Exploring the Remains of Sports & Stuff

On Cooper Foster Park Road just east of Leavitt Road on the Lorain side there used to be a place called Sports & Stuff. Sports & Stuff was a collaboration of arcade games, go-carts, mini golf, basketball, and batting cages. Every child's dream, and if you were able to clinch about 10,000 tickets from the arcade you got yourself a sucker.

Sports & Stuff was one of my favorite local places to go as a child. It closed down in 2006. My guess is that it just couldn't survive in a time where arcades were decreasing in popularity, and since it was a smaller operation they could not rebound from the loss of sales, but that is a matter of opinion. In the time after closing the property was repeatedly vandalized and the arcade building set ablaze in late 2008. As the property was uninsured the building was a total loss. The property is still for sale today.

The other day after I dropped some stuff off at Goodwill I made my way over to the property and snapped some pictures of what remains, and let me tell you, it was slightly creepy....and possibly trespassing. Here are those pictures in the name of preserving history (seriously don't come after me).

The main building and arcade once stood here before it burned down.

Some of the tile flooring still remains.

An old token machine. This may have been for the batting cages but I do not recall.

Basketball hoops behind where the arcade stood.

If you turn to the left you will see the entrance to the bating cages. Now completely overgrown.

I'm no expert, but I don't think this works anymore.

Some sort of electrical box laying in front of the go-cart track.

The entrance to the go-carts is on the opposite side of the arcade.

I don't recall every riding  the go-carts. I may have been too young.

The underpass is now a showcase for local art.

It has also become a sort of skate park.

Some old rubber.

Toward the front of the lot near the cages is where the old mini golf course used to reside.

Most of the course is overgrown and the turf is pulled up or gone.

The pond in front of the course. I believe there was a fountain in it and that the water in it was a very unnatural blue color.

I found this in the parking lot on my way back to the car.

It appears to be some sort of control box. Not sure what it was for.

After I wiped my fingerprints off the control box I made my way back to the car. I feel like the arcades may go the way of the drive-in movie theaters. They won't go extinct, but only the stronger (probably chains) will survive. children today are born into a world with games and other media at their fingertips. There is no need to travel for entertainment. As I get older I'm beginning to realize that I miss having to actually go out to do things. It made it all the more special.

Now that I made myself sound like an old man,

Thanks for reading!