A lesson in life and Philly soccer history

It's not every day you get to sip ginger ale with a soccer legend.

Only you wouldn't know it, because Walter Kudenko would never tell you he was. And because the auto accident that nearly ended his life on June 8, 1958, never fully allowed him to be.

As the summer sun seemed to scorch everything but the tree-lined street in the city's Fairmount section Kudenko has called home for more than 30 years, I listened to Walt explain the last 51 years of his life in stunning detail, assisted by his wife of 46 years, Martha.

Whatever points Walt left out, Martha knew exactly where to fill in the blanks. Of course, this is because she is his biggest fan.

After surviving the horros of the Nazi invasion, Kudenko, his mother and three sisters came to this country in 1950. His father, a Russian soldier during World War II, was killed during the advance of the Germans. Like many immigrants around that time, his family suffered from isolation, compounded by poverty. Kudenko, then in his teens, went to Northeast High and held two jobs to help his mother, who worked at the old Lankenau Hospital.

Despite all that was expected of him, he still found time for soccer.

"The games were on Sunday and practice sometimes was on Friday evenings," said Walter, who recounted memories of being a fullback for the Philadelphia Ukrainians (1955-58). "Everybody worked; there was no time to play soccer so when you had the chance everyone took full advantage of it."

Walt seized every opportunity, many times walking to and from practices with very little money in his pocket and virtually no food in his belly.

The dedication would pay off.

By the time the Ukrainian Nationals went professional and joined the ranks of the American Soccer League in 1957, he was one of their prized fullbacks. At the conclusion of the 1957-58 seasons, Walt was honored as the ASL's most valuable player. Kudenko was offered a spot on the U.S. Olympic Team in 1958 and landed a guest-player role for the First German Sport Club Phoenix, a select outfit from Feasterville that challenged Bundesliga giant FC Kaiserslautern, on May 19, 1957, at the La Salle College Stadium at 20th and Olney. He also was a member of the ASL All-Star team that took on Austrian club Vienna FC on Feb. 16, 1958.

The latter would arrive just 4 months before the worst night of his life.

"He did exactly what the position required, he wasn't a flashy player, but he could cover whoever he had, too," said fellow fullback Jerry Kozak, now president of the Ukrainian-American Sport Center based in Horsham. "The essence of style in the position was a lot different back then. And Walt was one of those players who really exemplified how to play fullback correctly."

With his brows furrowed, hands clasped and his eyes staring to the ground, Walt tells the story about the night a 16-year-old unlicensed driver blindsided his friend's convertible, ejecting him from the seat and hurling him down Roosevelt Boulevard at an estimated 60 mph, according to police reports. I could tell it was a story he has told countless times over a 42-year period. But I wondered what could have been if he hadn't been in that car that night.

"I was in the front seat of the convertible, and the kid hit us from the driver's side," Walt explained. "The seat was like a bench seat and when we got hit my friends slammed into me so hard that the door flew open and I was thrown out. I don't remember anything after that."

After that was an 11-day stay at Frankford Hospital to repair multiple fractures to his ribs and lower spine and multiple lacerations of the liver, spleen and lung that required blood transfusions. The end result was a yearlong body cast that ultimately closed the door on his budding soccer career.

"With the way Walter played and how much he loved the sport, there was no question he would have continued to have been successful," Kozak said. "But he was just never the same player after the accident."

"There is no question in my mind he could have been one of the best - to me he is the best; he was a star," said his wife Martha. "We hope his story is for the youth to know, that if you really want something and you channel all your energies, focus and keep on the straight and narrow, there is always hope."

Ask any Philadelphia soccer buff who the legends are in this town and you will assuredly hear the names of the Chyzowych brothers. Probably not more so than the name Walter Bahr, the 1950s great most noted for providing the assist on Joe Gaetjens' goal that upset mighty England in the World Cup.

They put soccer on the map in Philadelphia.

But for a time, so did the unassuming gentleman who, with his wife, talked soccer with me on their front porch as the intense heat slowly watered down the fizz of our beverages.