Akron teenager closing in on big deal for his simple invention

AKRON -- One day, when Adrian Lindsey was 12-years-old, his basketball fell out of his arms.

"Me and my cousins were going to the park on our bikes", he said. "And the basketball got lost and went out into the street".

He took a basketball net, attached a strap and some drawstrings, and made what he calls the All-Net basketball carrier. A basketball fits in the net, which is cinched at the bottom. Then the top of the net is secured with a drawstring. The attached strap allows the basketball to be carried on a person's back.

With help from a famlily full of business majors, he got a patent. And now at age 16, the junior at Cuyahoga Valley Christian Academy has sold more than 2-thousand All-Nets. He's even gotten them on the shelves of Wal Mart in Cleveland Heights.

His Attorney, Scott Oldham of Hahn, Loeser, and Parks says "It's very hard to take an idea and make it work. We find a lot of people lose interest, or they just don't get the response that they thought they'd get."

Adrian's All-Nets are mass produced in a textile factory in Akron, not far from the Inventor's Hall of Fame.

With the product retailing at just under 20 dollars, he's looking for ways to reduce production costs, and still maintain quality. That could land him some big deals, and make a lot of people look at his All-Net and say...."Now why didn't I think of that?"