Tabloids were shocked today when the President of the United States, Barack Obama, announced that in light of the recent economic crisis, the American government plans to downplay baseball and football in order to make more cost effective sports.
"The main problem with baseball and football is that if you get a ball into the crowd, you're probably never going to get it back," said a spokesperson for this new sport. "The new sport we have designed allows for much cheaper play, greatly cutting the costs needed for equipment, media coverage and crowd control. The great thing, too, is that the sport still retains all the energy from baseball and concentrates it into a 5x5 metre field. It's essentially a storm in a teacup."
The new sport is designed to be played in areas about as big as a local park, and supports teams that are made themselves, rather than state teams. It will also be shortened from the traditional game lasting hours to small segments lasting no more than five minutes.
The basic rules are that players are to take a small ball made of plastic and drop it into the opponent's basket. As the game is much smaller scale, the ball will be about the size of a marble, the basket will be about the size of a paper cup. The players will then stand 3 metres away from each other. This way, each point to be played will only last at the most 30 seconds. The game ends when a player scores 10 points.
It is also said to be zero contact, as to minimise hospitalisations. Control of the ball will be gained if one player manages to cause the other to laugh, in which the referee will intervene and swap position of the ball.
"It's definitely the most exciting game I've seen," said another spokesperson. "It is a fierce game of wits, strength, and most importantly, keeping one's pie-hole firmly shut."
The game will be premiered at 7:30, this Saturday, on most major broadcasting stations. Meanwhile, there is a current competition running to come up with a name that will replace its working title, "Cheap-skate-ball".
