Whiffle Ball

[WilliamTell]

Our "Pickle" was called "Hop Box" in Iowa. We used to play that a lot, with a tennis ball too. I remember a friend and I throwing a tennis ball about 350 feet because we got it wet and threw it with the wind.

 

Another game we played a lot was kickball, and those were competitive games. Sometimes the dads would even come out and play. We used to use a monsterous rubber ball, probably 2 foot in diameter. We had cross outs at first base and at home and you could always hit the person. Once a cross out happened or the person was hit, people at other bases could not advance. We had 5 run rules, and since we were playing on the street, if the ball was kicked farther than 100 feet, which was 5 lenghts of concrete slabs, it was a home run.

 

In football we used those concrete slabs on the road for 10, 20, 30 etc. yard lines. Meaning we had a 200 foot long field and probably a 35 foot wide field, so pretty odd dimensions. The one 1st down was after you passed the 50 yard line. You had to go for it on 4th down. When someone scored a touchdown, they'd do dances which would piss off people. When we threw the ball for the kick off we'd just yell "coming down" and then everyone would scream as we would run to the ball.

 

I basically live in a "cul-de-sac" however it's spelled, since there's one way in and one way out. But actually it's a square, so we would also have bike relays. We'd have teams and take turns riding around the block, once someone came, the next would go and so on.

 

We'd play capture the flag as well, but we could never get fair teams because certain people always wanted to be on the same team. I mentioned we'd play Ghosts in the Graveyard too, we called it base or home base. Finally sometimes we'd just make up games, which was fun. And we'd have an annual water balloon fight which was an enhanced capture the flag game.

[Iwritecode]

Smear the Queer. We used to call that "Kill the guy with the ball". It was usually a football.

 

When we played we had a mandatory fumble rule where whoever got tackled had to fumble the football (or at least make an attempt) as they were going down.

[mreye]

There is no "h" in wiffleball

 

I'm pretty sure there used to be. I don't know when or why they changed it, but I sent away for the official rules when I was a kid and I stil have them. I'll check tonight.

 

By the way, that was when they sold the balls in individual carboard boxes. Remember that? The one I remember had Rick Sutcliffe on the box.

[southsideirish71]

Also we played the s*** out of kickball in my back yard.

 

Anyone else have their school outlaw Red Rover?

 

I remember the funny thing about playing kickball in gym. You would request to the pitcher on the other team, "slow and bouncy" and for some odd reason the other team would honor your request. It was a glorified version of home run derby.

 

How about this, anyone play "no touching ground IT" at the playground. I remember doing all sorts of dangerous stupid crap to keep from getting caught. There was this park near my cousins house, it had a 2nd story wooden clubhouse with a slide. We would go hand over hand out to the edge and dangle like morons to avoid getting caught. Also there was a technique of running ontop of the monkey bars and walking on the swing beam. Amazing how coordinated you are playing a game like that, and ten minutes later you can trip over a snail. The dumbest thing I did was climbing on top of that 2 story wooden house, and then going to the very edge of it so the kid who was IT couldnt catch me. Again one of the 20 moments in my life where I am surprised that my stupidity didnt kill me.