Racquetball: A Cautionary Tale of a Sports Boom | Get Memphis Moving | Memphis FlyerRacquetball: A Cautionary Tale of a Sports Boom
In the mid-1970s, racquetball was one of the hottest sports on the
planet, and Memphis was its epicenter. Today it's one of those sports,
like jumping rope and baseball, that lots of us used to play and few of
us still play. It didn't quite go the way of tube socks and afros, but
it was definitely headed that way. How and why does a sport with such
appeal to both men and women bloom, fade and perhaps bloom again in
popularity?In 1976, Elvis Presley had a basement court at Graceland, where he
played Dr. George Nichopoulos and other members of his Memphis Mafia.
Memphis had a half dozen racquetball professionals and a young phenom
named Andy Roberts who would later win a world championship. One of the
city's most prominent businessmen, William B. Tanner, was a racquetball
fanatic and promoter who built a court on top of his office building on
Union Avenue Extended. Memphis State University, as it was then called,
and Coach Larry Lyles started a club team that dominated college
racquetball for two decades. Baseball legend Don Kessinger took up the
sport and built a court complex. In all, there were more than 150
courts in the city.
Today,
racquetball isn't dead, by any means. Memphis still hosts the U.S.
Nationals and pro tournament at The Racquet Club of Memphis in October,
and there are probably 100 courts scattered throughout the city and
suburbs at schools, churches, fitness clubs, and U of M. But they don't
get as much play as they used to, and nobody is building new centers
dedicated first and foremost to racquetball.What happened to the hottest sport of the Seventies? Memphian Randy
Stafford, owner of The Court Company and a former professional, has
played the sport at a high level for 40 years and is also the sport's
unofficial historian. The game, he says, was invented in 1954 and first
flourished in Louisville alongside handball. The first generation of
Memphis players included Giles "Bull" Coors, DeWitt Shy, Jack Doyle,
and Ronnie Leon.The game was slower than the modern version but easier to play than
tennis because the racquet was shorter, the court smaller, and the ball
bouncier. You banged it off the front wall, side walls, or ceiling and
it came back to you. It quickly replaced handball because it was easier
on the hands and women could learn it quickly. The sport exploded in
the early 1970s as hundreds of colleges built multiple courts and made
it a physical education elective. The game appealed to businessmen like
Tanner as a way to get an intense indoor workout in an hour or less. In
a Match for the Ages, a champion handball player, Paul Haber, played a
champion racquetball player using a racquet but playing with a
handball. Haber won the match. But racquetball won the war. At its
peak, the sport claimed 14 million players, half of them women, and set
an architectural standard for the modern fitness club.Today, Stafford says there are about 5.5 million players, only 20
percent of whom are women. Aerobics, cycling, jogging, and
weightlifting all took a piece of the pie."Pure racquetball didn't work so clubs had to add other things," said Stafford.
Racquets got bigger and balls faster. Stafford calls today's game "bullet ball."
"I don't know that the speed of the game hurt its popularity," he
said. "Young people like the speed. It's older players that complain."Stafford's own career reflects the sport's changes. He started
playing when he was 14 years old and a freshman at White Station High
School. His parents moved to Alberta, Canada and he began dividing his
time between racquetball and hunting. At a national tournament, he
caught the eye of the sport's grand master, Bud Meuhleisen of San
Diego, who invited him to come to California for the summer to train.
Stafford took him up on it. Almost broke, he paid him in bear meat and
moose meat.With a long, graceful stride and rangy body, Stafford was a natural
for the slow-paced game of the early Seventies, but the game outgrew
him as it got faster. He was a second-tier pro, wrote books about the
game, and began building courts all over the world. Until last year he
still competed nationally at the highest level in his age group.His nemesis is Ruben Gonzalez, one of the hardest hitters on the
tour when he was in his prime. Stafford is 55, which is usually the
best ago to play a new division. Unfortunately, Gonzales is older, so
Stafford has caught up with him, not left him behind.
September 12, 2009
Racquetball: A Cautionary Tale of a Sports Boom | Get Memphis Moving | Memphis Flyer
Courtney, Dave, Krist, Activision Fight Over Guitar Hero's Controversial Kurt Cartoon
Courtney, Dave, Krist, Activision Fight Over Guitar Hero's Controversial Kurt Cartoon
Who to believe, who to believe. As you know, Guitar Hero 5 features a playable Kurt Cobain avatar which you can unlock to have the Nirvana icon cover Bush, stunt like Flavor Flav, and roll over in his grave. Everybody's coming down on Courtney Love for licensing this atrocity, so Courtney Love very calmly took to Twitter to call out Activision and threaten filing suit. In her words:
"FOR THE RECORD I DID NOT APPROVE KURTS AVATAR FOR GUYITARHERO5. i think Kurt would despise this game alone let alone this avatar," and "WE are going to sue the shit out of ACtivision we being the Trust the Estate the LLC the various LLCs Cobain Enterprises" (via P4K, because there is no way I was swimming through her twittershitter to find the relevant tweets)(oh and, a big sic on all of that).
