| Personal information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Playing position | Forward | ||
| Senior career* | |||
| Years | Team | Apps† | (Gls)† |
| 1915-1919 | Bethlehem Steel | ||
| 1919-1920 | Philadelphia Merchant Ship | ||
| 1921-1922 | Fall River United | 16 | (5) |
| * Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. † Appearances (Goals). |
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Paddy Butler, date of birth and national origins unknown, was an early twentieth century soccer player who appears to have spent his entire career in the U.S. leagues. He was a member of the Bethlehem Steel F.C. teams which won the 1916 National Challenge Cup as well as the 1917 and 1919 American Cup Butler began his career on the front line, playing both inside and outside forward on both sides of the field. He ended his career at the right half back position.
The first team Butler is known to have played for is Bethlehem Steel F.C., then competing in the American Soccer League of Philadelphia. On October 25, 1915, the Bethlehem Globe mentioned “Butler, a new man being given a try-out at inside right as a partner to Dean.”[1] That season, Butler and his teammates won the 1916 National Challenge Cup.[2] On May 13, 1917, Butler scored a goal in Bethlehem's 7–0 shellacking of West Hudson A.A. in the 1917 American Cup. It was considered “the best goal of the game.”[3] That fall, Bethlehem entered the National Association Football League, winning the league title in 1919. Bethlehem took the double that season when they defeated Paterson F.C. to win the 1919 American Cup title. In that game, a 2–0 victory, Butler scored the first goal in the eleventh minute. In the summer of 1919, he moved to the Philadelphia Merchant Ship team.[4] Merchant Ship folded at the end of the season and records do not show which team he played for from 1920 to 1921. In 1921, the American Soccer League replaced the NAFBL as the top U.S.league. Butler spent one season in the new league playing for Fall River United.[5]