Rocball founder again bound for India this summer

Rocball founder James Feger, top, officiates a Rocball game in India in 2019. (CONTRIBUTED PHOTO)

Jim Feger, the creator of the CNMI’s indigenous sport of Rocball, will be traveling to India this summer to once again promote the sport in the South Asian country.

“I’ve been to India twice in the last two years with matters concerning Rocball. In India, the sport of Rocball is played in every state at different age groups for both men and women. I’ll be traveling to India this summer as a guest of India for the sport of Rocball.” 

Rocball founder James Feger does the coin toss during an international game between Thailand and Pakistan in Bangkok, Thailand in 2016. (CONTRIBUTED PHOTO)

The longtime Marianas High School physical education teacher said there are thousands more Rocball teams in India and there are hundreds of players in Pakistan and Bangladesh that have organized into Rocball teams at the local and national level. 

“Moreover, the president of the Kenya Rocball association has also asked me to write a letter to their state authorities to allow them to apply for a visa to visit Saipan to learn more about Rocball. They want to set up an African Rocball Association,” he said. 

At the local level, Feger said Rocball is alive and well in the campus of the largest high school in the CNMI—Marianas High School.

Rocball founder James Feger during his most recent trip to India last year. (CONTRIBUTED PHOTO)

“We started our Rocball practice games about a month ago. There are eight teams registered for the 2023 Rocball season. I’ll be giving out more of the Rocball trademarked shirts to players of the week. I’ll be ordering another three dozen of the trademarked shirts for Rocball players in the 2023 season.”

Feger added that after an absence of a couple of years due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Japan Exchange Cultural and Sport Exchange will return this year with Rocball included in the program.

As the CNMI’s indigenous sport, Feger said Rocball has truly passed the test of time. 

“Rocball is a best practice lesson plan that has been played at the public schools of Hopwood Jr. High School and Marianas High School since 1981. Rocball is the only annual sport that has been played as an intramural and interscholastic sport without any interruptions for over 40 years on a [Public School System] campus because of lack of funds. And, the news releases over those 40 years not only highlighted a team’s win-loss record and game points, but Rocball has been by far the sport that has most often done news releases on individual players.”

Feger is also mighty proud that Rocball is the first sport to include 3-point scoring, unrestricted hitting/kicking, and rally point scoring before the team net sports of basketball and volleyball adopted these creative forms of competition in the late 1980s and mid-1990s.

“Rocball is the first team net sport in the world to create unrestricted hitting and kickin in a team net sport. Rocball is the team net sport that invented rally poinr scoring and that has been documented and registered copyrighted since 1980. And, the bare facts and truth is that because of Rocball, the sport of volleyball changed their rules of play in 1995 and I have a letter from FIVB to prove it,” he added.