The sun is setting past 9 p.m., snow tires are finding their way back into storage and paddleboarders are beginning to bravely venture out on the still icy cold rivers.
While these are all strong indicators we’re headed toward another beautiful summer in the Flathead, it also means professional baseball in the valley is right around the corner — and for the Coopman family, it means counting down the days until they host yet another young Glacier Range Riders player.
On the eve of the player’s May arrival at the family’s Lakeside home, Meredith, the matriarch of the Coopman clan, fired off a text containing a very important question for their soon-to-be roommate, who is the eighth player the family has hosted for the ball club.
“What kind of groceries do you want?”
Part of the Pioneer Baseball League, the Glacier Range Riders debuted in the Flathead Valley in the summer of 2022 and, in the five seasons since, the organization has worked to integrate itself — and baseball — into the community beyond its home at Glacier Bank Park on McDermott Lane in Kalispell.
The Range Riders’ host family program has offered one way of doing so through a necessary, yet mutually beneficial, arrangement.
To align with Major League Baseball (MLB) standards, the Range Riders must provide players with suitable housing. To do this, the organization turns to families in the valley who graciously open up their homes to members of the team.
Athletes hailing from New York to California come to play for the Range Riders, meaning the organization relies on families with a spare room or two to offer a comfortable space and welcoming environment for its more than 30-man roster throughout the season.
While the main requirement is to offer a pleasant living experience for the players, many families “go above and beyond,” often hosting team meals and showing the out-of-towners all the natural beauty the Flathead has to offer in the summer.
“Over the past four years, it’s been awesome to see the relationships develop between host families and the players and staff members,” said Team Services Manager Josh Nichols, who manages the host family program. “I think the coolest part is seeing all the host families in the stands each night cheering on their player all summer long.”
Few host families embody going the extra mile (or in this case, base) more than Meredith and Cory Coopman, and their teenage sons Eli and Easton.
The Coopmans were introduced to the Range Riders even before the first bat was swung or first bratwurst was served in 2022, learning of the organization through a personal connection with assistant coach and baseball veteran Stu Pederson. Being the “big baseball family” that they are, the Coopmans decided they wanted to get involved beyond just repping the olive green and red club colors.
“We knew one of the coaches, and just got introduced to the organization, and we were like, ‘Hey, why not try this out and see,’” Cory Coopman said.
Next thing the family knew, a fresh college grad with big league dreams was on his way to the valley — his summer mailing address set to be the Coopmans’ home along Flathead Lake.
Even five years later, Meredith Coopman can still remember her family’s nerves ahead of the big homecoming, especially for her young sons, who were scared to even venture off the school bus that day, she said.
“We were really nervous going into it, and when we came home, we saw this little white Toyota Camry,” her oldest son, Eli, said. “It was a rental car, which actually a couple days later his dad drove down his big truck, but we’re just like, ‘oh, he drives a Camry.’”
“We were super nervous; I mean, we still are. Every year, we’re always super anxious to find out who we have. I usually, right away after we find out their name, I look them up on Instagram.”
The good news for the young Coopmans, however, was that they certainly weren’t the only ones with some nerves about their new living arrangement.
Roughly 1,600 miles away, Logan VanWey, who now plays for the Houston Astros, was preparing to head to Kalispell — the furthest he had ever lived away from home — after finishing his college career at Division II Missouri Southern State University.
“There’s a lot of emotions,” VanWey said. “I was just doing a tryout. I thought I was on the team. I didn’t know I was driving all the way up to do a tryout. So, I was driving up for that; you’re 26 hours away from friends and family. It’s a little bit of an uncomfortable environment, but I got in. I got my host parents and from day one, I couldn’t say enough good things about them.”
Roy Robles, who stayed with the Coopmans in 2023, has played baseball his whole life, staying with multiple host families over the course of his career. No matter how many times he’s done it, the first time meeting a host family is always filled with nerves, he said.
“You don’t know what to expect because it’s something new, so the very first day that I made it through spring training with the Glacier Range Riders, I was told that I was going to the Coopman house,” Robles said. “I met Cory and automatically, I could just tell that they were great people. He made me feel very comfortable.”
Robles said he’ll never forget his first time meeting all the Coopmans — a memory also earmarked as a favorite by the family.
“I met Cory in the driveway of their house,” Robles said. “He set me up in my bedroom and made me feel at home. They all came home. We went and saw Easton play some baseball and we went out to dinner.
“I felt like when I first met them, I’d known them my whole life. It’s been like that the whole time I stayed with them. I just feel like they brought me in as family.”
Becoming part of the family is a common thread tying together both the Coopmans and players whom they’ve hosted, from Sunday dinners after afternoon game days to days spent out on Flathead Lake.
“We’ve got a family chat, and we have a chat with the player, and when they’re staying, we pretty much never text in the family chat because they’re part of the family,” Eli Coopman said.
For the Coopmans, being a host family is about much more than providing room and board.
“It’s not just a place for them to stay; they become part of the family,” Cory Coopman said. “We establish long-term relationships. We were invited to Roy’s wedding, and they all talk about coming back and visiting.”
“There’s been times where Meredith would stay up for them to get home to make sure they were okay,” he said.
“I’m like, you’re my kid now,” Meredith Coopman added with a laugh.
