where Pele, who was named FIFA
Player of the Century in 2000 was being treated made a statement that his
tumor, that he had surgically removed from the right side of his colon in
September 2021 had advanced and required “greater care related to renal and
cardiac dysfunctions.”
Pele’s funeral is scheduled for this
Monday and Tuesday Jan. 2 and 3, 2023 at Santos’ Stadium in Brazil. Following
the funeral, Pele will be laid to rest at Memorial Necropole Ecumenica in
Santo, Sao Paulo.
Brazil declared a three-day national
mourning period upon Pele’s passing. His casket will be carried through the
streets of Santos this upcoming week.
Pele as WABC 7’s New York’s weekday sports
anchor Ryan Field put it on Thursday’s 5 p.m. of “Eyewitness News” life was
“one well lived that left a legacy unmatched.”
That legacy on the field consisted of a
soccer career resume of leading Brazil to three World Cup titles (1958, 1962,
1970), the only player to say he won three World Cups. In the 1960 World Cup,
Pele had six assists. In his World Cup career, Pele produced 12 goals and 92
hat tricks. At age 17, he became the youngest ever to win a World Cup trophy.
That record still stands today.
Pele won six Serie A titles in Brazil with
Santos (1961-65, 1968). His 77 total goals for his home country’s team, which
was equaled by Neymar in this year’s World Cup as Brazil’s all-time scoring
leader.
Pele’s 127 total goals for Santos in 1959
is thought to be the most goals by a club soccer player in one calendar year.
According to FIFA, Pele recorded 1,281 total goals in 1,366 career games.
“Why God gave me this you know gift? This
was a gift from God,” Pele once said of his amazing soccer career.
That gift from God came to Pele at a very
young age. He made his futbol debut for Santos at the tender age 16 and a year
later began his epic career scoring goals for the aforementioned Brazilian
national team. It was here that Edson became better known by his nickname from
his childhood “Pele.”
Pele professional soccer career began at
age 15 when be played for Santos and then for the Brazilian national team one
year later. In 1958 at the age of 17 became the youngest player to start in a
World Cup Final scoring two goals as Brazil defeated Sweden (5-2) in Stockholm
in the first of as just mentioned three World Cup championships that he won for
his homeland of Brazil dazzling those in attendance and that watched on
television with his fancy footwork and ability to score goals that seemed all
but impossible. That ability to shoot and pass became very attractive to those
that watched across the globe, compared to the more fundamental approach by
those that played the game from Europe.
“When Pele scored the fifth goal in the
final, I have to be honest and say I felt like applauding,” then Swedish soccer
player Sigge Parling said of being a part of that moment.
Nine years later when Pele visited
Nigeria, waring factions called a 48 hour cease fire in that country’s civil
war.
“The stopped the war to see soccer played
in Africa. This is fantastic,” Pele once said of that moment. “It’s something
you cannot explain.”
In 1975, Pele, who had just retired from
playing soccer came to America and signed with the New York Cosmos of the North
American Soccer League (NASL), a then ragtag franchise that played home games
at Downing Stadium on Randalls Island New York, NY.
Upon Pele’s arrival, then at age 34 and
seemingly his prime playing years in the rearview mirror, the Cosmos gained
instant credibility and began playing their home games at the old Yankee
Stadium in 1976 and then at the old stadium of the NFL’s New York Giants in
1977.
The Cosmos because of Pele drew amazing
crowds on route to winning the NASL title in 1977. A crowd of 77,981 were on
hand at The Meadowlands for the Cosmos Quarterfinals match against the Fort
Lauderdale Strikers.
In a statement, the New York Cosmos said
in remembering Pele that was in part that his name “will forever be synonymous
with sporting artistry and genius. His lasting impact on the sport of soccer is
inestimable.”
Pele’s final game came on Oct. 1, 1977, an
exhibition tilt at Giants Stadium where he played one half with former team
Santos and the other half with the Cosmos. The game attracted not just a big
television audience, but a number of celebrities were on hand for Pele’s final
game as well.
“Pele’s was the only footballer who
surpassed the boundaries of logic,” Dutch star Johan Cryuff once said.
French soccer star Juist Fontaine echoed
those same feelings saying, “When I saw Pele play it made me feel I should hang
up my boots.”
One player that was Pele’s teammate during
his time to witness the impact he had during his time with the Cosmos was Tony
Picciano. The now Long Island, NY native who played with Pele with the Cosmos
in 1975 says Pele was a great teammate and mentor to him and so many other
soccer players. Pele’s presence also gave the sport, according to Picciano a
huge boost.
Picciano told WABC 7’s CeFaan Kim on
Thursday that Pele that when you put him inside the dirt and he “would grow us
like an oak tree.”
“He was very good with certain players,”
Picciano added about how Pele interacted with him and his teammates as well as
opponents. “He really mentored some of the young players.”
That impact Pele continues with this
generation of futbol players like Lionel Messi, who said on his Instagram page
when Pele passed on Thursday with a photo of the two together, “Descansa en
pas, @pele: Rest in peace.”
One of the stars of this past World Cup
Kylian Mbappe tweeted a photo of him and Pele that said, “The king of football
has left us but his legacy will never be forgotten. RIP KING.”
