THE VINTAGE ALL STAR TEAM 2006

[forests failed you]

You guys voted for it...  Though you voted a lot less than last year.  But nonetheless, here it is.  It has been well over a week since the last vote was cast.  So here it is, deal with it.

Your Vintage All Star Team 2006

By the votes:

1. Dave Feinstien – 8
2. TK -7
3-5. Brian DeMars -6
3-5. Smennen -6
3-5. Eric Becker -6
6-7. JD -5
6-7. Rich Shay -5
8. Paul Nicolo -4
9-10. Ben Kowal -3
9-10. Nate Pease -3

Your Vintage All Star Team 2005
1) Vroman - 30
2) Stephen Menendian - 29
3) Andy Probasco - 24
4) Justin Droba - 23
5) Rich Shay - 22
6) Brian Demars, Peter Olzewski - 21
8) Roland Chang, Jacob Orlove, Kevin Cron - 20
11) Travis Laplante - 15
12) Matt Endress, Ugo Rivard - 12
14) Bob Yu - 10
15) Justin Timoney - 8
16) Josh Franklin – 7

Very interesting that last years number one player Vroman didn't even get two votes.

Comments?

[Tha Gunslinga]

So the two most popular Type 1 players are on ICBM.  Very cool.

[Komatteru]

And GWS has the most members on the team, with 4 (and the entire Michigan chapter of the team too!).  Interestingly enough, Meandeck only has 1 this year, despite having 6 last year.  It's like this year was a complete reversal...hooray for free agent pickups.

[vroman]

Very interesting that last years number one player Vroman didn't even get two votes.

Comments?

I blame the absence of midwest tournaments. and I forgot to vote for myself.

[Liek]

I didn't vote for myself, but I still made it in! Hooray!

[Dxfiler]

I stayed out of voting on purpose.  For the record, I have no business getting more more votes than TK.  It's kind of awesome ICBM is in top 2.  Wait, I'm on ICBM?

Surprise! :p

For the record, here's the 10 players I would have voted for, in order.  I made this list before I was on a team:

Tommy Kolowith (TK).  He came out of nowhere in early 2006 and remained strong throughout.  Best active player in the format.   

Nate Peas:  Almost always top 8's when he plays.  His numbers got better as the year went on, especially in the big events.

Dave Feinstein:   :p 

Ben Kowal: Strong showings early to mid year, significantly dropped off towards end of the year after top 8'ing both days of Waterbury.  Can be attributed directly to his job and girlfriend.  Doesn't play much magic right now and as far as I know, he won't be hitting tourneys at all in the near future.  Still had a great run for first 8 or so months.

Robert Vroman: Amazing stastistics considering how few events he attended.  Top 8'd almost every major event he was in despite playing the same deck and generally not traveling much.

Eric Becker: Good early showing, dropped off slightly mid year, picked up strong towards end.  A safe bet to top 8 any tourney.

Mike Hetherington:  My dark horse pick on this list.  Flew under the radar for much of this year, but had consistently top 8'd in local staples such as Blue Bell.  Blew up towards the end of the year, going on top 8 tears at multiple SCG's, including back to back top 4's at VA.  Will only continue to impress.

Jeremy Seroogy (Spookykid): Similar to teammate Kolowith in that he was strong throughout the year, including winning an SCG.  Multiple Top 8's all year long.

Brian Demars: Consistent throughout the year, particularly strong when the events are held locally to him.

Paul Nicolo: Solid year capped off by top 8 at Gencon Worlds. 

honorable mentions: Roland Chang, Ben Carp, Dan Carp, Elias Vaisberg, Evenpence, Smenenen, Arend, Paul Mastriano,  Andrew Probasco and Rich Shay.  None of the aforementioned names made my list since it's based on cumulative top 8's throughout the year.  Arguments could certainly be made for any of the honorable mentions, and I'm sure there were some I forgot to include.  I based my list looking at the entire year and actually went through and compiled top 8's for all of the major tourneys I could find (focusing on SCG's, Gencon and Waterbury).  I generally ignored top 16's and 32's, since it's just not that hard to place 9-32nd at a type one tourney.

Player of the year, if and when the TMD awards go up, should unquestionably be TK.

