Good Seats Still Available

[A scheduling snafu this week gives us a perfect excuse to re-release this hidden gem from November 2019 - enjoy!] You can be forgiven if you never heard of the International Volleyball Association – the mid-1970s co-ed pro circuit that aimed to draft off the rising popularity of Olympic and beach volleyball during America’s wildest sports decade – but the high-wattage media and entertainment moguls behind its creation at the time certainly cannot. The IVA was the brainchild of prolific Hollywood television and film producer David Wolper ("Roots," "The Thorn Birds" and "Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory" to name a mere few) – who became smitten with the sport while filming documentary footage of the 1972 Olympics in Munich. Wolper quickly recruited a who’s who of well-connected LA-based investors – including ABC-TV (later Paramount and Fox) chief Barry Diller, as well as Motown music studio founder/movie producer aspirant Berry Gordy – and by 1975, a five-team California and Southwest-centric league bow