Anyone try to revive a dead spaldeen? We tried frying and boiling them…no good! Anybody sing out “get the ball” back in the Bronx when trying to retrieve your spaldeen but you were too young to cross the street? Anybody ever hit an eggball in stickball where the spaldeen comes back at you?
Love this site! I grew up in Astoria, very familiar with “Last Licks” and “Chips on the Ball”. The home team, or team batting in the bottom of the inning was the team who got “Last licks”. “Chips on the Ball” meant, if the ball was lost or split ( Spaldings had way of splitting at the seams) the person who hit it had to give the guy who brought the ball money to buy a new one.
Gary, I grew up in Howard Beach , Queens and although 12 years your senior, even “back then” we used the term ‘chips on the ball’. Which indictaed the owner of the ball expected to be re-imbumbursed or have the ball replaced by anyone who caused it be lost (sewer, roof top), or broken. And I agree with your definition of “last licks”. Don’t see why anything one of the Yankee announcers (corporate shills) say should bother you. The default is that they’re wrong. I’ve been a Yankee fan since 1956 and this is the worst crew (by far) they’ve ever had.
First I’d like to thank this site. I was startled at my job that no one who I eat lunch with was familiar with the expression “chips on the ball” even though a few are my contemporaries (I’m 43), and they insisted “it must have been a Mineola thing.” I proved them wrong via your site. I am now seeking to clear up something that bothered me a lot this baseball season–hearing Yankee announcer Michael Kay referring to the 9th inning as being “last licks” for both teams. My childhood interpretation from our neighborhood was that ONLY the home team could get “last licks”, because they were the last to have an opportunity to bat. Indeed, in our neighborhood stickball contests, the ONLY advantage of being designated the home team was that you had last licks and the other team didn’t. What say you? Please reply either publicly or privately. Gary callisto [at] optonline [dot] net
We played a LOT of Chinese handball on my block in Astoria, primarily without boxes even though the sidewalks had them. When we were younger we played the AKQ version but than got more athletic and adventurous. A distinguishing rule on our block was that as long as the ball hit the wall in-bounds it could hit the ground on its way back to the next player OUT-of-bounds, which meant the winning strategy was to get up as close to the wall as you could on an offensive play and slam it as hard as you could at a sharp angle just in-bounds. The successful result was a ball that ran great distances unimpeded down the sidewalk for retrieval until it would go under a car, or in one direction on into traffic. The other blocks where I’d occasion to play in Astoria or nearby Jackson Heights also played this game in various forms and my observation was that the guys on my block were consistently better players down the line than other blocks we’d visit as it was the ONLY game we played. Not having a convenient schoolyard or park we didn’t play much stickball, though we did when we got a little older throw some touch fotball and eventually softball in nearby yards. For many years though Chinese was pretty much all we played. I taught the game to a guy in Texas a few years back in the university gym. He was a competitive tennis player and really liked it. I’ve had a standing bet with my oldest friend that I can spot him 19 points in a 21-point game one-on-one. He still declines and I still keep offering though we’re both currently 48 years old.
I grew up in East New York and Howard Beach. We played punchball in both neighborhoods,but not as Peter B. described above. Punchball, which we prefered the Pensie Pinkie for due to it’s being softer was basically played the same as baseball (on the street, in parking lot, even a driveway between houses when we were younger (in this version if you hit the wall on the fly you were out). The “batter” punched the ball (anyway he pleased), but overhand produced longer hits. In H.B. we played a game called “slapball” which was similar to Peter’s version of punchball, but played with out 2nd base. The field was a small triangle, the pitcher who stood in the center of the triangle had to pitch the ball over the plate, underhanded, on one bounce. The batter could wait for a pich he like, when the ball was hit, openhanded, it could not pass the line between 1st and 3rd or the batter was out. All other rules were the same as baseball (no stealing). The Spaldeen was our preferred ball for stickball since it was more durable. Of course most of the time we played with any ball we could fish out of a sewer, or pull out of a drainpipe that we’d climb up to.
This is to announce that the Puerto Rico Rookies Stickbal team from Rio Grande, PR, who won the 2004 championship in “El Barrio” July 4th weekend series, and Also this year won the Bronx emperors series, invites all teams to their Labor Day Sept. 3rd series in Rio Grande, for information pls contact team pres. Ruben Garcia 787-887-4526 or Danny Diaz VP 787-632-1602.
Hi everyone. I’m Steve’s cousin, Sharon. Every now and then I visit the site and read all the wonderful thoughts about my cuz. Just reading all the stories brings him back, if only in my mind. I miss him very much and think of him all the time. It’s a great comfort to read your stories and see the impact Steve had on everyone.
I’m currently working on a documentary about the history of stickball. I’m looking for photos or film/video of people playing stickball “back in the day.” The documentary entitled “Bragging Rights” has a tentative airdate of March 2006 on PBS. Thanks! Sonia Gonzalez Producer/Director “Bragging Rights”