By Stephen Brook and Kishor Napier-Raman
They are young, fast and exciting, and the hot streak of these twentysomething football players has taken the Hawthorn Football Club all the way to an improbable AFL semi-final.
But in addition to their on-field successes, Hawthorn’s off-field vibe is a social media feelgood, fun-factor phenomenon, thanks in part to young players Jack Ginnivan and Nick Watson and coach Sam Mitchell. The Hawks even have their very own phrase of the moment to describe the phenomenon: “Hokball”.
Hokball is so hot right now. Credit: Stephen Kiprillis
No one can quite define Hokball or where it came from, but The Age describes it as “less a game style than a vibe”. Could that be any more now?
Ginnivan and Watson are already flogging merch via their hokball.com website, where finals edition hoodies emblazoned with “Hok” retail for $119. A nice little earner.
Hawks Nick Watson (left) and Jack Ginnivan promote Hok merchandise.Credit: Instagram
Now Hawthorn, which doesn’t have a problem with the Hok merch, have been advised to trademark Hokball.
“Trademark application 2472410 Hok Ball was filed on 15 August. We are currently examining applications filed in July, so this application is likely to be assessed within the next one to two months,” said a spokeswoman from IP Australia, the government agency responsible for administering intellectual property law.
Papers lodged with IP Australia show the list of products and services the Hawks want to associate with Hokball runs to 1264 words.
They include sports bags, sports packs, sports wear, sports footwear, footwear other than for sports, sports beanies – and our favourite: “promoting the goods and services of others by arranging for sponsors to affiliate their goods and services with sporting activities”.
Get the picture?
And for those still struggling to understand what is going on (including us), we are indebted to our Age colleagues for this explanation.
“The term ‘Hokball’ appeared on Instagram and in TikTok hashtags last year, but has caught fire in 2024 as the Hawks launched their run to September. But it’s not easy to explain. As one fan wrote on X in reference to the phrase: ‘It means nothing. It means everything.’”
Meaning nothing and everything at the same time. We say again: could that be any more now?
KPOP PARTIES FOR PRIDE
When the Albanese government announced that former prime minister Kevin Rudd would be our ambassador to the United States, CBD worried for the sanity of any embassy staff forced to work for one of Canberra’s notoriously hardest taskmasters.
We shouldn’t have. Now living his best life in the DC swamp and no longer mourning his prime ministership like a miserable ghost, Rudd has become Australia’s biggest party animal since Corey Worthington.
Party animal and ambassador to Washington Kevin Rudd.Credit: Leigh Vogel
CBD recently revealed the extravagant bill for Rudd’s 2023 DC Pride Party – the $US3000 ($4500) balloon arch seemed particularly extra – which drew a babble of diplomats, journalists, and even a few Republican staffers to hang out with drag queens at Rudd’s White Oaks mansion.
It was such a roaring success that the Ruddster was back for more this year at the swanky new embassy building. And according to receipts revealed under freedom-of-information laws, Kevin from Queensland partied even harder. KPOP indeed.
Our back-of-the-envelope calculations show the embassy spent about $US43,000 ($64,000) on this year’s Pride Party, about $US10,000 more than in 2023. Inflation and all that. Maybe.
Fresh from Eurovision, and mid-US tour, electronic duo Electric Fields entertained guests, at a cost to the taxpayer of $A11,000. Rudd’s two favourite drag queens, Kitty Glitter and Crystal Edge, returned for this year’s event, at $US2000 and $US400 a pop.
Let them eat canapes! They cost $US12,400, with DC caterers bringing the Australiana with “mini chicken parmas” and something called a “lammie”.
The $US4000 drinks list included Yalumba and Coopers, while hiring a stage crew and technicians cost $US14,600.
“In 2024, the embassy’s Pride event again hosted by the deputy chief of mission was deliberately designed to mark the handover from Sydney WorldPride to next year’s WorldPride host, Washington DC, and included hundreds of guests from Congress and across government, media and the private sector,” the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said.
Looks like Rudd, who before becoming PM once got drunk in a New York strip club with Rupert Murdoch lieutenant Col Allan, is a different man in the Land of the Free.
LETTUCE LIZ
Well, we told you so.
Last week, this column predicted that former British prime minister Liz Truss, who spent just 44 floundering days in No. 10 Downing Street and was outlasted by a lettuce, would be heading to Brisbane to address the Australian edition of the Conservative Political Action Conference.
On Thursday morning, CPAC boss Andrew Cooper finally confirmed that Truss would indeed be joining the fun, describing her as “a leading voice in British and global politics”. How kind. Truss’ constituents certainly think otherwise, having turfed her out of her Tory safe seat in June.
Liz Truss is heading Down Under. Credit: AP
Speaking of TERFs, in other news from the Australian right, anti-trans keyboard warrior and failed Liberal candidate for Warringah Katherine Deves is the latest to join Alan Jones’ media outlet ADH TV (financially backed by James Packer) with a new weekly show called Straight Talk. We shan’t be watching.
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