It’s a game most people have played.
The elementary school recess competition with the big red ball that traces its root to 1917 and grew into the popular school game of the 50s.
Kickball.
Now, kickball is back, resurfacing in furious fashion over the past ten years. The resurgence was helped in the late 90s by four college graduates in the Washington DC area who were looking for ways to meet women, while mixing athletics with socializing.
This time around it’s adults who are playing. There’s even a World Adult Kickball championship each year in the U.S. where over 200 teams and 3,000 players compete for one of the most prestigious trophies in sports, “The Founders Cup.”
Few trophies in the world can compete with the history and mystique of kickball’s Founders Cup. The trophy was crafted by some of the world’s finest silversmiths in the Kaskmir region in India. It is a 12″ tall, sterling silver, wide-mouthed half-gallon grail with intricately designed handles, base and rim.
The Irish Lord O’Casey purchased and brought the trophy to Dublin in the early 19th century, where it was used to celebrate champions in O’Casey’s own private estate sports tournaments. So revered was the Cup by fellow Lords and commoners alike, O’Casey lost possession of it. It is still unclear whether the Cup was lost due to changing possession by tournament winners, or it was stolen by one of the participants.
From there, more than 50 years later, the trophy mysteriously resurfaced in the Americas soon after the end of the American Civil War. Rumor has it that the Cup served as a prize both for local baseball and soccer teams during its early days in the U.S.
Finally, the Cup made its way to the kickball league that would be known simply by its acronym, WAKA, where it debuts to this day as the World Kickball Championship Founders Cup, presented to the season’s national championship team.
The trophy will be raised this year in Las Vegas, when the tournament plays out during the second week of October.
Kickball has also risen in popularity in the Roanoke area, with the City of Roanoke Adult Kickball League arguably the region’s major league of the sport.
Brought to life in 2008, the league now has 31 teams in 4 divisions that compete Monday through Thursday nights on the Rivers Edge ball fields closest to the railroad underpass on Wiley Drive, just across the tracks from Carilion Hospital.
If you haven’t seen a kickball game since your younger days, an evening trip to the games is worth a look. The game has changed and these shootouts are a treat.
“Kickball is so unique,” Roanoke Parks and Recreation Marketing and Outreach Director Joe Hanning says. “We really promote it. It takes people back to their childhood. There’s nostalgia in the game; everyone did it on the playground as a kid and you don’t have to be a super-athlete to play.”
There’s another popularity to Roanoke kickball, all teams are co-ed, just as the Washington guys envisioned. So, teams consist of gals and guys over 18, some married. And, it’s not unusual to see kids in the dugout while mom and dad play.
“Kickball has definitely been one of our most successful ventures,” Hanning notes. “When a new sport or activity is introduced, often it’s a bang in the first year, then wears out by the third. Not kickball. It’s continued to be a big hit.”
With that information in hand, it was only appropriate to head to Rivers Edge in order to check out the action in person. While the competition is serious, there’s a lot of camaraderie and fun during the games. And, kickballers are never at a loss of words for a tongue-in-cheek response to an interviewers’s question.
Although played on a softball diamond with bases 60-feet apart and a roller’s circle in the middle, kickball has its own set of rules.
Each team has 11 players consisting of five outfielders, four infielders, a roller and a catcher. Four of the eleven must be girls, although in a pinch a team can play with as few as eight players as long as the four chicks are present. Obviously, if you’re down to eight, that leaves your defense like swiss cheese and a recipe for disaster against prolific kickers.
When the game begins, the roller fires the official 10″ kickball toward the kicker’s box where the kicker, a catcher and umpire await. A ball rolled through the box with no more than a foot-high bounce is a strike; outside the box is a ball. If you don’t kick the ball, four balls you walk, three strikes you’re out. If you kick four fouls you’re also out. Not as rare as you may think as technically thrown rolls zip and curve toward the kicker. And, in kickball, you can hit an off-base runner with the ball to get an out.
Games, limited to seven innings or an hour time limit, are fast-paced.
“This the first week and I’ve already had a game go seven innings and take only 40 minutes,” umpire Dave Richardson told me the first week of July.
There’s no shortage of catchy team names. One matchup pits the Texas Tavern Toe Jammers against the al-Q-ballicks (read between the dashes), a group formed at a Plantation Road pool parlor, The Q.
Toe Jammer manager Matt Togo, who has been at the helm for three years, notes his team is made up primarily by rehab professionals at nearby Carilion.
“It’s the competitive nature of the sport that attracts our players,” Togo says. The famous eatery donates the signature yellow TT shirts that are the team’s uniform.
Jammer rookie Hilary Albright has her own take on playing.
“We just formed the team,” the gregarious Albright notes. “It’s fun to get together with your co-workers. This is better than going to the gym.”
While the fielders scramble for the kicks, the most athletic position on the field is the catcher. The guy holding down that spot for the Toe Jammers is Adrien Rangel. Although Rangel says the reason he’s behind the kicker is “they just put me there…” don’t get fooled. This guy is good. Twice he follows the kicker out of the box, scoops up a short kick and beats the kicker to first base.
In the opposing dugout, al-Q-ballick vet Leanne Scruggs reflects on her attraction to kickball.
“It makes you feel like a kid again,” Scruggs, clad in the team’s bright pink jersey says. “We met playing pool at The Q on Plantation. They pay for our team’s entry fee
($175) and we pay for the shirts.”
Leanne’s brother-in-law, Joe Scruggs, is the roller for the team. He fires a variety of rolls complimented with wrist movement and bounces.
“I call my go-to roll the double helix,” Joe says with a laugh.
Last year’s Roanoke champions, ’99 Problems, But a Pitch Ain’t One,’ are a true school yard team. All the players know each other from elementary or high school. Many played softball or baseball in high school. Their dugout blares with a boom box.
“No sponsor, we’re self-funded,” fourth-year manager Julie Campbell points out as she watches her undefeated squad bunt and run the opposing team ragged. Successful bunting in kickball is paramount.
“Bunting improves the odds of scoring, then we’ll kick it deep,” Campbell explains. “Our pitcher, Brent Lawrence, also rolls what we call the ‘Stinky Cheese'” .
No wonder 99 Problems is again undefeated.
This night, 99 Problems gives up a run for only the second time all season. Will Campbell make the team run laps? “No, we’re going out to drink beer,” the skipper says.
When asked if 99 Problems will head to Las Vegas to go for the Founders Cup, the team’s unanimous response is, “If someone will send us there.”
Potential sponsors take note; this team is seriously good.
Bill Turner
