Edit: Apologies for the mistake regarding this being synagogue with the body of the post mentioning a church, but yes the main idea still stands and wouldn’t necessarily have to be done in a church, and I’ll continue to try to find ways to move forward.

I came across someone interested to discuss ideas who tried to buy a historic church for sale in Memphis. Even if we can no longer try to get this church, we could create a similar plan somewhere else, potentially with five different sports, aiming to create a similar saying as one from a place by one of the co-founders, Tom Shadyac, of the Memphis Rox climbing gym - a nonprofit place for people regardless of ability to pay - if we can gain enough support. Maybe this location can also be the official filming location for a Decades of Dodgeball Documentary with what began in 2001 in DeSoto county and later expanded with free play practices into tennis courts of Memphis.

The multi-court design could be inspired by the one you can see on the YouTube link below, from Season 3 of Extreme Dodgeball from Game Show Network, but we can modify the ends to open / close to offer different sports on different days of the week.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qX6w1vBitbE

The Five Sports:

You’ve heard of Carjitsu, but what about Churchodgeball? Churchoccer? Churchennis? Churcholleyball? Churchandball?

Dodgeball, soccer, tennis, volleyball, and handball (aka team handball in other countries) on a modified court design and rule-set, with a solid wall for an enclosed barrier to keep the balls in the playing area to offer the most spectator friendly and entertaining matches for competitive divisions, and also offering recreational divisions for people who just want to play for fun. I noticed some churches became skate parks and some became breweries, so I saw the potential to make this new plan become a reality.

The location for sale in the image is next to a few restaurants, so as one way to try to make it a cost efficient plan, would be to potentially use one of those screens to allow customers to order food without having to speak to employees and potentially having all the food to be made from the places next door, as a way to try to support the Memphis businesses next to the church, if we would be allowed to have their menus on the screen in the church, as one example.

The location of the church is next to Westy’s - Casual eatery is a trolley-line stop for Southern eats & pies in a quirky space with booth seats, and the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

About the organizer:

Born on Friday the 13th, in February of 1987 - Hello. I’m Cory from Memphis, and I first began playing dodgeball in my first year of high school in 2001, 12 years later became selected to play for a USA team at a world championship event in New Zealand, and gained experience with the sport across 7 countries.

International Teams Training Sessions:

I would be willing to help try to train players interested in representing their country in international dodgeball events, but I won’t be able to do as much as I hoped, because I was injured at work on Friday the 13th, in January of 2021, and I’m still in a state of shock the doctors made a final decision that I should return to work, since the main areas are still in such high levels of almost constant pain, muscle spasms, tingling sensation, numbness, but maybe I can save that story for part of the documentary since it all relates to trying to help others stay active and healthy through the power of sport. Since I felt unable to return to work after trying and trying again, I can try to dedicate all of my time to this plan if it goes well. One last positive note on that - being in such high levels of almost constant pain has helped me lose my fear of returning to Ukraine, so I returned December 2024 to February 2025, and I also lived there for seven months in 2021 when I hosted a few English speaking clubs and dodgeball practices. Someone in Kyiv and Odesa both recently told me not to return yet, because I was recently talking to others about it if my plans to try to help others go through, so maybe my offer to try to train people interested in representing their countries in international dodgeball events in the Memphis area will only be for up to six months per year.

I was also part of a recreational international traveling dodgeball team composed of players from multiple countries, so the training sessions could also be for recreational players as well, potentially creating a recreational and competitive Memphis traveling team as another opportunity for new content with the Decades of Dodgeball Documentary. I already have a set of custom uniforms with me now, for a Memphis traveling dodgeball team which you could view at - https://www.kbssportsapparel.com/products/tmp-memphis-juggernaut

Potential Corporate Leagues / Tournaments / Sponsors:

Interested to support the plan as a business owner? We could have corporate leagues and tournaments with the five sports, as well as opening potential multi-sport court sponsors to have your logo shown on the insides of the courts, which could also potentially be seen online, with one example being, a potential annual competitive video series inspired by Extreme Dodgeball from Game Show Network from the video link above, but with a modified version of the rules.

Thanks for your interest in being part of bringing something unique and positive to the community, and I look forward to seeing what type of response we get!