Oregon has a lot of official symbols. Our state raptor is the osprey, our state gem is the sunstone, our state fruit is the pear. But, as of yet, we do not have a state sport. Joshua Zurbrick wants to change that. Zurbrick is a middle school language arts teacher in Roseburg. He also has a history degree and a TikTok channel called “Obscure History Pod” where he shares strange tidbits from history. Zurbrick took to TikTok on Monday to share his one-man mission to get Oregon to name a state sport. But his plan goes beyond just naming any old sport. He has a very specific one in mind: Hacky Sack. “I just randomly ran into the fact that Maryland’s state sport is jousting, which seems really absurd,” Zurbrick said Tuesday over the phone during his lunch break. He started looking at other state’s sports and then realized that Oregon just doesn’t have one. That discovery took him on a journey. “So I was thinking about what sports could represent Oregon,” Zurbrick said. “And I of course started with track and field and then went to disc golf and then discovered that Hacky Sack was invented in Oregon and that just seemed like the natural choice at that point.” Hacky Sack, the official brand name of the game of kicking a small bag of beans around in a circle, sometimes called “footbag,” was invented in Oregon City in 1972 by friends John Stalberger, Jr. and Mike Marshall. The act of kicking a small bag was not new, but the friends' idea of making it mainstream in the United States blossomed in a basement during the rainy season. Marshall died of a heart attack in his 20s but in 1979, Stalberger was awarded the patent for “Hacky Sack.” Hacky Sack became a phenomenon. So far, Zurbrick hasn’t found or even looked for a state legislator to sponsor the idea of making Hacky Sack the state sport, which is probably what it would take to make it happen. But the idea has gained some traction on his TikTok post. Not everyone agrees that Hacky Sack should be the state sport, however. In 2022, Willamette Week columnist Marty Smith emphatically said it should not be. “Oregon has spent the past 30 years overcoming the stereotype that we’re a bunch of slack-jawed hippies,” he wrote. “Ensconcing the hack as our official pastime would set us back 29 — you might as well make Phish the official state band." But, it’s possible that Willamette Week is wrong. First of all, has Oregon really “overcome” the hippie stereotype? And why “slack-jawed”? Hacky Sack takes dexterity and concentration! And, objectively, Hacky Sack seems more representative of the state than the potato (state vegetable), milk (state beverage) or square dance (the state dance). So, will an Oregon lawmaker take up the cause of the humble bag of beans? – Lizzy Acker covers life and culture and writes the advice column Why Tho? Reach her at 503-221-8052, lacker@oregonian.com.friends' Our journalism needs your support. Subscribe today to OregonLive.com.