Goodbye To Jai Alai
December 09, 2001
By Les Gura
The story of how he came to learn his sport is well-told, and Wayne Pattie's eyes crinkle in anticipation of the punch line. He was 14, youngest of the five Pattie boys living in Newport, R.I., when his oldest brother, Paul, arrived home one afternoon and tossed him a "cesta," the long woven wood-and-reed basket used to catch the "pelota," or ball, in jai alai. Paul Pattie had just become a professional jai alai player by signing on with a Newport fronton, which was in the midst of a players' strike by its largely foreign roster. Wayne Pattie picked up the hook-shaped basket -- "It looked like a piece of wood you'd put in the fireplace" -- put the ball inside and whipped it forward. The ball went straight down. And straight back up, smashing into Pattie's chin. Seven stitches later, Pattie decided jai alai was a challenge he wanted to master.
Pattie and his wife, Stacy, who is listening in the kitchen of their Hamden home, laugh together, a bit wistfully. Inside their modest ranch, the trappings of a home and family, the playthings of their 9-year-old daughter, have been packed up. Outside, a Century 21 sign is surrounded by two rows of neatly stacked paper bags filled with leaves. The Patties are leaving New England, where they have both spent their entire lives, and heading south to Miami so Wayne Pattie can continue his career. On Wednesday, when the Milford fronton where Pattie has climbed walls since 1997 closes its doors after 25 years, the sport of jai alai will ever so quietly slip from Connecticut's landscape.
It only seems like it's been gone for years.
It is a Sunday matinee at the fronton, Game 13 of 15 matches to be played this day, and Wayne Pattie follows the line of 16 players competing in this contest, to the strains of "Espana Cani," the music that is an American jai alai tradition. Each team has a different color; Wayne is standing 12th in line, the second of two yellow jerseys in Game 13. His doubles partner for this game is Olate, who is of Basque origin, like most of the players. At once, the players lift their cestas and hurl the pelota. The first two teams remain on the court for the start of play.
Just inside the fronton's front doors, Gail DuBrow sits on a stool. She has worked the box office at the Milford fronton since it opened in 1977. Today, the box office is closed; fronton management is allowing everyone in for free these last weeks.
DuBrow's soft features and quavering voice betray her feelings. She knows it hasn't been good for jai alai the past few years; after her hours were reduced a few years back, she found herself another full-time job, working as a receptionist at Yale Dermatology. Yet she still puts in 30 hours a week at the fronton. ``I didn't want to give this up,'' she says, simply. "It's family."
Around her, some 500 patrons, people of all ages, colors and languages, watch the day's games, sprinkled among the fronton's 4,500 seats. Spectators still call out for their players, carping when a seemingly easy shot is missed, and hustling back underneath the stands to the betting windows to put down wagers, or, if lucky, cash a winner. But the atmosphere is different; the buzz of the crowd doesn't come close to drowning out the buzz of the fluorescent lights high overhead. Rarely do you have to wait in line to place a bet.
DuBrow says the past few weeks have been difficult for the employees, many of whom have worked at the fronton for more than 20 years. When asked about what happened to jai alai, why it has faded, DuBrow acknowledges the casinos robbed the fronton of many of its customers in the 1990s. Still, she can't help but beseechingly ask a question in return: "Why didn't you come back?"
Game 13 has begun. Jai alai is like an elaborate and intensely fast game of catch. Players hurl the pelota from their basket against the front wall of the court, and it can rebound off the side or back walls. The opponent must catch the ball on the fly or on one bounce. If they miss, the other team gets a point. A new team then comes out to play the team that won the point. It goes on that way until one team accumulates 7 points. Just like horse races, people bet on who will finish first, second and third.
The jai alai court is nearly 200 feet long and about 35 feet wide, made of polished concrete. The ball has a core of extremely hard virgin rubber, covered by two layers of goatskin; the basket is made of chestnut and reeds. Players strap it to their right arm. When hurled, the ball can reach speeds of 150 miles per hour, and players have to time their catches just right, diving off the concrete or using one leg to boost themselves off the wall to make a play. While some catches are spectacular, players can muff seemingly routine catches, which inevitably leads to catcalls and sarcastic comments from the audience.
Hartford Courant article (2001)
