Despite an emotionally crushing final two weeks of the season, hopes are high in the Baltimore Blast?s camp.
With six straight losses to finish the season, including a 21-6 defeat at Chicago Saturday, the Blast (15-15) missed the playoffs for just the second time in five seasons. Still, there is optimism that the defending league champions can rebound with another run to a Major Indoor Soccer League title in the near future.
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“I think we have the right coach in place and we have good players,” Blast president/general manager Kevin Healey said. “We didn’t come through this year. We’re not going to sulk. We’re talking about next year today.”
Healey also gave a ringing endorsement to coach Danny Kelly, who was in his first full season on the bench for the Blast after serving as the interim player-coach at the end of the 2005-06 season.
“That’s not a question. Danny Kelly will be our coach next year,” Healey said. “Personally, I think he’s an excellent coach, and he prepares the team very well. I think Danny is a guy that is going to be very successful as the Baltimore Blast coach.”
While the team may not have ranked high enough to qualify for one of the four playoff spots in the six-team league, fans flocked in full support to 1st Mariner Arena throughout the season. The team drew 111,732 fans throughout the 15 home dates ? tops in the league. Kelly was disappointed that the team couldn’t put on a better show in its home finale, a 13-12 loss to Philadelphia on Friday.
“The way they come out and support us, it was one of the things we talked about before the game,” Kelly said. “It’s a blue-collar town. Yeah, they want us to win, but they want to see us leave it all out on the field. We’ve seen enough of the million-dollar athletes, and that’s not what we’re about and that’s not what the city is about. They deserved more.”
The next step for the team is to finalize its list for the May 10 expansion draft. After repeated requests to the league, Healey remains unsure of how many players the Blast can protect in the draft and how many it can lose. The deadline to submit a player list is April 23.
Expansion teams New Jersey and Orlando will select players from the other six teams. There’s also a chance that a potential team from Monterey, Mexico might join the league in time for the draft.
