Hoopfest needs some changes in rules

Hoopfest is a word that’s hard to define.

To a player, it’s “Christmas in June,” a great time to be alive.

To a nonplayer, Hoopfest, which turns 17 this year, brings the same issues as any other 17-year-old – parking nightmares and stinky potties.

I fall into the first group – a player. That’s if a mid-50s guy can still call himself a player.

However, a lot of locals still think they are dancers, despite having Astaire through Travolta as role models, so we’ll call it even.

I will concede that there are signs my “player” status is nearing a close. Going up to the Hoopfest second-floor office to register, I got tired, and I was riding the escalator.

Having played in every Hoopfest, and most every classification, puts me in a position to offer insight to what is great at Hoopfest, what is not so great and, unlike my hoops, what can be improved upon.

The great at Hoopfest includes Saturday’s opening “Star Spangled Banner.” I’m full of energy and hope for the day, and it’s always a stirring moment.

Of course, about two hours into Hoopfest, there’s no “stir” left in me. I’m as immobile as the Clocktower.

Crazy haircuts, girls in multicolored pigtails, and 50-somethings in long, baggy shorts that reach down to their Ace bandages are all part of the fun. Team names have become a street version of Spokane stand-up, eliciting chuckles with such monikers as Rim Reapers, Ground Jordan, and You’ll Be Hearing From My Lawyer.

The bad of Hoopfest starts with water prices that exceed the price of a gallon of unleaded. Add in baby carriages wider than a truckload of timber maneuvering through ultra-crowded streets.

Then there’s the 2 p.m. Witching Hour. The Witching Hour invariably occurs early Saturday, when dashed expectations, rising temperatures, and not wanting a second loss that makes your team a Sunday spectator, often brings out the worst in sportsmanship.

If I were Hoopfest commissioner, the improvements would come swiftly.

First the entry fee would be lowered. This is a Hoopfest tournament, not college; so tuition-size fees should not apply.

“Chuck the thugs” would be a centerpiece of my reign as commissioner. In a rule that applies to players, parents, and coaches, out-of-line behavior gets you five minutes in the showers – the Riverfront Park fountain.

Throw a punch, and you’ll do hard time: You’re done at Hoopfest until you put in two years as a courtside monitor.

Getting the teams into proper brackets must be an administrator’s nightmare. I would help by adding two new player classifications to the current “competitive” and “recreational.” The additions would be “barely mobile” and “hold up a mirror.”

Just like horse racing, if you win a bracket, you move up in class the following year. It would end sandbagging from teams that want to win at all costs.

Conversely, lose all games, you move to a lower bracket.

I would steal another thing from horse racing – handicapping the teams. The Hoopfest Web site could add a one-line scouting report on each team, such as “excellent three-point shooting team” or “play solid man-to-man.”

Our family team has fallen on hard times, so our scouting report would be something like “good to their mother.” Or maybe not so good.

All of my seven children have played at Hoopfest, which just happens to always fall on the last weekend in June – their mother’s birthday weekend. It was mentioned in the divorce papers.

My best memory of Hoopfest didn’t involve winning. Playing in a family bracket, my sons and I were playing a three-generation family.

Grandpa’s wife was extremely worried about her husband playing and asked to speak to me about it. I winked at her and told her “no worries.”

My sons and I threw the game. That team had never won before, and it meant everything to them.

Grandma came running out and told my girlfriend that “he’s such a keeper” – a fact apparently lost on her when she dumped me weeks later.

Society just places too much emphasis on winning.