Ahead of the 1980-81 indoor soccer season, the Houston Summit needed a new home. Bernie Rodin, the team’s owner, had identified two potential destinations, Boston and Baltimore, and dispatched head coach Kenny Cooper to visit both.
Cooper had planned to go to Massachusetts first, but at the last minute, switched his flight to land in the city nestled on the shores of the Chesapeake Bay. An England native, Cooper fell in love with the close-knit, working-class atmosphere in Baltimore in part because it reminded him of Liverpool, located an hour south of his hometown of Blackpool.
Cooper could also see that the rabid Baltimore sports fans might embrace another professional team. While the Orioles were still in their heyday, the Colts had been lackluster in the late 1970s and would eventually flee the city in March 1984.
“No disrespect to Boston but there was just something about Baltimore,” Cooper said. “It’s a city with a soul. The people were very salt of the earth, very blue-collar, very provincial. Everybody knows one another.”
The visit was the beginning of a four-decade relationship between the city and indoor soccer, first with the Blast (1980-1992), then the Spirit (1992-1998) and again the Blast. Cooper coached until 1994. This season, the Blast celebrated the 40th anniversary of indoor soccer in the city. The commemoration would’ve been held last year but the COVID-19 pandemic forced the team to wait.
During two days in late February, former players returned to Baltimore, some for the first time in decades. Players from the 1980s and later eras were honored, including Cooper, who lives in Dallas full time but still considers Baltimore a home away from home.
Over drinks and meals, they reminisced about the move from Houston to Baltimore, the success they achieved early on and finally breaking through to win the team’s first championship during the 1983-84 season.
“It was a special time,” said Mike Stankovic, who played 15 seasons in Baltimore, including seven seasons as a player-coach. “Just being around the guys for a couple days, it brings back all the memories.”
Jim Pollihan was one of a handful of Houston players — along with Joseph “Sepp” Gantenhammer, Dan Geerling and Nick Mangione — who moved with the team. Pollihan recalled how Cooper urged his players to undertake an aggressive public outreach campaign to win the hearts of the Baltimore faithful.
“Kenny knew it was a great sports town and he told us when we were coming here that we had to make sure we touched as many people as we could and let them know who we were,” said Pollihan, who played for four seasons and later served as an assistant coach under Cooper for five more.
Cooper sent his players to Kiwanis and Rotary clubs and to meet with school children and community groups. They visited the city jail and even served as guest bartenders in local bars. Cooper’s rule was that every player had to take part. If a player couldn’t, the team had to find a replacement.
“Had we not done outreach, the Blast wouldn’t have been around for 40 years, that’s for sure,” said Pollihan, who later coached the Harrisburg Heat and still lives in Pennsylvania. “It has to continue and it is continuing.”
Signs of the goodwill Cooper’s team established came to bear last month when the players signed autographs for fans before the Blast’s Feb. 26 game and were honored at halftime. The autograph line stretched through the arena. Fans gave Cooper flowers and a bottle or two of his favorite wine.
“It was emotional. I did not want to cry. I tried not to cry but I found that I couldn’t,” Cooper said. “I was overwhelmed with the love from the players and love from the fans.”
The First Championship
Almost immediately after coming to Baltimore, the Blast was successful.
In its third season, 1982-83, the team reached its first championship series against another royalty of indoor soccer, San Diego Sockers.
The first two games of the best-of-five series were a disaster, recalled Joey Fink, a forward who played for Baltimore from 1981-1985. After being shut out twice, Rodin, the team owner, stormed into the locker room to yell at his players and demand better play, Fink said.
The Blast responded immediately to Rodin’s expletive-laden rant, winning the next two games before narrowly losing the deciding fifth game. Though they fell short, Baltimore’s players had regained the respect of their owner and the fans for fighting back in the series.
“From the moment we got off the plane [in Baltimore] till the moment we got to the luggage rack there was just a lineup of people. Everybody thanking us, shaking our hands,” Fink said. “They must have made an announcement to come meet the Blast at the airport and thank us for the season. And that was totally memorable and really, really special.”
The following year, the Blast returned to the finals, this time against St. Louis Steamers, in a best-of-seven series.
After a Game 1 loss, Baltimore came alive, winning the next three games. Cooper remembered letting out a sigh of relief on the plane home after Game 4. The Blast had eked out an overtime victory thanks to a golden goal by Stan Stamenkovic.
