Baltimore basketball legend Tamir Goodman has taken his talents to the innovation aspect of the game.
Goodman, 40, is the founder of Aviv, which aims to develop innovative sports equipment. Aviv has developed the Aviv Basketball Net, a moisture-wicking and antimicrobial basketball net engineered to dry and clean the ball each time it goes through the hoop, according to avivsports.com.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the Israeli Basketball Association introduced a rule in which players had to bring their own ball to practice to limit the number of germs passed from one player to another. Goodman thought there had to be a better way to stop germs from spreading.
“There’s proven bacteria on the ball and when you pass the ball, you can basically make the referee sick or any other players sick and it’s really dangerous — every player needs to have their own ball at practice,” Goodman said on Glenn Clark Radio March 3 regarding what he was told. “I thought to myself, ‘Wow, I love the game way too much and I love the players way too much. I’ve got figure a way to help this.’ I thought, ‘Why don’t we use the net as a cleanser?'”
The nets were first used during competition as part of international play in Jerusalem. The Basketball League, an American hoops league, became the first professional league to make the Aviv net its official net this past December. The net was also recently used in the CIAA Men’s and Women’s Basketball Tournament at Royal Farms Arena in Baltimore.
Goodman thought he needed to make the game safer, but he also believed some revitalization and rebirth was needed in the game of basketball, thus the name Aviv.
“Aviv in Hebrew means spring — like rejuvenation, new energy — and we thought with the net, we’ve got to bring something new to the world, new to basketball, especially after the pandemic, something that will help and spring forth new blessings for all the players in the world,” Goodman said.
Goodman grew up in Baltimore and was an incredibly talented basketball player. He attended the Talmudical Academy of Baltimore. He started to receive national attention when he averaged 35 points per game during his junior season. Sports Illustrated even called him the “Jewish Jordan.”
The college recruiting process was quite tricky for Goodman as an Orthodox Jewish athlete. He was unable to play from sundown on Friday to sunset on Saturday so that he could observe Shabbat, the Jewish Day of Rest. He originally committed to Maryland, but after learning the program would not able to accommodate him, he looked into playing at Towson, which could play around his schedule. He decided to become a Tiger.
Goodman averaged 6.0 points, 2.5 rebounds and 4.0 assists per game as a freshman at Towson in 2000-01. Mike Jaskulski, who recruited Goodman and coached him as a freshman, was fired following that season, something that would change Goodman’s basketball career forever. Michael Hunt succeeded Jaskulski, and Goodman didn’t mesh as well with Hunt. In December 2001, Goodman claimed that Hunt kicked a chair that hit him in the shin. He was not injured, but he knew this was the end of the road for his Division I career.
Goodman still has love for Towson despite what happened.
“I always believe that everything is divinely ordained, and everything happens because that’s the way God wanted it to happen and not necessarily the people that made it happen that way,” Goodman said. “I love Towson University. I will always love Towson University. I am still in touch with all of my teammates and all of my coaches. I love them so much.
“It was seen as impossible to be a Division I athlete on a full scholarship and not play on the Sabbath and Towson made that happened for me. That was a historical moment. … I am forever furiously loyal and grateful to them for allowing me to live out my dream.”
Goodman played professionally overseas for seven years, but then was forced to retire from basketball due to numerous knee injuries. Goodman now lives in Jerusalem with his family and hosts an annual basketball camp in Israel.
Goodman also works with players from Division III Yeshiva University, a school in New York City attended mostly by Orthodox Jewish students.
“Most [Orthodox] Jewish kids after high school, they take a gap year in Jerusalem in Israel, they study and then they go back to play if they’re going to be a college player,” Goodman said. “I’ve had the great opportunity over to train a huge percentage of [the Yeshiva team] over the last seven years during the gap year before they went back to play at Yeshiva University. I could not be any happier, because it’s like I see those kids play, it’s like watching my own kids play, because I train them at 6:30 in the morning here in Jerusalem.”
For more from Goodman, listen to the full interview here:
Photo Credit: Courtesy of Aviv