Preston Joseph Hebert Sr.
October 28, 2008
Olive "Nookie" Sonnier Pitre
October 30, 2008
A line of six red rubber balls divides center court.
Two teams, one called 6 Pack, wearing orange team shirts, and the other called Hit and Run, wearing aqua blue, line up on each end line in the ready position.
Two more teams, Dodge This and Triple T, anxiously wait their turn in the stands.
As the referee blows the whistle, three members from each team race out and snatch their weapons of mass destruction. They run back behind the yellow line, and that’s when the fun begins.
They bombard each other with balls like eggs flying towards a bad comedian.
Cerisse Antill, a member of Hit and Run, is one of the unlucky ones who gets belted by rubber balls.
Her team lost 9-8, but all that could be heard was the sound of laughs following the match.
Months ago, the Big Dog Sports League, a newly formed recreation group, wanted to be experimental, so they decided to bring a fully-functional dodgeball league to the Bayou Black Recreation Center.
Both Antill and co-director Shirley Grizzell have played in numerous other dodgeball leagues and tournaments. It didn’t take long for them to decide to bring dodgeball to Houma.
Antill, who is in the process of moving from Baton Rouge to Houma, is the brains behind the league. After playing dodgeball for the last several years, Antill said she didn’t want to give up something that was such a big part of her life when she moved.
“I felt that the area really doesn’t offer many sports like this or social outlet cordials,” she said. “I was disappointed when I thought I would have had to give up something that meant so much to me.”
Along with her friend Grizzell, the two wanted to give people of all ages a chance to get away from the normal stresses of everyday life for one night.
The league, which is open to anyone 18 and up, plays matches every Wednesday at 6:30 p.m. When the first matches were held two weeks ago, Antill admitted that she wasn’t sure what the reception would be.
After finally playing the games, she feels that bringing dodgeball to Terrebonne Parish was the right thing to do.
The Houma Police Department, state Rep. Damon Baldone (Damon’s Dodgers) and the The Courier (The Forrest Rangers) have all assembled teams.
Currently, eight teams participate in the league, with each team playing a 30-minute match.
Antill said that she and Grizzell started promoting the league by using flyers, brochures and word of mouth.
“I like it,” said 18-year-old Christian Armstrong of Houma. “It gives me something to do and it’s actually a workout. It feels like you’re running suicides while throwing air.”
Antill echoed her teammate’s words.
“I think I had a lot of sore players for a few days including myself, but you get used to it,” she said. “It’s a sprinting kind of workout.”
The rules of the game are similar to those in the 2004 Ben Stiller and Vince Vaughn movie “Dodgeball.”
A player is out when he is hit with the ball, steps out of bounds, has an opponent catch the ball they threw or drops a ball thrown from the opposing teams.
If a ball is caught anytime during the match, the team that catches the ball is allowed to return a player to the game who was previously out. Once all six members of a team are eliminated, the remaining team is awarded a point. After the half-hour time limit, the team with the highest number of points wins.
One thing Antill brought to the local dodgeball league is the “golden hoop shot.” When a team is down to one player, the last remaining player can attempt to make the dodgeball in a basketball hoop. If that person makes the shot, then his entire team is allowed to return to the floor.
“We tried to make the rules so there wasn’t a lot of gray areas and everything can be understood within the rules,” Antill explained.
Each team is also co-ed, as three guys and three girls must be on the court at all times.
The season has three weeks remaining beginning tonight and is capped off with a playoff tournament. The winning team receives championship T-shirts and a trophy.
“But everyone who plays in the league gets drink specials from whichever bar is sponsoring the league,” Antill said. “Mahoney’s Pub is sponsoring dodgeball, so anyone who plays can go there after their game.”
In addition to dodgeball, Antill said Big Dog Sports is looking to offer other sports such as volleyball, kickball and even flag football. Expansion may also be in the plans barring the success of the other sports. If things go as planned, they’ll look to offer men’s, women’s and co-ed leagues for every sport.
“What we hope to do is to get leagues set up in Thibodaux too and have the winners from each league play each other,” Antill said. “We’ll have to wait and see what happens.”
Anyone interested in playing on a team can call Antill at (225) 572-9199 or e-mail info@bigdogsports-league.com.
Members of Team 6 Pack ready dodge and toss dodgeballs at their opponents last week. The six-member team defeated Team Hit and Run 9-8. * Photo by KYLE CARRIER
