PSP LA..What The Skinny??

[sjt19]

Xball

Originally posted by JtJ

1. Grass was nice.
2. D1 & 2 XBall refs were INCREDIBLE. My team was more penalized than most, and I'm still saying it. Those guys didn't miss ANYTHING. They were there at 10:30 am, and they were there, one night, for a 7:15 pm game. That's a long day. And they reffed that 7:15 pm game just as well as they did the 10:30 game. I can't say enough. These guys just impressed the hell out of me

Sounds like just what us Euros have been used to for a while now in the Millennium Series......ecept that the games start at 8.00 am so the judges work for longer......shame it is only now that the US seems to be catching up.

Sounds strange also that at past events i have been reading that the refing sucked......and now from this report at least (and i know its only an Xball report and therefore not reflective of what the majority experienced) it sems that the reffing was good, but they fell WAY short of what is expected of the promoters by not having such basic things as dead boxes.....whats next....??......no air filling stations at the next event.....or no space for the vendors to set up.......or no toilets....(oh wait....the toilet thing was the WC wasnt it!!)

Chuck Hendsch and WDP got it right first time.........why cant the PSP get it right when theyve been doin it for years!!!!????

glad i live in the Uk where decent tournaments are the norm rather than the exception.

sam

 

[Joy_Robin]

Wadidiz:

EY man watcha doing overthere again?! Did we loose you on the flight back home too???

Just messin buddy. Take care over there and hold on tight to your plane ticket THIS TIME!

(Passa dig för dom där galna jänkarna. Dom är inte lika lugna som oss svenskar.)

Puss
/Rob

 

[Beaker]

This was a post on smacktalk. Seems like a sensible appraisal of the first 2 events.

I'll start off with the good:

1. The prize value advertised actually WAS the prize delivered. It was cool to get the dealer dollars which we could spend right away rather then a bunch of crappy Pyramats which noone will ever buy off of us.
2. The grass fields were nice. More or less level ground.
3. There was enough bleacher space for the number of spectators that attended (even though there were barely any)
4. Not having us buy ID's.
5. Press coverage was in full force.

And now the bad:
1. Dead boxes...seriously, there were probably enough local teams that attended that could have loaned the use of the canopies to use for the dead boxes. Caused alot of bonus balling and people walking off the fields and shouting at refs/players.
2. For the first couple days, not even all the fields had armbands.
3. The player passes/security passes. What was the point? The only job security did at the event was being a bunch of pricks by not letting us drive one car up to drop off the paint instead of making us lug 20 cases back and forth.
4. Big walk from staging to fields, this couldn't be helped but it was still reasonable.
5. $6 a day for parking, wasn't PSP fault. The only reason I don't feel too bad about this is that I didn't have to shell out for an ID.
6. In X-Ball they wiped the bunkers between games with less than 2 minute intervals. On the 10 man fields they have all the time they want and it wasn't done. I got pulled twice for rubbing up against crap on the dye field. They coulda done what HB did and just hire a couple manual laborers for the day to wipe the bunkers down.
7. Worked the timing out a little better on turning the stadium lights on for the night games. Again, not the PSP fault.

Every type of team you ask will have different opinions on what they want from the event. Teams that have full rides are mainly only concerned with the reffing and the location since they have not much to lose and alot to gain. Teams that are paying their own way want to make sure they are getting the value for their dollar with a possiblity of recouping some of the damage in the prizes.

The PSP event seemed like all the effort and accomodations were put towards X-Ball and the 10-man was just a little something on the side.

Don't get me wrong though, I played both events, and if I had the option to go back, I'd still play both.

BUT....the things that the NPPL did far better then the PSP in my opinion:
1. Made the players truely feel like high level athletes and helped the public realize that.
2. NPPL cut out the middle man. You can take paintball to the media and let the media take it to the public. Or you can just take it and stick it in the middle of the public on the beach at one of the busiest, highly trafficed areas in California.
3. Security, made players feel a little more comfortable leaving their stuff under a tent.

In short, in HB I felt like I was professional athlete with a hundreds of eyes watching me walk on the field during the finals. Cheering, clapping. Couldn't help but grin. In PSP I just felt like an average paintball player playing just another tournament. Props to PSP for the prizes.

