Professional Seaside
October 25, 2024
I renewed my 50-year love affair with seaside volleyball on Saturday.
In mid-October no much less.
Not in Joao Pessoa, Brazil, for the Elite16 event, or in Puerto Cortes, Honduras, on the NORCECA cease. Or in Oceanside for the AVP League. This a lot seaside volleyball in October, for Pete’s sake?!
Nope, I used to be at a spot known as Blackie’s Seaside, which isn’t some small spit of sand in Scotland or some burial floor within the swamplands of New Jersey. That identify doesn’t essentially conjure heat and fuzzy, however the vibes emanating from that small slice of heaven in Newport Seaside had been off the charts.
The event: The Newport Seaside 4 Man/4 Lady Invitational, merely probably the most entertaining seaside event I’ve attended in years. And, I might say judging by the massive smiles from the shut to five,000 spectators on web site (on a school soccer Saturday!), in addition to the gamers (Phil Dalhausser beaming … a number of occasions!), which will have been a sentiment shared by fairly a couple of in attendance.
And the weekend left me with so much to say to new USA Volleyball CEO John Speraw as we head into the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics. My phrases for him observe.
The competitors in Newport Seaside was very good. That’s what occurs when you have got three Olympic gold medalists, seven of the eight gamers who represented the USA ultimately summer time’s Olympic Video games in Paris, AND 12 previous Manhattan Seaside Open champions representing 26 titles in all. So whereas the AVP League was taking place in Oceanside, this event had Alison Cerutti, Phil Dalhausser, Eric Fonoimoana, and Brandie Wilkerson.
The climate was within the mid-70’s on a spectacularly sunny day with no wind. Mixing with the group, the legends in full pressure: Smith/Stoklos/Menges/Don Shaw/Jon Lee/Sean Rosenthal/Jake Gibb AND probably the most colourful participant to ever don a pair of Quiksilvers, Gary Hooper. To prime all of it off: Corridor of Fame announcer Chris “Geeter” McGee, again on the mic, offering the soundtrack to a heavenly day. Is there a P.A. announcer in ANY sport higher than Geeter?
Who introduced this spectacular solid of characters all collectively? Co-impresarios Steve Obradovich, Kevin Martin (no, not the previous seaside nice Okay-Mart), Mario Marovic and Enjoyable Zone’s Henry Pyle. They had been in a position to appeal to eight totally different native company sponsors. The end result: A complete purse of $250,000, the most important one-day payout of any event within the WORLD for 2024. However greater than that, the gamers had been lodged on the five-star Balboa Bay Resort, and upon coming into their room, every had been greeted with a present bag. It’s these little issues that may, and do, make an enormous distinction.
One of many sponsors was Slunks. I’ve by no means met their CEO Chris Reames, however I can let you know that firm has given extra again to the sport of seaside volleyball in recent times than anybody else. Along with sponsoring a wide range of groups/gamers, Slunks just about gave away their very distinctive hats. You might purchase one for $5 at this event. It was 1970 over again! Cause sufficient to struggle L.A. site visitors and hoof it to Newport Seaside!
The 4 man/4 girl sport is an distinctive product. The rallies are longer, which engages spectators extra. With 4 gamers and a few subs on every staff, there’s an esprit de corps you don’t see within the two man/two girl. And the gamers appear to have extra enjoyable and it exhibits (see Dalhausser remark above). The matches from Newport Seaside had been all proven on VBTV, Volleyball World’s streaming service. And right here is hoping that the FIVB offers this model of volleyball a really, very shut look sooner or later.
The ladies’s event was exceptionally entertaining. And revelatory in lots of respects. One of the best participant on the courtroom Saturday?
Megan Rice.
Now, there are two gamers named Megan Rice who play skilled seaside volleyball. The one ripping it up on Saturday was (I imagine) Megan J. Rice. The J ought to stand for leaping jack. She has obtained to have one of many two or three greatest vertical leaps on this planet. And to prime it off, she hits the stuffing out of the ball. The four-woman format performed to all of her strengths.
A few different shout outs to her successful teammates, Carli Lloyd and veteran Geena Urango. Lloyd, the previous AVCA indoor nationwide participant of the 12 months at Cal, now 35, received a bronze medal indoors in Rio in 2016. And she or he has among the most lovely arms, irrespective of the floor. She actually has the quickest flick-like launch of any setter. In case you are in Austin this winter you’ll be able to see her play indoors for the LOVB franchise there. Urango would have received the “Hoover vacuum” defensive participant of the event if there was one. She was within the pocket, digging for that successful Provenio Capital staff that featured Lloyd, Rice, budding star Toni Rodriguez, Charlie Ekstrom and Betsi Flint, herself a Manhattan Seaside champion.
