Cleats (comic strip)
Encyclopedia
Cleats is a comic strip
by Bill Hinds
. Cleats features a group of young kids, coaches, and their parents as they deal with the day-to-day trials and tribulations of being on a soccer team (Although there are storylines that have the kids engaged in physical sports other than soccer). Cleats was carried in over 75 newspapers
The last iteration of Cleats had been run on 31 October 2010, in the form of a special Halloween 'exit' strip. Bill Hinds stated that he had ceased producing Cleats because the strip "had suffered in many newspaper comic polls over the past nine years."
In many newspapers, editors have chosen to run the earliest Cleats strips again, allowing readers to compare Hinds'
initial style and characters against their more recent development. This has resulted in previous Sunday strips appearing on weekdays, but has opened to broad examination the processes by which a professional cartoonist evolves his work over years of production.
costume for help in getting back the soccer ball, which has fallen outside the cemetery wall.
of Cleats comics named Who Tracked Soccer Through the House ?: A Cleats Collection was published in March, 2004 by Andrews McMeel Publishing.
Comic strip
A comic strip is a sequence of drawings arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions....
by Bill Hinds
Bill Hinds
Bill Hinds is a sports cartoonist whose work includes the sports comic strips Buzz Beamer, Cleats, and Tank McNamara. He received the National Cartoonist Society Sports Cartoon Award for 1986 and their New Media Award for 2000...
. Cleats features a group of young kids, coaches, and their parents as they deal with the day-to-day trials and tribulations of being on a soccer team (Although there are storylines that have the kids engaged in physical sports other than soccer). Cleats was carried in over 75 newspapers
The last iteration of Cleats had been run on 31 October 2010, in the form of a special Halloween 'exit' strip. Bill Hinds stated that he had ceased producing Cleats because the strip "had suffered in many newspaper comic polls over the past nine years."
In many newspapers, editors have chosen to run the earliest Cleats strips again, allowing readers to compare Hinds'
Bill Hinds
Bill Hinds is a sports cartoonist whose work includes the sports comic strips Buzz Beamer, Cleats, and Tank McNamara. He received the National Cartoonist Society Sports Cartoon Award for 1986 and their New Media Award for 2000...
initial style and characters against their more recent development. This has resulted in previous Sunday strips appearing on weekdays, but has opened to broad examination the processes by which a professional cartoonist evolves his work over years of production.
Characters
- Abby Harper, 11, "competitive but not mean."
- Peri, Abby's best friend.
- Jack Dooley, 10. Dreams of playing in the World CupFIFA World CupThe FIFA World Cup, often simply the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior men's national teams of the members of Fédération Internationale de Football Association , the sport's global governing body...
. - Armando "Mondo" Ruiz. Jack's best friend. Has a crush on Abby.
- Dee Radomski, a goalkeeper. Has a major crush on Edith.
- Edith Tippet, also a keeper. A reluctant athlete who would rather read. Does not reciprocate Dee's crush, but enjoys his weirdness. Just before the strip ended, she accepted Dee's invitation to go to the movies. This was correctly perceived as a sign that the End was coming.
- Jerome, son of the assistant coach and grandson of a curmudgeon who makes sarcastic remarks about modern sports. Jerome and Dee are best friends and play baseball together as well as soccer. Dee and Jerome like to send each other text messages, even while they are sitting a couple of feet apart from each other. Just the thing to drive Grandpa nuts.
The Final Strip - Halloween 2010
The October 31, 2010, strip showed Peri, Mondo, Abby, Jack, Edith and Dee as ghosts playing soccer in the Comic Strip Graveyard. Abby has her giant ponytail back. Jack asks a trick-or-treater in a Spider-ManSpider-Man
Spider-Man is a fictional Marvel Comics superhero. The character was created by writer-editor Stan Lee and writer-artist Steve Ditko. He first appeared in Amazing Fantasy #15...
costume for help in getting back the soccer ball, which has fallen outside the cemetery wall.
Return, on Reruns
GoComics began, on December 2010, to show reruns. These go back to November 26, 2001.Special Guests
Fictional characters who have made special guest appearances in the strip include:- Buzz Beamer
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- Tank McNamaraTank McNamaraTank McNamara is a daily syndicated comic strip written by Jeff Millar and illustrated by Bill Hinds. The strip debuted in 1974.The title character is a local sports television reporter who used to be a defensive lineman in the National Football League, hence his name...
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Books
A compilationAnthology
An anthology is a collection of literary works chosen by the compiler. It may be a collection of poems, short stories, plays, songs, or excerpts...
of Cleats comics named Who Tracked Soccer Through the House ?: A Cleats Collection was published in March, 2004 by Andrews McMeel Publishing.