Millennium Series : Prizes for Novice teams please

[TJ 2]

What's tha Rush?

Chill out Mr T...I used you as opposed to one of tha others cos I know you guys come on here a lot and would respond and get debate going. And yes, there are other teams like tha ones you mentioned...Obviously you guys can do what you like, but I think it's fair to say that you guys are one of tha best and most consistent Brit teams out there and you regularly beat up on tha UK Pros.

There is, IMHO, no real difference between yourselves, Banzai, Shockwave, Tigers, Backlash et al - as I think you just proved by winning tha Angel Cup, which had a number of Pro teams in it. I know there's the old 'Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while' argument, but tha fact is no-one was much surprised by that result - yet shouldn't it be an upset when a Div. 1 team beats a Prem League team? But it wasn't - to anyone. That speaks volumes for your abilities and tha way they are perceived - and to my mind it makes a mockery of tha Pro/Am distinction if everyone accepts you are as good as these guys.

Now maybe it's just me, but if I'd been at your level for so long and was whupping on my fellow UK Pros I'd feel a moral duty to move up. You don't, thass cool, everyone's different.

As for using your own name, please gimme a break....I don't see that as having a single bit of relevance unless I had an agenda which involed you guys in any way, which I patently don't...


peace

 

[Mark Toye-Nexus]

'TJ'

I think that we are talking about degrees of ability here.

The Rushers do play 'Pro' - we play that classification in the UK which has meant that we have gained plenty of experience and play to a higher standard compared to many other Am teams in the UK.

What I would say, and this is not meant as a slight on fellow Brit teams, that there are now NO Brit Pro teams who can win a Millennum event. Lets go further - I think that there are few who can even qualify for the semis, let alone the finals at Pro level in Millenniums.

So Rushers do well against that opposition, at home, on occassion. So extrapolate those results and it puts our level at almost certainly not qualifying for the semis at pro level at Millenniums.

WE GOTTA STEP UP THEN!!!! It's a no brainer innit?

Wake up dude. We aint qualified for an Am Final in nigh on two years.

Our level is a top end European Amateur team. There are a number of European Ams out there that are better than us. It would seem mad for us to step up and be swallowed up in a world that we just would not survive in.

I'm sad to say that, but at the moment its true.

But 'TJ' as for agenda, hidden or not - no-one can tell unless we know who you are!!!

Mark T 'chilled'

 

[TJ Lambini]

All debate is good...

Now it gets interesting.

You play Pro in tha UK but Am in tha Millennium!!!???!!! And we wonder why we struggle to get recognition as a sport...'yeh, we were Pro last Saturday and beat up on Shockwave and Backlash to win the UK Cup, but at Toulouse we're gonna be in tha bracket below them.'

Lunacy...not that that's your fault (though it is your choice).

As for not winning stuff or getting swallowed up...How many teams are realistically in tha hunt for tha Soccer Premiership? Three - at a massive push five...don't stop there being 22- teams in tha league does it?

Let's say there are somewhere between 150 - 300 teams in Europe. Rushers are in what, the top 20, top 25? If that ain't enough to go Pro I don't know what is. Hey, let's just have 12 Euro Pros and be done with it...if the ability to make tha semis, at the moment, is your rationale for being Pro.

Again, personally, if I was reading the 'Who are the top 5 teams in tha UK' thread and I saw that everyone had mentioned my team in it, yet all the others mentioned were playing at Pro level in tha Millennium and my team wasn't, I'd have a real problem with that....you obviously don't, so it's a personal thing.

However, as I said before, I ain't here to pop at you guys necessarily - you just make a fantastic test case to show why we need promotion/relegation and set categories...Pro is Pro, Am is Am, Nov is Nov, you can't be more than one. And if we had promotion/relegation then no-one could acuse you of sandbagging.


As for agenda - PGI sponsors you, right? Talk to tha Antman or Robo, they'll confirm I have no agenda here...

 

[Mark Toye-Nexus]

Fair enough

I understand what you are saying.

We are an Am team that plays in the Pro ranks in the UK - perhaps I didnt make that clear. We do that out of choice and we reap the benefits.

Perhaps you are right and we should be Pro. We certainly have never made a case bigger than NBK did and they took years to go Pro.

In the last 18 months we have not feilded the same team in consecutive events. That is our problem and we are addressing it. But every time we build a good team someone leaves, someone retires or someone emmigrates. Everytime we do this, we rebuild.

We'll get there - and we'll make the step up when we're ready.

But the £3000+ I spend every year (and I'm not alone) on going to the events is why it will be so difficult to force teams into changes they arent happy with.

Make them unhappy and they stop. My bank manager would be so happy if I did. I'd be living in a bigger house and have a nicer car.

