Adventures in Sporting
Menukten enters its roster for the Kronum World Cup too late, but a vibrant community of Kronum inspired sports spring up in the wake of the Menukten Kronum team's disappointment
Menukten enters its roster for the Kronum World Cup too late, but a vibrant community of Kronum inspired sports spring up in the wake of the Menukten Kronum team's disappointment
The Menukten Kronum team returned dejected from New Wolfopolis after discovering that they had missed the entrance deadline to secure a position in the Kronum World Cup.
“Deadlines aren't really part of squonk culture,” said Coach Goodwill Keeps-the-Pipe, the coach of the international Menukten Kronum team whose ineptitude lead to the team's disappointment. “As a people we live day to day, mindful of each moment, each moment equally important and valid. And so we tend to forget things like deadlines that the international sports bodies impose on international competitions, and Menukten's showing in sports internationally have suffered as a result. I told the Secretary of Sports a year ago that we should at least hire foreign secretaries so we can make sure we have all the paperwork in time, but she didn't take my advice.”
The Kronum teams disappointment has done nothing to dissipate what many papers have termed the “Kronum fever” that has swept the nation.
“When coach and I announced that we would be forming the first Kronum international team,” says Visible Fat Bear striker for Menukten's most prestigious soccer club Limmeritich Lacrimic which is coached by Keeps-the-Pipe, “people went crazy. The phone at club Limmeritch was ringing off the hook for a whole month with people asking what Kronum was and how you played it. People just couldn't get enough, and a lot of sports enthusiasts were trying to start Kronum leagues all over the nation.”
Secretary of Sports Lisa Calm-Water, decided to capitalize on the new sports craze by spending a significant portion of her budget constructing Kronum fields in Menukten's elementaries, high schools and colleges.
“People were clamoring for more Kronum,” she said about her now controversial actions, “and so I gave it to them.”
But Calm-Water failed to do her research, for elementary and high schools and colleges all over the nation soon discovered the prohibitive cost of the Kronum goal, ball and other equipment.
“Kronum's website lists the three ring goals as six hundred dollars,” says Superintendent Wallace Sharp Eye of Menukten's Pine Ridge educational district, “or three thousand lacrimas, and that's just for one goal. A whole set would be one hundred nine thousand lacrimas. Now, what kind of elementary school has that kind of money to drop on a set of goals? And that's just the three ring versions: the five rings, which high school and colleges would want to purchase, are a whopping thirty thousand lacrimas each.”
“So we were stuck with a bunch of Kronum fields and nothing to do with them,” explained Yarence Nightinggale, the physical education teacher at Pine Ridge elementary, “all because of secretary Calm-Water's 'brilliant' plan. We were using them in a game of four way soccer with trash cans as goals, the soccer team being very unwilling to share their goal structures. It was during recess, and the children were playing a pickup game of Kronum soccer with a kickball. This little boy who gets bullied a lot was playing wedgeback and the bullies were on the opposing team. Instead of trying to kick the ball past them, they made a contest out of seeing who could hit him with the ball the most times. One point for a shot from the goal zone or wedge that hits the wedgeback in the goal zone, two points for a shot from the flex and three points for a shot from the prime ring. The next day they decided to get rid of the goals altogether and use a wedgeback as the 'goal', points being scored by striking him or her with the ball. The new game, which is a mix between Kronum and dodgeball, became really popular at recess and all the kids started playing it.”
“Krodgeball”, as the game invented by bullies came to be called, was soon played on every Kronum field in Menukten, with the “goal wedgeback” eventually evolving into a position called a dodger who is unaffiliated with either team and stands in the goal zone, unable to leave it, trying to doge the balls thrown at him. Unlike in Kronum, the ball can be handled by either hand or foot in the wedge as well as the rest of the field. No players except the dodger and the wedgeback can enter the goal area. Wedgebacks are only allowed to enter the goal zone on offense and do so to restrict the movement of the dodger and make him or her an easy target. Shots must be taken from without the goal zone, though an offensive wedgeback can try to score on goal by kicking the ball at the dodger.
The Department of Sports soon began nurturing Krodgeball as part of their new comprehensive Physical Education policies for the nation's schools.
“Its a great use of the Kronum pitches, which unfortunately, due to budget restraints, could not be used for their intended purposes,” says Secretary Calm-Water, “all you need are players and a kickball.”
The burgeoning playground game did not go unnoticed by the nation's high school and college age students.
