Friday, May 30, 2008
Playoffs; Week 1 in Review
It all started Monday night when Straightshots beat Magic Pool in the opening match of this season's Playoffs. I for one, am still surprised. As shockingly bad as MagicPool has been in any interleague requiring cam for Playoffs, you had to at least figure if they didn't beat SS, they'd put up something that resembled a fight. They didn't, and got swept 4-0. I'm gonna stop short of calling Magic Pool an utter joke on cam, because unlike them, I have a season to look forward to and there are plenty others out there who can say as much and then some - I will however go as far as saying this is a league that will never, ever, EVER win a major interleague championship, at least in this "era," if you will.
Tuesday night, more 5 over 4 goodness. Lucky Shots gained a 3-0 lead, initially only having 5 players available, against United Pool. Michelle beat Ketan, Pete beat Ste after an almost laughable shot at the end for the United Pooler, and then Snow Queen beat Snooky_style... Who went on to imply something, when the only thing he should've implied was "damn, do I suck or what?" When you're relying on snooky, dandi, and aaron to try and bring your league back from a 2-0, 3-0, 3-1 deficit... You are not gonna win many matches. In the end, LS shut the door when Pascal blew a gimme, and canucklehead finished the job, LS wins 4-2. I know what King tried to do here. He tried to throw the house at LS and confuse them. But he got caught with his hand in the cookie jar and couldn't pull it out. As a Captain, you have to know who the other team has. He backed off when Ketan and Ste didn't get the job done. He should've kept trying to throw his best - Pascal and himself - at them. All LS is gonna have at the end is weak players. Just look at the stats if you need me to prove that. UP would still have a handful of weak players available, if LS didn't run out of players and time out first. Eventually canucklehead and wolf man showed up for their 6th and 7th players, but I'm very certain had King stuck to his guns, instead of changing his strategy, his team would've been playing on Thursday.
Wednesday night, more hilarity. 8Ball Runners had FOUR players. They also jumped out to a 3-1 lead over Cheap Shotz... Yeah, I know... "WTF?" 8BR would then time out and give CZ a 4-3 win. So that moves Cheap Shotz on to face Cue Keepers, who received a forfeit from Straight Shots on Thursday. After what I saw last week, let's just bypass the match and put CKP in the World Series, because right now they're playing a team in the AL Championship Match that doesn't even deserve to be there.
Also on Wednesday, the battle of the Legends - TPL and PL. Who would be the REAL True Pool Legends on this night? Well, the league called TPL of course. Without Koty, and with Travis losing, and without Sova even playing, True Pool Legends knocke dout PL 4-1. It was still a very good match, and one that could've shifted either way in almost all 5 games. TPL however stuck with what was working for them, they were definitely more aggressive than PL, and forced Jason & Darkinc, I think, into making decisions they didn't necessarily wanna deal with. That is your job as a visiting league, and you bet your ass they're gonna try to do the same to Kerry & Poolfiction next week.
Speaking of the National League's #1 seed, how did they fare against the possible Cinderellas of the NL? Well, they made LS look more like the 7 dwarves of the NL, referring to size, not awesomeness. A 4-1 win for PFN, trailing 0-1 but winning 4 straight, including 1 timeout when Eskimo Pete got disconnected after being forced to rerack a game due to an illegal break. LS played the match right, in my opinion, with what little they had available, but really it just wasn't their night. When Pete timed out, you kinda knew it was curtains. Simon came up in the right spot, Kerry put Jamie up and he 8-balled the not-so-Lucky Shot... and that, as they say, is that.
So next week, it's Cue Keepers and Poolfiction playing host to Cheap Shotz, and True Pool Legends, respectively. Both #1 seeds are still alive, and there's a #2 and #3 to go with them. I do think Poolfiction is the only league in all of MLP right now, that could give Cue Keepers a run for their money. Either way, I'm still picking CKP to take home Season 11, whether it's against PFN or TPL. Now all we can do is wait out the weekend, and get ready for another week of must-win matches.
Dazed will be along with predictions for said Conference Finals in a bit. Enjoy!
