Animal ball is alive and well on the courts of Rehoboth Beach

FUNDAMENTALLY FLAWED - Let’s talk youth sports and determine, “What is the actual purpose?”

Is it to instill winning as the objective in any sport with a hanging scoreboard of digitized elapsing time between ascending numbers?

No, of course not. The purpose is to learn sound fundamentals and to have kids become better players. I watched some YBA - or is it YBL? - girls basketball and God bless all coaches and volunteers, but holy guacamole, what exactly is the point?

Back when I was in Catholic high school, physical education class consisted of 40 boys in suits with white socks and no shoes and one basketball. We called it “animal ball.” Whoever got the ball was attacked by everyone else. It was so much fun and was decent training for the sport of roller derby.

Animal ball is alive and well on the courts of Rehoboth. The person with the ball can expect to be attacked by a swarming defense as soon as she comes over half court. True, other people are open, but you would need a can of mace to clear a sight line. My suggestion is a silly one, but how about a rule where you have to guard your own person and are not allowed to mess with other people? No more half court, jump trap quintuplet teaming of the basketball.

ARRIVEDERCI, ROMO – It means goodbye in Italian, so does, “Hey yo Tone, why don’t you and Jessica, T.O. and Jerry take America’s team and get on up outta here?”

Just like political pollsters, pundits and prognosticators told us that Hilary was a “no chance” in New Hampshire, no one saw the Giants going to Green Bay for the NFC title game or San Diego with L.T. and that goofy Phillip Rivers on the bench beating the ever-present Peyton and the Colts and getting the right to get rolled by the Pats in the AFC title game. I told several Dallas fans before the game that they could argue strengths and athleticism all they wanted - I was feeling a Giants victory. Dallas became a mirage of itself the last third of the season and that NFC title game belongs in Green Bay anyway, because how much fun is it watching fat flaked football in the snow with those green and yellow jerseys in high definition and the “Lambeau Leap.” Wouldn’t we all like to flop backwards into a sea of adoring fans who frantically play “pat a bunny” with our numbered bellies before we run back to the bench shouting “That’s right! That’s right!”

But seriously, I think if the Packers win Green Bay should host the Super Bowl; next in line New England and then New York therefore San Diego can’t get the game and, anyway, its climate is not conducive to real football.

Super Bowl XLII will be held at the University of Phoenix’s new stadium, which has a retractable transparent roof and roll out grass field. And rich celebrities and corporate types in the stands like high-priced Weebles of the Western World. Enjoy this Sunday of atmospheric football because the actual Super Bowl is a party of players and you are not invited. Can you feel me, playa!

THE WIRE! - Attention all athletes from winter to spring. The semester is about to flip and some of you will get got! It is time to “wire up” the second nine-week marking period because if you fail you won’t be back at practice until April, and we are talking Praxis.

The glitch that stole eligibility is still in play, but you will not be if you fail the second nine weeks but pass the class at semester because that is the rule as dumb as it may be.
I still say that those who cry “Academics are more important than athletics” are always the people who can’t play anything. Take the grossly unfit out of all Honors and Academic Challenge classes. Level the playing field. What’s good for the goose he ain’t complaining about. The advice to all young people is to play all the talent cards in their hand, to be all in at all times. Protect your freedoms and if that means passing geography for the criminally insane or British Lit for the Mildly Interested, then make sure you pass it!

FORTY-NINE CENT - “I’m liking” this latest story about entertainers taking steroids including the rapper 50 Cent, Mary J. Blige, Timbaland, Wyclef Jean and the actor Tyler Perry. Mary J. changed her music and her looks and my man 50 has some serious pipes to give him “street cred.” What am I talking about I surely don’t know except quite often the most successful among us are also the most needy, which is why I’ve been linked to Bona, Nicola’s Pizza and Casapulla subs just out there keeping it real.

SNIPPETS - The “under five crowd,” my peeps, will be appearing at all boys basketball games in the Henlopen Conference. It just is what it is, but at really crowded games how do these energetic rovers stay in one place? They don’t, but I’m used to working with kids crawling over me to get where they are going.

Sussex Central’s talented wrestling team will grapple at Caesar Rodney on Feb. 1, the biggest “showdown throwdown” in many years in the Henlopen Conference. I am not a handicapper, although I could use the license plate, but Central has a chance to stop the Rider streak, which is not want this is about is just about two great programs getting after each other. The Golden Knights host Smyrna on Feb. 8 in another great matchup. The Henlopen Conference Wrestling Championships are also at Central.

Fear the cannon! Go on now, git!