At the moment we are having a great time striving to be the best Euro Am team. When we acheive that - or have a team that we feel can hold its own at Pro - then we'll do it.

Until then we'll carry on doing our best for our sponsors, carry on working harder than most teams ever think of doing, and strive to be good enough to kick ass where we dream of doing it -

at Pro.

Assured of your best intentions - great debate

Mark T

 

[TJ Lambini]

Assured of your best intentions - great debate

Ditto.

Tha Millennium board, so vocal at times, are keeping well outta this thred...wonder why???

Come on guys, tell us why, or why not, or agree to discuss it, say something...

peace

 

[Liz]

All debate is good...

Originally posted by TJ Lambini
Let's say there are somewhere between 150 - 300 teams in Europe. Rushers are in what, the top 20, top 25? If that ain't enough to go Pro I don't know what is. Hey, let's just have 12 Euro Pros and be done with it...if the ability to make tha semis, at the moment, is your rationale for being Pro.

Ah, but the Rushers aren't staying as Am because they can't make the semis at Pro level - they aren't making the semis at Am level right now or not very often.
Mark says in an earlier post here "Well we made the semis twice last year, highest place 6th, made no finals and came joint 8th. " This was at Am level, so how on earth does that mean that they are good and consistent enough to play at Pro level?
Pro UK and Pro Millennium are very different levels and the same goes for Am. The problem is that if there are maybe 4 Pro level UK team (from a Millennium perspective) who on earth do they play week after week at home? The same 4 teams playing each other all the time & no-one else isn't much use, so the best Am sides (again, from a Millennium perspective) end up playing them. You go to a tourney with 40 teams and the top 8-10 will play in the "Pro" division - this means that there will be at least 4 Am rated teams playing Pro. Yes, you'll find some of them winning occasionally, but not consistently. Once they have that consistency I'm sure the Rushers will be moving up to Pro but just because some Brit teams play Pro & get murdered Millennium after Millennium that doesn't mean they must. Note I'm not getting at any Brit teams here at all, as I can't remember the results of the last couple of years off hand.
Only 2 UK teams got into the Novice finals at Amsterdam, but a couple of the teams that made it to the semis end up playing first or second division (i.e. thought of as "Pro") every tournament here at home because of the derth of true Pro level teams.

 

[Mark Toye-Nexus]

Liz

here here

Mark

 

[cjohns]

My 2 cents worth: I am going to use my team, Outkast, as an example. We have 3 pro players on the team from the old NWC regime. Two younger guys who went straight to pro, and 4 who worked their way up from Nov to Pro. We decided to jump straight into Pro to play the best possible teams out there and gain the most experience. On a U.K. level, we can compete with the high AM's and Pro's. On a worldwide scale, so far we have gotten our asses handed to us, but we have gained a lot out of it. It really is how comfortable that particular team feels comfortable playing at.

 

[manike]

I'll be blunt...

The fact is that the level of competition and division is not equal across the world of paintball.

In all honesty Pro in the UK does not equal Pro in the USA or Pro from many levels in Europe.

So why shouldn't a team play at a fair level of competition? In the UK the Rushers play 'pro' because that is the level to play against their peers, in the Millennium Series or NPPL they play Amateur because that is the fair level of competition to play against their peers.

The Millenium series and NPPL rankings are not necessarily comparable to local event rankings.

How many Pro UK teams do you think actually compete with a chance of winning in the Millennium? no disrespect to any of them but I don't think any really do. You only have to look at their results to see this. And yet they do compete at that level in the UK because they are the pinnacle of UK play.

I think many (if not most) of the UK pro teams would find it bloody hard to qualify as Amateur in a Millennium or NPPL event. I know many UK amateur teams that wouldn't qualify as Novice in the Millennium (and some that are playing as Novice in the Millennium with old Pro and Amateur players and not always qualifying!)

I think the division titles for the Millennium series (and maybe all of paintball?) are misleading. We should have Division 1, Div 2 etc and on down, and people play in the fair division.

This may not relate to the Divisions they play in back at 'home' or it may. Who cares as long as the level they are playing at is fair. Isn't ultimately that what we all want?

manike

 

[Mark Toye-Nexus]

Nicely put Manike

And are the Rushers being fair by playing at Am??

I think so. Like you say, measuring against the existing heirachy here is not the best test of where to play abroad.

I think we have it right.

Take us and several other out of Am and put us in pro and you have a dilution in the pro ranks and lower quality Am teams then 'doing well'

What happens then?? Do they then have to go Pro just cos they are doing well at what is a depleted Am scene??

The competition at Am is very very difficult at present. With the likes of Trauma, Shockwave Canada, Hardcore it is a bitch actually!!!

Mark

PS we allow Trauma and Shock CA to play Am here cos if they didnt they'd lose their Am status at home. They beat up on all the Euro Pros but no mention about them here?