So according to Courtney, Courtney is not so bad after all! According to Activision, though, she might need a new story. The company just sent a press release stating: "Guitar Hero secured the necessary licensing rights from the Cobain estate in a written agreement signed by Courtney Love to use Kurt Cobain's likeness as a fully playable character in Guitar Hero® 5."
Courtney's response, posted just minutes ago: "activision is fulllof shit they have a a contcrct called a deal memo that said upon approvale they could use an avatar i approved i .," adding "and i never inteneded to aPPROVE this shit, they are doing a recall you can be sure o fthat. waita ew hours maybe tomorrow press and etc."
So either Activision will be recalling the game, or Courtney doesn't understand the terms of the deal memo she signed. Tough call. More soon I'm sure.
UPDATE: Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl release a statement:
This is a statement regarding Nirvana, Guitar Hero and the likeness of the late Kurt Cobain.
We want people to know that we are dismayed and very disappointed in the way a facsimile of Kurt is used in the Guitar Hero game. The name and likeness of Kurt Cobain are the sole property of his estate - we have no control whatsoever in that area.
While we were aware of Kurt's image being used with two Nirvana songs, we didn't know players have the ability to unlock the character. This feature allows the character to be used with any kind of song the player wants. We urge Activision to do the right thing in "re-locking" Kurt's character so that this won't continue in the future.
It's hard to watch an image of Kurt pantomiming other artists' music alongside cartoon characters. Kurt Cobain wrote songs that hold a lot of meaning to people all over the world. We feel he deserves better.
Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl
RT @courtneylover79 - http://j.mp/hZMfe - "Guitar Hero® 5 Kurt Cobain - Courtney Love Gives Kurt Bad Name - Impossible Mash" - #youtube #video via @mrjyn - *My little Greatest Hits vid is causing a stir in Cobain Enterprises LLC-land. - "30-second Guitar Hero 5 vid, 'Courtney Love Gives Kurt Bad Name' video on YouTube is a 30-second 'fan?' compilation of all the most improbable, 'unlocked' performances given by Kurt Cobain from the new Guitar Hero 5 Activision release, including: Flava Flav, Bon Jovi, Stevie Wonder and David Bowie. Really! HERE's the URL - http://j.mp/hZMfe -AND- HERE's an article about it - http://bit.ly/s3Yph - " zergwatch (gamer zine)
Courtney Love -- Guitar Hero 'Raped' Kurt's Image | TMZ.com
Courtney Love -- Guitar Hero 'Raped' Kurt's Image | TMZ.com
Courtney Love -- Guitar Hero 'Raped' Kurt's Image
Courtney Love is on the warpath -- threatening to "sue the s**t" out of the people behind Guitar Hero after she saw Kurt Cobain's image in the video game.
Cobain's widow just unleashed a serious Twitter attack on Activision -- the game developer -- saying they never got her permission to use Kurt's image ... and she wouldn't have given it to them if they had asked. Here's a sample:
"not in twenty JILLION years would i EVER have allowed this and this islethal."
"we get NO money for this, travesty, Frances gets NO money for the rape."
Love is no stranger to lawsuits ... we'll let you know when she takes this thing to court.
UPDATE: Activision released the following statement:
"Guitar Hero secured the necessary licensing rights from the Cobain estate in a written agreement signed by Courtney Love to use Kurt Cobain's likeness as a fully playable character in Guitar Hero® 5."
Read more: http://www.tmz.com/2009/09/10/courtney-love-guitar-hero-stole-cobains-image/#ixzz0Quri7H69
The new tastemaker -- latimes.com CONGRATULATIONS JANE ALDRIDGE SEA OF SHOES
The new tastemakerThe new tastemaker -- latimes.comThe days of a few magazine editors dominating what's hot and what's not are over. The Internet makes everyone in the know. It's also an easy place to shop.
WEBSITE: Community, content and commerce come together at Fashionair. (www.fashionair.com)
The Internet is the world's front-row seat to fashion.
You don't have to rummage through crowded store racks or pay for a personal shopper; the Web will do it for you. Aggregator sites and social networks give anyone insider status, offering up-to-the-minute news about sales and new merchandise. Runway photos are posted online minutes after the shows end, and style how-tos are not confined to the pages of glossy magazines; they are everywhere.