Bringing in players as family has also resulted in an ever-growing group of older brothers for Eli, Easton and their friends, as Range Riders players would often help at their baseball practices or come to watch games, the Coopmans said.
“It’s just exciting every year waiting to see who your player is, then once you finally meet him, just seeing how you bond throughout the year; I think that’s really unexpected,” Eli Coopman said. “I just kind of expected an older kid, kind of just cocky and neglects us a little bit because we’re younger high school kids. But honestly, they just treat us like we’re one of their friends, and I think the most unexpected thing is just the brotherhood you get from it.”
With the players often hundreds, if not thousands, of miles away from family of their own, the feeling of a brotherhood is mutual.
“I have three younger sisters, so being able to live with the two boys was fun for me,” John “JT” Mabry, the Coopman’s most recent house guest, said. “They were like little brothers that I didn’t have and it was fun.”
From fishing on kayaks at the lake to late nights playing Fortnite or Rocket League, their little brothers for the summer often offered a fun outlet to balance the grind of a nearly 100-game season.
“[Easton’s] a freaking savage playing PlayStation,” Robles said laughing to himself. “I stayed in the basement, so they’d come down there and play and I’d pop over there and play with them. We still play to this day, which is cool.”
While the players may be another brother for the young Coopmans to have fun with over the summer, the experience of living with a professional baseball player also provides an invaluable opportunity of seeing what it takes to chase your dreams, Cory Coopman said.
“Our takeaway from having the guys staying with us is that the boys saw what it takes,” Cory Coopman said. “Life isn’t handed to you. You have to go and get what you want, and you have to go work for your dreams.
“The boys that have stayed with us, they’re all hardworking, dedicated kids that are focused and they’re putting in the work. So whether it’s baseball or whatever they do in life, it was good to see them as examples or role models.”
The Range Riders players have also been a resource and have offered a direct line of communication for Eli Coopman, who recently committed to play both collegiate baseball and football.
“After Logan got the call-up, I was struggling … with something about my pitching, and I just texted him, and I asked him for some advice,” Eli Coopman said. “I sent him videos, and he helped me with some stuff. It’s just cool you can literally have a professional baseball player in your house and you can just go ask.”
And while the players have become a crucial presence in Eli’s athletic career, the Coopman family has also been able to return the favor, their former players said.
“Host families are huge,” Mabry said. “Not that it makes or breaks your summer, but it does have a huge impact on you when you have a good host family. It makes everything a lot easier, so I got really lucky with the Coopmans. They’re great people and they’ve been doing it for a long time, so they know how to make you feel at home.”
Having a good host family experience is especially helpful when navigating in the day-to-day grind of constantly “competing for a job,” with Robles saying it’s always nice to see a familiar face in the stands when family from back home can’t make it to a game.
“[The Coopmans] are very busy,” Robles said. “They work their butts off for what they do for their job. They come home, they take their boys to their sporting events and then when they have time, they’d make it to my games … and they still had dinner sitting there waiting for me.”
“Anything that I needed, they made it so easy,” he added. “All I had to worry about was getting to the field on time and then … getting back safe. That was it.”
Being another support system for players in these vulnerable, intense times makes it that much more satisfying seeing them make it to the next level — something the Coopmans got to witness in their first year as a host family with Logan VanWey.
VanWey made nine appearances for the Range Riders in 2022 before signing as an undrafted free agent with the Houston Astros. VanWey’s season that summer finished in the Florida Complex League, followed by stints in Asheville, North Carolina; Corpus Christi, Texas; and then Sugar Land, Texas, where he played the entirety of 2024 with the Houston Astros Triple A affiliate Sugar Land Space Cowboys.
In April 2025, VanWey made his MLB debut against the Los Angeles Angels, facing seven batters across two innings, retiring six of them and giving up no hits and no runs on 24 pitches. He was just the second Pioneer Baseball League player to make an MLB appearance since the restructuring of the league to an MLB Partner League in 2020.
“The day he got moved to the big leagues, they showed him pitching on TV, and then they pan over to his parents and his girlfriend that are in the stands, and they’re all crying,” Cory Coopman said. “We’re even getting emotional, right? Because you’re bonded to this kid. And then our family knew his family, too, because they had come up and visited, and it was cool to see, like, they did it. He did it. The dream came true.”
Despite the short stint with the Coopmans, VanWey continues to keep in touch with the Coopmans, still talking with the family once or twice a month. During the summer when he made the move to the minor league in Florida, VanWey invited the Coopmans out to watch spring training games and tour the facilities.
“Just them getting to see the facility that I had told them about … it’s just a really cool place to get to spend a spring training, and them getting to see that I thought was awesome, especially them being a part of my journey,” VanWey said. “Starting off, I’m out of college and it’s all on you now. You gotta do what you gotta do to create your own path to the big leagues and they’re a big part of that.”
But whether the players make it to the MLB or their playing career comes to a close in a Range Riders uniform, each one has walked away with a lifelong connection to the Coopmans and the Flathead Valley.
“For me, it’s the after-the-fact stuff,” Meredith Coopman said. “After they’ve left, they keep in touch and wish us happy Mother’s Day and happy Father’s Day, and invite us to weddings, and check in.”