In the years that followed retirement,
Pele’s infections love for the game of soccer made sure his name would continue
to be relevant. He became a businessman. A United Nations Ambassador for Ecology and the environment
and from time to time got entangled in political and financial issues. He
rubbed elbows with state leaders across the globe. He even received honorary
knighthood from Queen Elizabeth in 1997.
In 2013, Pele served as honorary president
in the re-launch of the Cosmos as a member of the 21st century
version of the NASL. The Cosmos played home games at Hofstra University’s
Shuart Stadium from 2013-2016 before their move to Brooklyn, NY.
In 2014, Pele received an honorary
doctorate from Hofstra University during a conference entitled “Soccer As A
Beautiful Game: Football’s Artistry, Identity and Politics” where 100 speakers
and journalist from 20 countries were on hand and participated in over a dozen
panels and roundtable discussions.
“My sense was that he loved the New York
area,” Brenda Elsey, an associated professor of history at Hofstra University,
who wrote extensively about soccer.
Elsey, who helped to put together this
2014 conference Pele should receive more credit for helping to transform soccer
from a sport that went from being something that is watched an attended as a
pastime sport to being one of the most popular in not just the here in the U.S.
but the entire world.
To put the incredible career of Pele into
perspective when he began this journey at as mentioned 16 years of age in 1956,
he was a minority that came of age during a period where “hierarchies were
being challenged,” Elsey said.
African nations were declaring their
independence from colonizers from Europe and were beginning integration into
FIFA. Black South Africans challenged apartheid and African Americans in the
U.S. pushed for their civil rights.
Pele during this time period served as the
symbol of a working-class individual who displayed how having a great talent
and the work ethic and focus to get the most of that talent can move you up the
social ladder.
Elsey said that Pele being “Black” and
“the best athlete in the world’s most important sport” was vital during this
period. His signing with the New York Cosmos at the height of his fame ignited
a soccer boom in the U.S. that continues to this day. Pele, according to Elsey
was the bridge between Long Islanders and immigrants from Latin America and the
Caribbean that moved within this region beginning in the 1970s.
Elsey said that she heard many stories
about the impact Pele had on Long Island just from that 2014 conference from
how people talked about how their parents took them to see Pele and getting
lunchboxes with his face on them.
Pele also adapted quite easily to life as
a celebrity in New York. While he was always gracious to fans that he ran into
and was a very religious person, he adopted the style of New York sports
legends from the 1970s in Hall of Fame Quarterback of New York Jets Joe Namath
and two-time NBA champion, Hall of Famer and now television color analyst of
New York Knicks for Madison Square Garden Network Walt “Clyde” Frazier wearing
a big fur coat in the winter.
“He was very Studio 54,” Elsey said. “He
was not so managed to social media like athletes today.”
While Pele has always been a global icon.
In his native Brazil though, he will always be regarded as a national treasure.
“I am from Brazil. I’m sad,” Brazilian
native Lucas Strabko said to Kim on Thursday night at the Pele store in
Manhattan, NY about the passing of the soccer icon
“We lost our biggest idol. The greatest
man of our history. Pele. Pele. And I’m in New York today. It’s so crazy see in
Times Square. The most important place in the world and to see Pele’s name.”
“Pele’s means everything to Brazil. Pele’s
Brazil. He is our history. He put Brazil’s name all over the world.”
A day after his passing, fans have
flocking to the stadium in Santos where scored a number of his mentioned 1,281
career goals. There is also a tribute outside the Sao Paulo hospital where Pele
passed.
On Thursday, the world of soccer and the
sports world at large said goodbye to a legend who at the peak of his powers
was and continues to be regarded as one of the best in his sport. After his
playing days he was powerful enough that his name resonated more than most.
Edson “Pele” Arantes do Nascimento was a
true global icon whose reach and impact have only been equaled by the likes of
Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky, the late Bill Russell, to name a couple.
Unlike Jordan, Gretzky, and Russell, Pele
ESPN’s Soccer Play-by-Play Commentator Frenando Palomo put it was more known to
people than the game of soccer itself was known.
“Its four-letter words that transcended
the word of soccer. They knew about Pele before they knew about the sport,”
Palomo added. “He traveled around like a traveling circus. H went to different
countries, even putting his body at risk in order to play in front of thousands
of people that had waited for weeks or even months for his arrival. He’s an
icon. He’s a national treasure.”
ESPN Soccer analyst Taylor Twellman said
of Pele greatness came from the fact that he did things “sooner” and “quicker”
than anyone. Twellman also said that unlike Jordan and Gretzky whose career
records in their sport have been passed, Pele’s mark of three World Cups won
and over aforementioned 1,200 career goals have stood the test of time. On top
of that, Brazil remains the last country to win back-to-back World Cup titles
in 1958 and 1962.
“When you name the G.O.A.T.’s [Greatest Of
All-Time] in other sports, there’s an argument. I’m not sure there’s really an
argument,” Twellman said of Pele’s place as the best soccer player to ever play
the game.
Fellow ESPN Commentator and analyst John
Sutcliffe put it best about the passing of Pele that we lost “the greatest
soccer player” in the history of the sport.
“If you consider that soccer or futbol is
the most popular sport in the world, we lost a legend. We lost one of the
biggest athletes in the history of sports.”
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