I try not to write about sports too often, as I know many people don’t care for the world of athletics as much as I do. And I have to say, my interest over the years has feigned. I used to know all the facts and figures, who was leading divisions, and on. These days, I’m lucky to know a couple of players on any given team.
Putting that aside, there is one thing we seldom consider when it comes to sports. They cannot be played without the ball. Or the puck. Or the shuttlecock. We need those devices, our helmets and racquets, our bats, and our boards.
It was on this date, February 3, 1876, that the Spalding Athletic Company was formed. The guy, Albert Spalding, was quite a fellow. He was a pitcher and the manager of a baseball team — those Chicago White Stockings. He played other sports too, but baseball seemed to be his main gig.
Anyway, he had a nose for business, and while he was playing baseball, he decided to start the company. I imagine he got tired of playing with lop-sided, different-weighted baseballs, stitched together by local shoe cobblers in whatever town they were playing. So, his company standardized early baseballs and developed the modern baseball bat. In 1892, Spalding acquired Wright & Ditson and A. J. Reach, both rival sporting goods companies.
He got into all branches of sporting goods, even founding a library and a publishing company called The Spaulding Athletic Library and the American Sports Publishing Company. Pretty straightforward, I’d say.
The other big name, I’d say, is Wilson. They had a much different start. The Wilson Sporting Goods Company can trace its beginnings to the “Schwarzschild & Sulzberger” meatpacking company. They were based in New York, and just as it sounds, they ran meat packing slaughterhouses.
Around 1913 they recognized they had quite a bit of animal by-products from its slaughterhouses. So, in 1914, it started making tennis racket strings, violin strings, and surgical sutures. Then, as time when on, they expanded their operations into baseball shoes and tennis racquets.
The guy here, Thomas E. Wilson, the man behind the curtain, renamed the company “Thomas E. Wilson Company”. Over the years, they bought up a lot of small companies, like Hetzinger Knitting Mills, to produce athletic uniforms. They acquired a caddie bag company that produced golf balls. Before anyone knew it, they had expanded into footballs and basketballs. Over the years, it has taken on many new directions to become what it is today, a world leader in athletic goods.
But other companies came along too. Today, the market seems to spread around. Who supplies the balls for all the major league sports?
Footballs – The NFL just switched, this year, from Spaulding to Wilson.
Baseballs – Rawlings
Basketballs – Spaulding
Hockey Pucks – InGlasCo
Tennis Balls (ATP) – Dunlop
Of course, none of this answers the question as to why Wilson ended up on the island with Tom Hanks in the film Cast Away.
I guess it was just a casting call.
But, all of this reminds me of our own abilities in life. No matter what we do in this world, whether we are bankers, car mechanics, nurses, or short-order cooks, we surround ourselves with tools for the job. We have those things necessary to get the task done. Beyond our jobs, there are those personal projects, or undertakings, that require a specific set of tools to be completed. Like knitting, or patching a hole in the wall.
And of course, if we take it one step further. If we consider our lives on an emotional, intellectual, or spiritual level, we try to equip ourselves with those tools that will help us play better. Those things in our gym bags that give us an edge when facing a problem, or a charge.
To be in the game, we have to be in the game. That means having a ball to dribble. A racquet to swing. A target to hit.
Today, may we all be well equipped to meet our moments, whatever they may bring.
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“When the student is ready the teacher will appear. When the student is truly ready… The teacher will Disappear.”
― Tao Te Ching
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“You’re not obligated to win. You’re obligated to keep trying. Do the best you can do everyday.”
― Jason Mraz
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“Life is more fun if you play games.”
― Roald Dahl, My Uncle Oswald
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You have to have balls, to play the game.
