When Joe Yoder talks about playing his favorite sport, he often gets strange looks, along with a few wisecracks.

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“You still play that?” is a common one. “I stopped playing that as a kid,” is another.

 

The reaction isn’t surprising. The sport is croquet.

 

          Sure, it was fun as a kid hitting those colored balls through wire hoops stuck in the yard, and even more fun knocking other kids’ balls away. But before long, we moved on to other things, and the old croquet set went the way of our ant farm, Slinky and Chinese checkers.

 

Not so for Yoder. For him and other adult croquet enthusiasts around the world, it’s not a childhood game.

 

He saw what’s called “association croquet” being played in New York about 20 years ago, took it up then, and still plays a couple times a week.

 

“It’s a lot different game than what we played as kids,” he says. “There’s significantly more to it. This is not your grandmother’s croquet.”

 

Association croquet, as established in this country by the United States Croquet Association, is played with fewer balls and hoops than the backyard variety. And those hoops, better known as wickets, are only an eighth of an inch wider than the ball.

 

          That, as they say, makes it a whole new ballgame.