Carmichael's Position: Busting my Balls

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March 22, 2008

Busting my Balls

Played Racquetball yesterday... In preparation for yesterday's game I went down to the local Dick's sporting goods store to buy a replacement glove for the two that I blew out in Tuesday's games. Oh, and while I'm there I might as well pick up a couple of cans of balls.

Searching the shelf I find a couple of 3-pack cans of ProPenn green balls. Racquetball always is better with new balls! Or so the story is supposed to go!

Things were looking pretty good for our end of the week de-compress. My racquetball partner Rich and I even managed to reserve the best court at our club.

After stretching and our warm-ups we commence the beatings with the first of the new balls. We play very competitive racquetball, both of us are rated as "A" players, are very evenly matched and neither of us give up on points too often. It is a great workout and usually lots of fun.

Well 12 points into the first game... that's right 12 points... the that first ball explodes! Damn... That's rare, they usually last more than that. Ok maybe a defective ball, happens. New ball two.

Ball 2 ...Lasts halfway into the second game before giving up the ghost! "What are you friggn' kidding me?... That was a good shot too!"

Third ball... pops after 20 or so points! "For the Love of....!!!"

Second can... Fourth total ball. Blows up on a low passing shot rolling out a whopping 4 feet from the front wall! Would have been cool if said ball didn't look like it was gasping for air! Like the two combatants! JEEEZUS!!! This is NUTS!

We went through 4 brand new racquetballs in 6 games! Now, yes, both Rich and I can accelerate a racquetball above the 100 mile an hour mark, but in our combined 57 years of racquetball experience we have NEVER blown 4 brand new balls in 6 games!

So if I may... my appraisal of the ProPenn green Racquetballs is somewhere to the south side of whale poop! These balls are the worst I've ever played! Dead at the start and even more dead after 50 hits or so... Not a good performance record. No wonder they claim to be the World's #1 Selling Brand! You have to buy a CASE of them to get through a tournament!