“There was no way we were gonna lose at home,” Cooper said.
And during Game 5 in Baltimore, the Blast blew away St. Louis, 10-3, to win the team’s first title in front of more than 12,000 fans.
The title-winning team was catalyzed by good relationships on and off the field, Stankovic said.
“I think everybody sensed we had something special,” he said. “We created that energy that everybody felt, that everybody is a part of the Baltimore Blast. Our connection to the fans was magical.”
Struggles In The 1990s
Cooper and the Blast continued to field competitive teams through the 1980s, finishing runners-up in 1984-85, 1988-89 and 1989-90. But Baltimore was never able to overcome San Diego in a championship series.
The Major Indoor Soccer League folded in 1992 and the Blast with it. Cooper took over the team’s replacement, the Baltimore Spirit, in the newly formed National Professional Soccer League. The Spirit made the playoffs in its two seasons under Cooper, who stepped down in 1994 but remained team president.
Through the rest of the 1990s, Baltimore never reached the success it had under Cooper. He left in 1995 to serve as general manager and coach of an NPSL expansion team in Florida.
In 1998, Ed Hale, who had owned the original Blast team from 1989-1992, bought the team and returned the Blast name. He unveiled the now-famous black, gold and red kits.
Stankovic, who was entering his second decade in Baltimore, helped bridge the gap from the 1980s teams to the renewed success of the 21st century.
The Serbian-American defender had moved to the U.S. from the former Yugoslavia and signed with the Blast in 1981. Stankovic made 394 appearances for Baltimore clubs in 15 seasons, scoring 221 goals. From 1991 until his retirement in 1998, Stankovic also served as player-coach.
“It’s an honor to be a part of the Blast, a team that has existed for 40 years,” Stankovic said. “I don’t think anybody can say that in the United States. Looking back it’s just amazing.”
2000s Revival
In 1999, the Blast traded for a prolific, if injury-prone, midfielder named Danny Kelly.
In eight seasons in Baltimore, Kelly scored more than 100 goals in 220 appearances and helped the team break a 19-year championship drought by winning the 2002-03 title in the second iteration of the Major Indoor Soccer League.
Two more MISL titles followed in 2003-04 and 2005-06. Ahead of the 2006-2007 season, the team made Kelly the new coach, a position he would hold for 14 seasons.
Under Kelly’s leadership, the Blast became the preeminent indoor soccer franchise in the country. Kelly led the team to six league championships and four seasons as runner-up, with the Blast’s three most recent titles coming in the Major Arena Soccer League.
Kelly left the team ahead of the 2020-21 season. His successor David Bascome, a wiry Bermudian forward who played with Kelly and then served as his assistant, took over. Bascome’s debut had to wait since the season was canceled because of the pandemic.
Bascome, who played five seasons for the Blast from 2003-2008 before joining Kelly’s coaching staff, said the goal of his tenure is to continue the legacy started by the 1980s teams. He has connections to those teams, including Paul Kitson, who played from 1983-1986 and was a mentor to Bascome during his playing days. Kitson died suddenly in 2005 at the age of 49. The tragedy sticks with Bascome to this day.
Through 19 games of the 2021-22 season, the Blast is 11-8 following a dominant 12-4 victory against the division rival Florida Tropics March 20. With three games to play, the Blast is eyeing yet another deep run in the Ron Newman Cup playoffs.
“This is a high-energy team,” Cooper said after watching the Blast in action. “You’ve got to look at the job Danny Kelly did, a remarkable job of winning championships, and now David Bascome’s coming in to continue it.”
A Long-Lasting Legacy
At the age of 76, Cooper knows this may be the last time he comes back to his adopted home. If he can make it to the 50th anniversary, he’ll be there, he said, but if he can’t then this will be his goodbye.
He hopes that Hale, who has poured millions into the franchise to keep it running throughout the decades, continues his efforts to keep the long-lasting legacy of the Blast going.
During the weekend celebrations, Cooper sat with his former players, some of whom he probably coached too hard, he said, and others he traded away because it was the best move for the team at the time. He apologized to some for his actions back then and thanked others for their years of sacrifice. But most of all he thanked the fans, with whom he forged a decades-long love affair that lasted well after he retired.
The fans are what drew Cooper and his team to Baltimore all those years ago and it’s those same fans who will keep the Blast as an indelible part of the city’s fabric for years to come.
Photo Credit: Sabina Moran/PressBox