“My little sister started playing it,” says Emma Two Branch, student at Menukten's University of Phlox Hill, “and I really like the game. It was fascinating. Unlike most sports, the goal could move and defend itself. So me and my friends started playing it at college. I was the dodger and I happened to be practicing my juggling at the time. A ranger snuck up on me and the next thing I knew I had a face full of kickball and my juggling balls were scattering every which way. The incident gave me an idea. After the game I approached the opposing team and questioned them about replacing the dodger with a juggler juggling three balls. The goal would be to cause the juggler to drop the balls or hit them out of her hands with the kickball, each ball being worth a point or more than a point according to where the successful shot was taken. They really liked the idea and the game of Krugglum was born.”
In Krugglum, points are scored according to how many balls the juggler drops when hit with the kickball. A shot from the goal zone earns one point per ball dropped; from the wedge, two points oer ball dropped, from the flex, three points per ball dropped; from the prime ring, four points per ball dropped. A scoring opportunity could thus net the offensive team 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9 or 12 points, depending on where the ball was shot and how many juggling balls it knocked out of the juggler's hands. A twelve point shot is called a krugglum.
Krugglum soon became the favorite of college intramurals nationwide and a collegiate league overseen by the student created and administered National Guild for the Advancement of Krugglum (or NGAK), was soon formed with colleges playing all over the nation.
But not everybody was satisfied with the new game.
“The problem was,” says Patrick Handsome, son of multi-billionaire Ori Handsome, who attends Menukten's prestigious college Yarrow, “was that the jugglers would turn their backs to the pitch and face the boundary ring making their balls almost impossible to hit. To prevent this me and my college buddies modified the field a bit. We pulled out the goal zones from the boundary ring into the middle of the wedge and extended the cross and flex zones around the boundary line. We named the new game Bobsquat which means, in the squonk language, 'hit the fool', the fool being, of course, the juggler."
“It's really an exciting concept,” says Handsome's friend Derrick Shallow Water, “it's like the difference between soccer and lacrosse. In soccer the goal is on the boundary line, making it impossible to play behind it. So the goalkeeper concentrates on what is in front of him. But in lacrosse the goal zones are in the middle of the field at either end, so the goalie must be aware of what is happening behind him as well as in front. And in Bobsquat, where there is not net, this means that goalkeepers have to guard from attack from three hundred and sixty degrees.”
The modified Kronum field comes with modified terminology.
“When we finalized the design of the Bobsquat pitch we thought it looked like a wheel,” says Handsome, “so we gave its various sections automobile names. The huge circle in the center is called the hub, the lines coming off it and connecting to the far edge of the boundary ring are called the spokes, the edge it connects to is called the rim. The spokes are sandwiched on either side by the strips and inside the strips in each quadrant you have a wedge. Inside the wedge are circular structures that look like the things used to bolt automobile wheels to the axle, so we called them the bolt. And the whole thing is called the Bobsquat wheel or pitch.”
Bobsquat rules are similar to those of Krodgeball and Krugglum allowing the ball to be handled with the hands in the wedge. However unlike Krodgeball the offense is allowed to take the ball into the bolt zones where ball handling is restricted to the feet. And in Bobsquat the offensive wedgeback becomes a defensive boltback who must guard the juggler from attack from three hundred sixty degrees. Scoring, however, is the same as in Krugglum with the stipulation that some of the zones now extend behind the bolt. As shot in the bolt counts for one point per ball dropped. A shot from the wedge counts as two points per ball dropped. A shot from the strip counts as three points per ball dropped. And a shot from the hub, spokes or rim count as four points per ball dropped.
“The target is smaller,” agrees Shallow Water, “which makes goaltending easier, but the range of attack is much larger than say in soccer or even lacrosse, which makes goaltending harder.”
The new game has took off like a herd of bison, stampeding its way through the country. Even the die-hard Krugglum collegiates admit the virtues of the new game.
“I won't say Bobsquat is an improvement over Krugglum,” responds Two Branch, creator of the latter, “but it certainly offers some different, exciting dynamics completely different Krugglum ball play that I think are just fascinating. Krugglum will still occupy most of the space in my heart, but that doesn't mean there isn't room for Bobsquat too.”
While Bobsquat has already found its way into collegiate competitions, Handsome's father Ori is in the process of sponsoring a professional league.
“We are starting with eight team with the idea of expanding to twelve by the end of the year,” the elder Handsome explained, “the league is planning its inaugural game sometime at the beginning of June.”
Shallow Water is excited about the new sporting league, tentatively called Premier League Bobsquatch.
“I'm thinking of trying out,” he admitted, “this is going to be the next big thing in Menukten sports. Kronum fever is now Bobsquat fever.”
