Kicksters: Making the old young again

Though my friends have been kicking around for the last two years, encouraging me to join them, it wasn't until this spring that I finally succumbed. My leap off from this particular bridge was into the world of adult kickball, a pastime that has bounced around the country for about seven/eight years, arriving in Madison shortly after the turn of the century.

The sport is as you remember it from recess, only, as remarked upon by participants, observers, and emblazoned on the red rubber ball itself, the role of EtOH is paramount to the experience.

Madison is home to two leagues, which are the Midwest Unconventional Sports Association (MUSA), playing at Demetral Field up by Oscar Mayer and the airport, and Legends Sports, which is located at parks across the city, including Brittingham, Elver, High Point, and Wingra parks. These leagues sponsor other sports for relapsed adults, including flag football and dodgeball, but it's the kicksters who are the meat and potatoes of these operations.

MUSA, which is the league I play in, defines its goal as "bringing together people in sports which really can not be taken too seriously," according to its website The league has more than four thousand participants on 250 teams in seven cities; Madison, Milwaukee, the Twin Cities, Green Bay, the Fox Cities Racine/Kenosha, and the Northshore (aka north Milwaukee exurbia).

MUSA Madison is "the second home of the big red ball," which really isn't as big as you remember it from childhood. The ball is a little smaller than a volleyball or basketball, featuring the printed face of a beer mug-clutching mascot.

The sandlot revival has attracted intermittent media attention, getting covered in July 2001 by the State Journal, again in July 2002 by the Cap Times, and last year for a second time by the State Journal.

As reported in the State Journal last July;

The Midwestern Unconventional Sports Association has from 15 to 30 teams playing each season at Demetral Field on Madison's East Side. The association runs kickball and other retro-playground leagues in the Twin Cities, the Fox Valley and Milwaukee.

The names of the teams in the 2005 spring session include Chico's Bail Bonds, Grassholes, A Drinking Team with a Kickball Problem, 4th Grade Dropouts, Vote for Pedro, Ligers, Cage Fighting Ligers (apparently Napoleon Dynamite is popular hereabouts), Militant Kindergarten Front, Strategery, Phocksi and the Ball Busters, and last year's second place squad in the Golden Lunchbox tournament in Milwaukee, Oh No You Di'int!

Like many sports, teams try to get sponsorship from local taverns, and as mentioned above, the boozing theme is prevalent both in name and in deed.

There's a little more blogging about Madison kickball at Tim in a Nutshell, as well as Kick. Ball. Action., which was "originally intended to promote social activism through kickball, glorious kickball," way back in the autumn of 2003.

For those interested in registering new teams or as individuals for the dog days Summer Skool session from MUSA, the deadline is June 13.