24 MONTEREY COUNTY WEEKLY april 27-may 3, 2023 www.montereycountyweekly.com expectations, if not exceeded [them].” Oz Lucero, who leads MBFC supporters group Fuerza Union, recalls how he’s met people who bought the gear having not even known the team existed beforehand—drawn by both the design and a desire to represent their home region. “It’s a very proud area… We like to show off that we’re from around here,” he observes. Indeed, MBFC has leaned into the idea of the team as a local unifier, adopting the moniker of “Union”—a common club identifier across the soccer world—as an alternative name signaling a link between the disparate communities of the Monterey Peninsula, the Salinas Valley, and the rest of the Central Coast region. “I think it’s something that we really needed in this area—something to unite the Salinas-Santa CruzWatsonville area with the Monterey and Carmel [area],” says MBFC midfielder Adrian Rebollar, a Watsonville native. Both Rebollar and Santa Cruz native Walmer Martinez, who was the club’s first-ever signing, played their college soccer at CSUMB, and the pair’s local roots mean they’ve swiftly become fan favorites. But whether Monterey Bay F.C. is succeeding in engaging with communities beyond its Peninsula homebase remains open to debate among the club’s fans and followers—especially those from Salinas and the surrounding Valley. • Ruben Ramirez grew up in Salinas as a diehard soccer fan—his heritage luring his allegiances to the Mexican national team, affectionately known as El Tri. He notes that before Monterey Bay F.C., the “closest thing we had” to a hometown team was the Salinas-based California Jaguars, who played in USL precursor leagues for several years in the 1990s before folding in 1999. So Ramirez embraced the opportunity to support a local club, purchasing Monterey Bay season tickets last year. He’s now ever-present at the front of the supporters’ section, playing a large drum that leads a growing selection of songs and chants emanating from the stands. “We finally got our own team,” Ramirez says, applauding MBFC for bringing local products like Rebollar and Martinez into its ranks. Yet despite being just the kind of dedicated fan that Monterey Bay is looking to attract, Ramirez still feels the club has done “not enough at all” to engage with the Salinas community. For contrast he points to the San Jose Earthquakes, who have played in Major League Soccer, the top American soccer league, for more than a quarter-century and have long established a local following—one fostered through their recruitment of Salinasbased players and fan events like a season kickoff party at the Salinas Regional Soccer Complex just this February. Salinas native Lucero, himself a longtime Earthquakes supporter, admits that he was initially concerned that Monterey Bay was “just going to be a team for the Peninsula,” given how “there’s a lot more money out there” that the club would look to tap by marketing primarily toward the area’s affluent residents. While he thinks the club could do more to attract fans in Salinas, he believes many are already gravitating toward the team—whether it’s going out to the games or attending the watch parties that Fuerza Union throws at XL Public House on Main Street. “If you’re going to fill that stadium, it’s going to be people from Salinas mostly,” Lucero says, pointing to soccer’s embedded place in Latino culture and how even high school games between Alisal and Everett Alvarez can draw thousands of spectators. A self-described cynic, Lucero says he truly believes Monterey Bay F.C. can be the kind of local institution capable of bringing together Monterey County’s socio-economically polarized communities under one banner. “In this area, culturally and socially, the Peninsula and the Valley have been two different universes,” he says. “And if this team works and does it right, they can unify those two.” Beshoff says he’s intent on having the club live up to its name as a “union,” and agrees that drawing more folks from Salinas to the games is “100-percent the key” to MBFC’s future success. “Salinas is my market,” he says, noting the city’s working-class identity and how the sport is ingrained in the local culture. To that end, Monterey Bay has grown its footprint in the county seat via the recent launch of MBFC2, an amateur development team based in Salinas that will play its games at Rabobank Stadium. Part of the team’s purpose is to spot and develop young local players—many of whom turned up for tryouts at Alisal High School this spring—and potentially give them a pathway to a pro career. The second team is led by MBFC assistant coach Ramiro Corrales—a Salinas native who had a long and distinguished career in MLS with San Jose, among other clubs—and Beshoff hopes it will be a “good bridge that we need” to further connect with the Salinas community. Of course, it would also help if it were easier for folks in Salinas to get to Cardinale Stadium: The MontereySalinas Transit bus line that serves the stadium doesn’t operate on weekends, when most of the team’s matches are played, meaning there’s no public transportation to games. Both Lucero and Shey Gibson, a Salinas resident who founded the college student-focused MBFC supporter group The Rising Tide, say they’ve spoken with fellow fans about potentially organizing shuttles to and MBFC’S SEASON Highlights 3/11 • 5-3 win vs. Hartford Athletic: The Crisp and Kelp start the season with a win in an eight-goal thriller, sparked by new signing Alex Dixon’s first-half hattrick. Attendance: 3,615. 3/18 • 1-0 loss vs. Louisville City: A tight game sees MBFC fail to take advantage of a second-half red card for Louisville City, last year’s USL runners-up. Attendance: 3,019. 3/24 • 1-1 draw at Rio Grande Valley: The trip to Texas is marred by midfielder Mobi Fehr’s red card, which leaves MBFC at a disadvantage as their hosts score a last-minute equalizer. 4/1 • 2-1 loss vs. San Antonio: A raucous Cardinale Stadium crowd leaves heartbroken after an 85th-minute winner for San Antonio, the defending USL champions. Attendance: 3,885. 4/5 • 3-1 win at Central Valley Fuego: MBFC makes the trip to Fresno for a U.S. Open Cup match against third-division Central Valley, leaving victorious after extra time. 4/8 • 4-2 win vs. New Mexico United: MBFC overcomes an early 1-0 deficit and romps to a win inspired by midfielder Sam Gleadle and forward Christian Volesky. Attendance: 3,548 4/15 • 1-1 draw at Phoenix Rising: MBFC earns a hard-fought point on the road thanks to Dixon’s second-half penalty kick, though both teams have chances to win it late in the game. 4/22 • 3-2 win at Indy Eleven: MBFC comes back from a 2-1 halftime deficit in Indianapolis to remain unbeaten on the road, with new signing Nevello Yoseke scoring the winner. MBFC fans gather at the Britannia Arms in downtown Monterey on March 24 to watch the team’s away game versus Rio Grande Valley. “We can only survive if we get the fans—we can’t survive without them.” Daniel Dreifuss
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