[who716]

We also are currently in the search of a material to grip the ball, we started with some surgical tubing that was wrapped around the poles very tightly with not much success, we then went and wrapped the poles in some kind of fabric I believe its called Polyester/Vinyl Foam Mesh: http://www.mcmaster.com/#antislip-carpet-pads/=qkubq7
this worked well for the application we are using it in but we are continuing the search for another material such as some type of grip tape type material.