pic: Basketball vs 2006 Poof Ball

[Racer26]

I'm not saying in the kit, I'm saying that FRC Game Pieces for years (except 2005, and arguably 2007/8/11) have become all but impossible to obtain during build season.

In 2003, the sterilite bins were a) expensive, and b) sold out everywhere
In 2004, the balls became difficult to find
In 2005, the tetras were built by the teams from easily obtained materials
In 2006, the poof balls became unavailable
In 2007, the tubes were only available from Logoloc, and IIRC were sold out for much of build season
In 2008, the trackballs were extremely expensive
In 2009, the orbit balls were out of manufacture during build, and FRC teams bought out all of Wal-Mart's stock. It was a serious enough situation that some enterprising teams went to the trouble of building some balls of a similar construction and sold them to other teams.
In 2010, the soccer balls were sold out, worldwide.
In 2011, we had custom-made game pieces only available thru AM (IIRC), though I think they were in stock throughout build.