Okay, that didn’t go so well, and it’s looking like I can’t get tournaments to happen until late September now, after LFU gets established in its new/old digs. However, when I bring back the local tournament scene again, I want it to become a more regular thing. This means monthly, if not bi- or tri-weekly events. The idea is to foster local competition and not have guys slip through the cracks via long waits between tourneys (ie: Joey Guerts, Stephen Mace, etc). I’ve talked to Scott McUne, and he is on board, at least after he moves the store. I have come up with a number of ideas to grow the community around here. Unfortunately, I can’t put any of them into action outside Logan for the time being.
-“A Day of Old-School.” The idea is to run the late September tournament with a lineup of HF/A2/MK2. Relax guys, I’m not taking MK seriously. I just realize that by reaching out to the MK players, we’ll pull some more Street Fighter players out of the mix. Depending on how that goes, I’ll do it again once MK Armageddon comes out so we can run Ultimate MK3 (I should have my own cabinet by then, but no way am I lugging that thing out to the mall), which should get a good following by then thanks to Xbox Live Arcade. The overall game lineup may seem underwhelming, but I urge everyone who wants to support the Utah scene to show up, because it’ll get a different crowd, and we need to impress and keep those guys around all the same.
-Regular tournaments. I touched on this at the start. Once I start rolling out tournaments again, I don’t want to have to stop. There will be no “off-season” in Utah. We’re not going to see a good player come to one of our tournaments and drop off the earth by the time we get to our next one. That shit’s killing us. It’s keeping us from bringing in new players and sustaining independent communities within the state. Don’t get me wrong - it’s great that we can bring the whole state’s top players together whenever we do put up a tournament, and we’ll at least have to keep it up for a little while longer, but eventually we’re going to have to have regular shit going on in Logan, Ogden, SLC, Provo, Brigham City, etc. If you guys can help me pull this off in Logan, I’ll do everything in my power to return the favor, since my current employer has set a personal goal for me to be driving as of Halloween, and that takes me to my next point…
-We are going to motherfucking Evo next year, I don’t care if I have to stuff players in a U-Haul to make it happen. Shit, rent a generator, throw a table and a TV in there, and run rotation play all the way to fucking Vegas. We’re god damn good enough to be at Evo, and this logistical bullshit has to stop. Unless something goes terribly wrong with my getting a drivers license, however many Team Utah players need rides, I will take them to Evo my fucking self. As long as we inform any true newcomers we get about what exactly Evo is and what it means, they’d know they really have something to shoot for, which would help the turnout at our own smaller events leading up to the big one.
And to close the message, here is, to the best of my knowledge, Team Utah’s roster (I’m going by my tournament signup sheets and old contact info that I have on hand). If anyone can track down the MIA players or point out other Utah players, it would be much appreciated.
Jacob Bleyl “Ugly Duckling” - Status: Active
Joe Bleyl “Sloppy Joe” - Status: Active
Jon Bleyl “Quarter Ace” - Status: Active
Spence Devine - Status: Active
Joey Guerts - Status: MIA
David Hendel - Status: MIA
"Jizzz_frame" - Status: Active
Samson Keonine “G-Style” - Status: Active
Stephen Mace - Status: MIA
Patrick Mifflin “DarkCatalyst/Neobeast” - Status: Active
Tyler Pendleton “Frater Pluritus” - Status: MIA
Alex Pritchett - Status: Unknown
Nate Reed “G.Silver” - Status: Active
Dan Silver “Nanobit” - Status: Active
Tony Stockseth “Black Chance/Jaded Perspective” - Status: Questionable (college)
Ernie Thompson “manji187/Lord Dubz” - Status: Active
Dana Torp “Professor D” - Status: Questionable (has a kid)
Seth White - Status: MIA
Yuki “Spy” - Status: MIA
Utah, along with Team Portland members who attended our tournaments, dominated the 1-6 spots in the division that weekend. Ricky Ortiz had 7th.