Unequivocally, the most effective participant on the sand Saturday was the appropriately named Taylor SANDer, who led his staff, Citrus Ford, to a second consecutive males’s staff title. He had the aforementioned five-time Manhattan Seaside Open champion and two-time World titlist Jim Menges shaking his head in absolute wonderment at his termination abilities. It was bombs away all day for Sander. It appeared as if he jacked each excessive angle that was potential on the courtroom. It was as phenomenal a hitting show as I’ve ever seen. — anyplace. His staff included 2008 Olympic gold-medalist Dalhausser, Nick Lucena, and Sander’s brother, Brendan, in addition to the Crabb brothers, Taylor and Trevor.
It’s actually fairly astounding when you concentrate on it, that neither the Seaside Professional Tour nor the AVP can get native (or nationwide for that matter) sponsors on the stage {that a} small group like Newport Seaside can and did.
Obradovich, Martin and Marovic are all senior executives in unrelated companies who labored this as a aspect hustle, and spent cash out of their very own pockets to assist this occasion succeed. Their love of the sport of seaside volleyball, and their selflessness ought to hopefully encourage others in order that gamers like Miles Partain, Andy Benesh and Trevor Crabb don’t should jam down the 405 to get to Oceanside to play one other event the identical day.
Which leads me to my “Expensive John” letter.
John Speraw is the newly employed president and CEO of USA Volleyball. I’ve met him as soon as and he is an interesting persona who is sensible, has a commanding presence, will pay attention and look you within the eye.
However he has a significant activity at hand — properly a whole lot of duties all through the game — and a significant alternative in seaside volleyball.
Speraw is well-connected with among the ex-volleyball-playing rainmakers within the enterprise world. There are a LOT of very profitable former gamers who make up his interior circle. Along with the plain want for extra company sponsors, it’s crucial that particular person benefactors be recruited, whether or not by way of a basis, or another means to supply developmental cash in order that the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Video games can present a springboard to the long run progress of the game.
Second, Speraw, the previous UCLA and USA Olympic indoor coach, must prioritize the seaside sport usually, and the boys’s aspect particularly. If it was me, I might again up the Brinks truck and rent German Jurgen Wagner or Brazilian Marcio Sicoli, or each, to guide the nationwide program efforts on this essential quadrennial main as much as a house nation Olympics.
The German program has been stunningly profitable, together with Olympic gold-medalists Laura Ludwig and Kira Walkenhorst (2016) and Julius Brink and Jonas Reckermann (2012), and the reigning silver medalists from Paris, Clemens Wickler and Nils Ehlers. Svenja Muller and Cinja Tillman received the newest European Championship. The frequent denominator: Jurgen Wagner.
Sicoli is well-known to American seaside fanatics. He coached Kerri Walsh Jennings and Misty Might-Treanor to 2 of their Olympic gold medals. In Paris he mentored Wilkerson and Humana Paredes to a silver medal and means, means again in 2004 he was the coach to Brazilian legends Shelda and Adriana when that pair misplaced within the remaining to Walsh Jennings and Treanor on the Athens Video games.
Third, Speraw must stimulate the event of a home USA seaside volleyball circuit. One which works carefully with the worldwide Seaside Professional Tour, in order that there aren’t calendar conflicts, and the most effective home gamers can be found to play on every. Additionally, USAV must host some worldwide competitions within the USA, and never await the Seaside Professional Tour to get its act collectively on that entrance.
In September 2009, the AVP placed on a compelling Davis Cup-like twin between Brazil and the USA in Glendale, Arizona. It was a sensational event with actual drama. That’s what occurs once you put on the Staff USA singlet. The actually excellent news is that now there are extra nations than ever that may discipline 5 aggressive groups in each genders.
I really imagine Speraw has the unifier gene in him. No time is best than now to rally the troops and have a gathering of the minds. Get probably the most inventive and elastic minds and thought leaders in seaside volleyball collectively in a single room. There are a selection of wildly profitable individuals on the market like Obradovich/Martin/Marovic/Pyle, who’re altruistic, and care concerning the seaside sport, and need to see medals across the necks of USA seaside stars in Santa Monica in 2028.
New leaders in lots of companies sadly turn out to be wallpaper after six months. They get mired within the bureaucratic sludge and spend time drowning in emails, conferences and protocols. However the first six months is when it has to occur:
There’ll by no means be a greater time for John Speraw to impact change than NOW.
