This is a form of rugby played, for the most part, in total darkness. Each end zone emits a load hum - the home team's end zone at a low frequency, and the visitors at a high frequency.
A specific player at a specific location on the field begins the play. The ball is rigged to emit one or the other frequency with a switch. The ball carrier can switch the hum of the ball at any time. This communicates to the other players that his team has the ball.
The ball carrier may bounce the rugby-shaped ball on the turf at any time. Via a combination of technical factors that a half-baked version of this idea precludes me from detailing (turf conductivity, ball charge, etc.), this bounce action causes a dim light to flash in the arena, giving all players a glimpse of the action.
Players must use communication, keen hearing, and intuition to advance the ball down the field, while the defense must do the same to stop them.
The ball is heated for infra-red viewing. The spectators in the arena will watch via infra-red goggles. At home we watch the infra-red video on the TV.-- globaltourniquet, Nov 07 2007 Blind sports http://www.britishblindsport.org.uk/There's already plenty of sports (sort of) like this (this is just the 1st link I found) [neutrinos_shadow, Nov 07 2007] Would this not be painfully slow?-- bungston, Nov 07 2007 Not as slow as baseball...-- globaltourniquet, Nov 07 2007 I think someone posted an idea here once about a rugbyesque game in which the players wear virtual reality helmets and watch themselves running around. Blindball could use these same helmets, but not include batteries. This would allow the audience to call the beer man over when they spotted him.-- bungston, Nov 07 2007 It's well thought out. I like it.-- david_scothern, Nov 08 2007 Re: link, [neutrino's] - maybe I'm wrong, but I get the feeling that watching real blind people trying to make their way around a ball game - as a spectator sport - is a bit morbid, to say the least...-- globaltourniquet, Nov 08 2007 I was watching a Spurs UEFA game last night and got a mite ticked off at the grammatically erroneous Tottenham shirts. All the names on the shirts were uncapitalised, which as we all know is wrong. It got my friend and I to thinking on stupid fonts to use on shirts - I'd personally have mine in Windings - and we also mentioned having the names in braille. And then I find this.
Get out of my mind!-- theleopard, Nov 09 2007 All the spectators should be blindfolded too. They can find out what's happening on the pitch through a combination of sound and a tactile interface - something like a grid with variable-height pins sticking up through it.-- hippo, Nov 09 2007 random, halfbakery