The Internet's share of retail clothing sales has been well documented. Although apparel sales overall are down 7.11% in the period from July 2007 to July 2009, online sales have grown 12.55%, according to the NPD Group, a market research firm based in Port Washington, N.Y. But it's the Internet's role as tastemaker that may very well signal the end of the severely coiffed fashion editor as gatekeeper.
"The Internet is the great leveler of trends," said Jane Buckingham, president of L.A.-based trend forecasting firm Trendera. "Previously, only a select group had access to [designer] fashion [shows], but now everyone sees everything. Not only can things be knocked off more quickly, we can buy them more quickly and know what is in fashion more quickly."
Inspiration and advice comes from professional websites built around a common love of clothes and personal blogs, whose authors are enjoying a moment in the sun.
The autumn issue of H&M's in-house magazine looks at "the boys and girls who dictate fashion from their bedrooms," including L.A.'s Cory Kennedy ( www.itscorykennedy.com); the Philippines' Bryan Boy (www.bryanboy.com), after whom Marc Jacobs named a purse; and 13-year-old Tavi Williams (www.tavi-thenewgirlintown.blogspot.com), who also appears in the September issues of LOVE and Pop magazines.
Several bloggers turn up in Style.com's list of front-row faces expected at the runway shows this season, including San Diego-based Rumi Neely, 26, ( www.fashiontoast.com), who is now designing a collection for RVCA, and Jane Aldridge, the Paris, Texas-based 17-year-old behind Sea of Shoes (seaofshoes.typepad.com), who was tapped to design footwear for Urban Outfitters and model in the fall lookbook for the label Simone. Meanwhile, Penguin recently published a book of photo blogger Scott Schuman's best shots at the Sartorialist ( www.thesartorialist.com), and the Gap has asked French blogger Garance Doré to put together some of her photos and sketches to feature in a pop-up shop open during London Fashion Week.
It's not a blog, but at Closet Couture (www.closetcouture.com), the styling advice comes from professionals, for a fee, after users upload photos of themselves in various outfits. StyleHop ( www.stylehop.com) and Lookbook.nu (lookbook.nu) invite anyone to do the advising.
"Because every individual has been given this means of expression, you get inspiration from your neighbor, from someone living in Hong Kong, from so many different places," says Sojin Lee, who co-created Fashionair ( www.fashionair.com) with "American Idol" guru Simon Fuller. Launched Sept. 3, it is one of several new websites to combine community, content and commerce.
The site is designed to be a forum for users to share style diaries, watch behind-the-scenes movies about designers and hear about trendy items and buy them. Unlike traditional fashion magazines, there is no fashionable figurehead, no monthly editor's letter, but there are experts, including makeup artist Val Garland, celebrity stylist Annabel Tollman and designer Thakoon Panichgul. "We are all about celebrating the breadth and diversity of style," Lee said.
When it comes to wardrobe solutions, the Web is a bottomless well.
Whereas traditional magazines are frequently bound by their advertisers to feature specific, typically very high-end brands, websites are less likely to be, so there is always potential to discover a new designer, store or product.
One of the sites most notable for spotlighting new trends is Polyvore (www.polyvore.com), which functions as a community-created magazine -- a forum for user-generated fashion spreads that are created using collages of runway images and product shots. One spread pays homage to pop singer Avril Lavigne's style, another to the aesthetic of the house of Lanvin. Click on the items in the spreads and you are taken to the Web stores where they can be purchased, whether in London or in Shanghai -- or at the mall.
Of course, the Web is a two-way street. It's a platform for emerging designers to receive attention. And every click is more information for fashion designers and retailers to use when thinking about what kind of clothes to make and how they present them.
New York-based designer Norma Kamali, who has her own signature line and a lower-priced line NK for Wal-Mart, was one of the first designers to launch a website, back in 1996. She says the Internet has become a valuable tool in the creative process, and in production.
"Not only do we get feedback on our retail site, but we get feedback from the Wal-Mart site," Kamali said. "We learn about our mistakes, we learn about what's appropriate and what's not."
New York-based designer Malcolm Harris took this philosophy to a new level. For his One Dress Project, he took himself out of the equation and relied on his customers to tell him what they wanted.
He used MySpace, Facebook and AsmallWorld, another social-networking site, as his design laboratory, interacting with more than 1,000 women around the world over the course of 18 months and asking them questions about what was missing in their wardrobes. The research culminated in a single dress, a viscose jersey wrap style that Harris is selling for $250 at one-dress.com.
"Women felt as if they were being forced into certain things, forced by magazines, forced by designers," he said.
"In my mind, I kept thinking liberate, liberate, liberate."
Since the launch of Harris' website in June, he says he has sold 3,000 of the $250 dresses.
So the Internet is giving people a voice in creating fashion too.
"We are becoming a society that wants everything how we want it," said Buckingham, the trend analyst. "Technology allows us to get it."
booth.moore@latimes.com