[3] To reverse these trends, Samuels proposed turning the league’s focus away from international stars to domestic players in order to create a larger fan base.

[4] Samuels’ concept dovetailed with a desire on the part of the United States Soccer Federation (USSF) to build a more successful national team program.

[9][10] This forced the NASL and USSF to turn to recently naturalized players—ten of the 21 on the roster (see below) had been born outside the U.S., including Alan Green, who was still a British subject in 1983 (he finally gained American citizenship the following year).

[11][12] Several top U.S. players did join the club, including Chico Borja, Jeff Durgan, Arnie Mausser and Perry Van der Beck.

Wearing a red, white and blue uniform with a horizontally striped jersey,[13] the team began well, going 8–5 (including a shootout win over the Cosmos in front of 31,112 at RFK on June 17) but lost 15 of its last 17 games, finishing at the bottom of the standings with a 10–20 record.

Some, such as Jeff Durgan, publicly criticized Rick Davis and Steve Moyers for choosing to remain with the Cosmos rather than signing with Team America.

[19] (This was a little misleading, however: the figure includes the 50,108 who attended a game against Fort Lauderdale that featured a free Beach Boys concert; the other six matches averaged just 14,926.)

As the losses piled up, though, the fans stopped coming to RFK: barely 55,000 showed up for the last eight home games combined, lowering Team America's average to just 13,002 for the entire 1983 season.

At the end of the season, Robert Lifton pulled the plug on the franchise; afterwards, he, Commissioner Samuels and the USSF engaged in much public rancor and wrangling over who was most responsible for the club's failure.

The new direction of the club meant many of the Manic's non-Canadian players would be let go; given Canada's poor track record at producing world class soccer talent, fans were put off by the prospect that the team's play would diminish.