The latest thing in children’s play?  The recess coach!  This is a great listen from NPR’s Tell Me More program, featuring Jill Vialet (president and founder of Playworks), and NYC’s own Free Range Kids evangelist, Lenore Skenazy.  Even Lenore, who scoffed at the idea at first (we’re guilty on that one too), sees some benefit beyond the knee-jerk “harumpfing.” This is mainly because no one is teaching kids any “actual reality” games to play anymore; the traditional way that kids learn games–from older kids–is going away because the older kids don’t know the games nowadays either!

Listen and decide for yourself… and remember that Streetplay’s Rulesheets are always there if you want: print them out and give them to your kids.

Careful readers of this blog may remember an earlier post about Baron Ambrosia, whose brilliant food review TV series Bronx Flavor seems to be an on-again/off-again affair.  Well, I found recent signs of life from the elusive Baron on his YouTube Channel… and he’s no longer off-topic for us.  The video below depicts The Baron playing handball against what appears to a second coming of Divine from Pink Flamingos, watched by two old-school real handball players.

We have no idea of the context of this video–if it’s just for fun, or part of a past or future Bronx Flavor episode–but it’s great nonetheless.  If anyone involved in this video–from the “real” handball guys to Divine’s love child to even The Baron himself–reads this post, please contact us at Streetplay, if just to say hello, or even if you want us to help with any street-game-themed upcoming episodes of Bronx Flavor!

Our original Streetplay.com graphic designer, Alf Brand, is kicking it West Coast style nowadays working for the e-mail marketing firm Vertical Response.  Of course, Alf brought his street sensibilities to the table, and they’re featuring him in an ad campaign (seen at left), with the moniker of “The Furious ALF.”  Part Chubb Rock, part Curtis Sliwa: so 1992 your can almost taste it!

Don’t miss the accompanying video, below, pushing VR’s iPhone app.  I’m hoping the sequel is pattered after Word Up.

Maybe the snide comments we’ve made about today’s baseball players are having a positive effect: we just learned via self-styled Bronx sports reporter “JR” of the “JR Sport Brief” [links on YouTube and Twitter] that Alex Rodriguez recently spent some time in an honest-to-goodness Bronx backlot (along with less-renowned but equally applaudable Jerry Hairston Jr.).

The normal sports news gathering apparatus didn’t seem to be anywhere in sight: just JR, a couple of Yankees, and kids.  I do wish that they were using actual stickball bats, but I’m sure the kids didn’t mind.  Kudos to both players.

Earlier this season, Yankee Mark Teixeira was seen playing some stickball down in Florida during spring training (see a local TV news report below).  Let’s hope this is the start of a trend!

The ongoing newsfeed search for “stickball” has turned up this gem today: a suite of “street games” for your Wii gaming console!

Go Play City Sports by Majesco Entertainment

Video courtesy of NintendoWorldReport.com; read their review of the game

I’m not sure whether this is great–keeping the games alive for future generations–or whether it’s just more fodder for the oft-heard argument that videogames keep kids indoors getting fat sitting on the couch.  And it’s true: this is at least the second street game-based videogame available (MLB Stickball is the first I know of). I don’t know my take on this yet: maybe this will encourage kids to go outside and play the games they rehearse on the Wii. And I love my Wii, so it would be a little duplicitous to say an ill word against it.  But I do wish that the “handball” depicted here were the Ace-King-Queen version, though (where the ball hits the ground before hitting the wall).  And where’s skully?

I mainly wish the milieu depicted by publisher Majesco Entertainment weren’t so shabby; it’s an insult to people who actually lived (or live) in the city as a child.  The implication is that the street is a dirty, ragtag place that (thankfully) the shiny white Wii box is saving you from having to experience firsthand.  Hey, when I grew up, that setting was my home, and it was the greatest place to be in the world.

It was nice to hear that handball is still capturing some attention in the media world. Noted NYC handballers Cesar Sala and Satish Jagnandan, along with New York Magazine writer Peter Duffy, were interviewed on WNYC’s Brian Lehrer show on Tuesday, August 4, 2009.  You can listen to the segment in its entirety below.

Longtime Streetplay readers will recognize Cesar as a friend of and contributor to the site. Congrats on the interview!