Cheers to all the teams that won both events. I think Dynasty and the Naughty Dogs are the smartest teams out there now. They are cutting through the crap and proving that they just want to play and win money. If you ask the dream of any up and coming rookie player, he'll say he wants to turn pro, get on a podium finish, and get paid to play.

 

[xternal]

I went to watch the the Friday that the NPPL was at Huntington, and the Friday that PSP was at the fairplex. At HB, I saw many obvious non-players stopping to watch a few games. At the PSP on Friday, everyone I passed looked like a player or vendor rep.

As far as taking it to the non-playing masses, HB seemed to have an advantage. HB could draw on the thousands of people that already planned to take a walk at the beach. Nobody was going to walk by this event at the fairplex. It's up to you to decide if you care about that.

I will say though, I'd much rather play on grass than sand. The first step I took at Huntington, I thought, "man, this must be rough to run on".

I can also confirm they didn't have distinct deadboxes. Players either went into the single entry/exit tent/chrono station and waited there, or left the field entirely. Lots of eliminated players out of habit walked back towards where they started, only to remember that's not where the "deadbox" was, then ran forward, jumping over a bunker (possibly being confused for a live player), and hit the tent. I saw a few times players that had exited the tent go stand outside the netting and whisper info to their remaining teammates on the tape. That's jacked.

Lastly, I've come up with a bit of advice from comparing the staging at HB and Pomona. I didn't play either, so this might seem unfair, but anyway. At HB, the security at the staging entrance appeared to be checking that people weren't lugging markers past the exit. If you want non-players around, I think this is a great idea. First, people outside the net didn't have to wonder if the player that just passed had a gassed up marker without a barrel bag. Secondly, since all the players were staging at an internal area connected to the field entrances, there wasn't as much excess paint laying around outside. At the PSP, there was a fair amount of paint around the entrances to the fields, and the tunnel I walked through to get to the infield had paint broken all over (and I distinctly remember thinking, this probably isn't good). I'd think if you're planning an event, it's good to take into account a setup that will effect the smallest area of the venue.

To avoid being totally negative, I will say that when I saw the fields, the definitely looked like they'd be fun to play on. The grass (at least on Friday) looked good, and I didn't note any underinflated bunkers.

 

[Beaker]

Seems players definitely like a nice grass playing surface more than anything else.

 

[acsik]

Hmmm theese kind of reports are always make me feel good that we got the Milleneum..

We are spoiled from the start with grassy fields proper toilets and *gasp* dead boxes.



Its only a few weeks to Portugal and Im definitely curious what Laurent & Co will come up after HB upped the "standard".




Cyaz

 

[neill]

just my two pennys as im not a tourney player anymore and having played the world cup albeit in 1997, organizers of a series like the psp which have been running for years surely have a basic list of requirements to run an event like number 1 enough netting number 2 enough armbands plus extra for those that go missing as the always do and having no dead boxes seems to me a joke(i dont mean to upset anyone)the players pay top whack to play these events and from the sound of things are getting 90%value for money instead of 100%.
does it all come down to attention to detail or is it organizers vying to be number one and cutting corners while trying.i visited the campaign cup last year to spectate my first time back to an event in over 5 years and i was blown away with they whole thing it was amazing.the buzz i got seeing how far the sport had come since i quit was fantastic it reminded me of how i felt playing hyperball for the first time then my first and only world cup .
players need i think more input with organizers to say hey this was great but this could have been better and this was crap,and organizers actually listen and be proactive in response than being more interested in finacial reward
laters
neill

 

[shamu]

Originally posted by xternal
To avoid being totally negative, I will say that when I saw the fields, the definitely looked like they'd be fun to play on. The grass (at least on Friday) looked good, and I didn't note any underinflated bunkers.

I'm sorry but how sad is that for positive comments? The bunkers weren't underinflated??? If that's the best thing to say about the the event, something is wrong with this picture.

The deadboxes, armbands, etc make me think PSP is trying to go in too many directions. Maybe they need to focus their resources on fewer formats.

 

[Gyroscope]

Any landing you can walk away from...