Before he became a soccer magnate, Arthur Blank was a soccer dad

We mostly know Arthur M. Blank as the co-founder of Home Depot, the owner of the Falcons and a stupendously generous philanthropist.

But what about this?

Has there been a more impactful soccer dad?

The case for AMB as MISD (Most Impactful Soccer Dad):

The World Cup games in Atlanta — a little more than a month away and sure to be one of the most historic sporting moments in the city’s history — will be the crowning achievement of soccer’s meteoric growth here in the past decade. None of it would have happened without Blank’s investment.

But those eight games — to be watched by literally hundreds of millions worldwide — and all that has preceded them might well not have happened had Blank’s son, Josh, grown up infatuated with basketball or swimming instead of fútbol.

As the billionaire father and emerging executive son conducted a series of interviews Monday at the palatial Arthur M. Blank Family Office, I posed that question to Blank — is it possible that all of this would not have happened had Josh pursued a different sport?

Both chuckled at the premise.

“Well, that’s a very good question, Ken,” said Blank, speaking the words that inflate every reporter’s ego like a bike pump. “I haven’t really thought about it that way. I mean, there’s a chance that’s true.”

Before Atlanta was awarded World Cup games in $1.8 billion Mercedes-Benz Stadium (which he bankrolled with considerable taxpayer help), before he launched an MLS expansion team that became a model franchise, before he invested the first dollar of his $50 million into the U.S. Soccer Federation’s national training center in Fayette County, before he secured an expansion franchise for the National Women’s Soccer League, Blank was driving Josh to games and watching from the sidelines. He even served as an unofficial team photographer, according to Blank’s 2020 memoir “Good Company.”

“(Watching Josh play) is how I first fell in love with the sport, really,” Blank said.

Josh began playing with the Concorde Fire club at 5 years old, continuing there through his high school years. He played at Pace Academy and then collegiately at Elon University. His father was a regular attendee, even for Josh’s college games.

While the Falcons’ version of football was obviously an option, Josh said he liked how soccer was a game that you could play anywhere with anybody.

“I liked the component of you were always running around nonstop,” said Josh, 29, sitting alongside his father. “As a young kid with a lot of energy, it was great to play a sport where you were constantly involved.”

When asked if son Josh Blank's choice to play soccer in his youth was the eventual catalyst for the World Cup coming to Atlanta decades later, Arthur Blank (right) said Monday, May 4, 2026: “I haven’t really thought about it that way. I mean, there’s a chance that’s true.” (Keith Lovely Jr./AJC)

Before Atlanta was awarded World Cup games in $1.8 billion Mercedes-Benz Stadium (which he bankrolled with considerable taxpayer help), before he launched an MLS expansion team that became a model franchise, before he invested the first dollar of his $50 million into the U.S. Soccer Federation’s national training center in Fayette County, before he secured an expansion franchise for the National Women’s Soccer League, Blank was driving Josh to games and watching from the sidelines. He even served as an unofficial team photographer, according to Blank’s 2020 memoir “Good Company.”

“(Watching Josh play) is how I first fell in love with the sport, really,” Blank said.

Josh began playing with the Concorde Fire club at 5 years old, continuing there through his high school years. He played at Pace Academy and then collegiately at Elon University. His father was a regular attendee, even for Josh’s college games.

While the Falcons’ version of football was obviously an option, Josh said he liked how soccer was a game that you could play anywhere with anybody.

“I liked the component of you were always running around nonstop,” said Josh, 29, sitting alongside his father. “As a young kid with a lot of energy, it was great to play a sport where you were constantly involved.”

As Josh played, his father grew to share his son’s infatuation, even to the point of joining his Saturday morning staple of watching England’s Premier League games. Being around Josh, he saw the sport’s diverse community in Atlanta, its growth and its joy and passion.

“My exposure to the game really came through his commitment to the game and through his eyes,” Blank said.

And that led to tween Josh planting a seed with his father around 2010, according to Blank’s memoir.

“C’mon, Dad,” Blank wrote, quoting Josh. “It would be so cool. Atlanta should have an MLS team!”

Now a vice president of Arthur M. Blank Sports and Entertainment, Josh offered his own recollections Monday.

“I don’t think I necessarily had to pitch anything or push for it,” he said. “I think just naturally seeing the sport and what it could be and what it was in other places around the world presented an opportunity that was exciting of, ‘Why can’t we replicate this?’”

It took years and hundreds of millions of dollars, but in 2017, Blank launched an MLS expansion franchise and opened Mercedes-Benz Stadium, constructing it to accommodate soccer’s wide fields, not only for Atlanta United but also for the possibility of World Cup games.

Atlanta United has won a championship, set multiple MLS attendance records and drawn crowds to rival the most storied clubs in the world. The club has tapped into a multicultural and multigenerational soccer culture in Atlanta that most suspected didn’t exist.

And in June and July, Atlanta will be a host to the world’s biggest single-sport event.

“You know, there were folks in professional soccer, men’s soccer, at that time that said, ‘Well, I’m not so sure about Atlanta,’” Blank said. “I said, ‘I am. I’m sure about the city and I’m sure about the sport. I know if we couple them together and create the right environment for them inside our stadium, then we’re going to be very successful.’”

Blank has been proved correct beyond measure. He — and Atlanta’s soccer-loving masses — can thank a certain curly-haired midfielder for pointing the way.