By John Branston
It seems worth noting that the most successful and well-attended events the last two weekends in Memphis had nothing to do with basketball, football, baseball or music superstars.
They were, instead, an Asian market at Crosstown Concourse, a motorcycle rally at the fairgrounds, a track meet on Beale Street and the ever-present sound of pickleball in public parks and (formerly) tennis centers.
Imagine, for a minute, that you are a sports investor – maybe, say, a rich philanthropist (not likely) or a Memphis mayoral candidate (anyone can play!) or an event planner (whatever that is). Or just, uh, a know-it-all parent, player, or fan.The goal of the game is to maximize current facilities, abandon or upgrade old ones, and spot the Next Big Thing before it is too late.
Remember that there will probably be more unexpected surprises and disappointments as Memphis finishes more than a billion dollars in tourism and sports-related developments funded by public and private sources.
Downtown: I would have bet there would be pole dancing before there was pole vaulting on Beale Street, but for the second year in a row promoter Eddie Murphey put together a menu of field events on Beale to go with a track meet at Rhodes College in honor of his late father, a track star at Tennessee. Throw in a few hundred motorcycles and riders strutting their stuff and you got a hit.
On the other hand …. AutoZone Park, a very big thing in terms of bucks and space, is pitching minor-league baseball and soccer. Both games are fun to play but – so sue me – boring to watch. Baseball is a perfect fit for college towns in Mississippi and small towns anywhere. Soccer at the highest levels is a cure for insomnia, as demonstrated by the women’s World Cup 0-0 snoozers.
The fairground redevelopment has been focused on Tiger football, the stadium, and a new basketball facility, but don’t count out Tiger Lane and all that vacant space. A few thousand bikers with fuel and money to burn camped at Tiger Lane and rode to Beale on $30,000 Harleys and Hondas.
The stadium itself will be all right despite the overhyped sob story of the Tigers not getting into a big-time football conference. Be careful what you wish for, Tiger football diehards. The Athletic reports today that Rutgers, which joined the Big Ten in 2012, has lost $250 million since then and won 13 conference games.
The failure to get into a major confernce ignores three things. First, there is good money to be made playing powerhouse teams in away games. For example, Michigan’s first four opponents are East Carolina, UNLV, Bowling Green and Rutgers. They will all get a nice check and some national TV time as well as a beating. Second, the reborn USFL looks like it could find a home in Memphis – again. Bet on it, which is the point of pro football anyway. Third, in this day of free agency and college transfer, we are all cheering for laundry anyway. The makeover of Tiger Lane and the stadium looks more and more like money well spent.
I wish I could say the same for tennis, the sport I have played for more than 60 years. Around the time the Racquet Club closed there was a surge of construction of new, tennis* facilities at Audubon Park (Leftwich), MUS, Memphis Country Club and other privates and well-run public centers in Whitehaven and East Memphis. The challenge is going to be getting people to come here from Nashville, Knoxville, Chattanooga, Little Rock and Alabama which get better press and have equally nice, if somewhat smaller, facilities for tennis* and its category-killing counterpart, pickleball.
Whether you play it, love it or hate it, pickleball is instructive. It is social, easy to learn, and cheap to construct indoors or outdoors. You can get better at it at any age. You can travel anywhere and get a game. It is for people who would rather do something than watch something. Beware.
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John Branston covered Memphis as a reporter and columnist for 35 years.