Even though the voting pool was small, thank you for voting me on the all-star team.   

- Dave Feinstein






 

[EotGiftsGG?]

does the "all star-team 2k6" win anything? lol

[Hydra]

Bragging rights I suppose.  Maybe someone would talk Ray into redoing this (trying to generate more interest in actually voting amongst people here) and offering something up as a reward at Waterbury.  I'd chip in for something of that nature.

[JACO]

Having said all of that, in the interest of keeping this thread on topic, my congratulations go out to the members of the 2006 Vintage All-Star Team. Now my next question for all you is two-fold:
a) If you had to take 3 people to be on your country's 2006 Vintage Worlds Team, who would you want and why? (I expect their to be different answers for different countries)
b) If you had to take 1 person to win the final match of the 2006 Vintage Worlds, who would you want that 1 person to be and why? (again, I'd like different answers from people in other countries, as it relates to their country)

[Jacob Orlove]

Okay, I cleaned up this thread. Further discussion on TMD policy should be taken to PMs.

[forests failed you]

Whoops, I totally forgot to unlock this thread when I was done. Sorry about that. I'm merging Brian's continuation of the topic back in here.
-Jacob

WHO WOULD YOU WANT TO PLAY WITH FROM YOUR COUNTRY IN A VINTAGE WORLDS SITUATION? 

Whereas the Vintage all star team is a collection of people who are important to the community for any number of reasons (influence, community aspects, play, deck design, and ability to get the job done).  Picking teamates to try and win a big money tournament is different.  What three players would you want backing you up, strickly from the point of view of trying to win a big event??

This thread is basically asking:  What three players (not yourself) would you want on your team if you were just trying to win games?

My picks:

1 Rich Shay
2 Eric Becker
3 Robert Vroman

[M.Solymossy]

Ryan Spindler,
Eric Becker,
and ffy.

[Moxlotus]

Eric Becker
Brian Demars
Tommy Kolowith

Those 3 always make a showing whenever they play.  There are others that do too, but I actually know these 3 guys and have seen them win out of crappy situations and less than stellar draws. 

[forests failed you]

How would people feel about actually trying to do our own worlds?

We could vote for teams, and then play the whole thing out on MWS?  Just a thought, I don't know how much non USA support it would get.  But, thought I would throw it out there/

[Hydra]

A Worlds thing could be interesting, as would a MWS "Invitational" where someone can work out X positions based on statistical placement in large tournaments (paging Ray to this topic, paging Ray) and X positions on votes and have a fun little mini-tournament that way.

[EotGiftsGG?]

i think "Vintage Worlds" would be awesome. Like Invitation only and like bracket wise. Or "Teams 2k6" lol.

MWS would definitely be a must, and it would be amazingly popular! WTF?

[Razvan]

How would people feel about actually trying to do our own worlds?

We could vote for teams, and then play the whole thing out on MWS?  Just a thought, I don't know how much non USA support it would get.  But, thought I would throw it out there/

I am sure Netherlands, Canad(i)a, and maybe a couple more european countries could muster some teams.

[EotGiftsGG?]

Team Usa vs. Team Europe vs. Team Canada lol

If i could think of a Vintage Worlds top 8 it would most likely be..

Roland Chang vs. Me. Because i always beat him = )

Brassman vs. Smenen -   hmmm.. GG!11

Umm

Dave Feinstein vs. Paul Nicalo - Whose the better fisher? lol

And Tk vs. The world ..



A tournament of champions?

[Hydra]

And Tk vs. The world ..

That's not a fair fight and you know it.  Give us Mars and Jupiter, and then maybe we'll stand a chance.

[forests failed you]

If you guys are actually interested in setting up an invitational MWS tournament I could start a thread about organizing it in the Adept and Mod lounge.

I would really like to do something like this, I think it would be a lot of fun.

[49 Cents]

If you guys are actually interested in setting up an invitational MWS tournament I could start a thread about organizing it in the Adept and Mod lounge.

I would really like to do something like this, I think it would be a lot of fun.

We could finally do a REAL world championship! Not just an American world champs!

[EotGiftsGG?]

i think that it would be amazing.
Like either Invitational or everyone on the so called "all star team" lol.
I'd like to see this developed.