Wednesday, February 26, 2014

APL Redux: A Spectator's Review

Without wishing to flog a dead horse beyond all recognition it is fair for the reader to wonder if I'm secretly or not so secretly doing the PSP's bidding at least with regards their "competition" by ridiculing the APL's first event. Happily a reader who attended the event sent in his own review. To keep this short and to the point I'll restrict myself to a few quotes that suggest my post, while critical, wasn't out of line or a mischaracterization of what happened.

"Trade show was well, a few booths" ... "Virtue, Valken, CCPaintball (SoCal store), Aggressive Sports, HK, and a couple food vendors were there."
"Two fields and one of them was barely used 1/2 the time" ... "because there were SO FEW TEAMS. It's a national event, how do they expect to keep the series going for all 4 events when participation is like this?"
"Reffing appeared fine, no real gripes as a spectator, but I'm the wrong person to ask about that." 
"No one I spoke to had issues with the paint."
"The majority of the teams playing were all from within a few hours drive, and more often then not play at Camp P regularly"
"The pro games were well, not pro games. I felt like I was watching a Sunday scrimmage with a pro team (without their full squad) play a local D1, D2, or D3 PSP team (depending on who Heat & Dynasty were playing). Honestly, it was sad, I could have gotten my [team name removed by VFTD] brothers together (the D2 team) and we would have competed in Pro - until we played those teams and Shooters and Looters." 
"If I was Valken I would pull out, this is a waste of time and money." 

The simple truth is the APL is the PSP's best friend whether they know it or not. As long as the APL is around claiming to be a national level series alternative the PSP has no real competition. And my view is the APL makes a mockery of everything that real competitors value with their me too format and hand me down league. And for those who think any paintball "grows the sport" are you really prepared to hold up the APL as the standard of our game? I didn't think so.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

No doubt in my mind that a few thousand people watching the webcast is positive for paintball.

Whether it grows the sport or increases the lifetime participation of a player, it's a positive thing.

splatkid10 said...

My question now...CPS seems to be a worthy competitor to the Millennium in Euroland, why? Maybe if the APL figures that out then they can figure out how to make it work...?? Maybe?

PROsinceNXL said...

more psp propaganda...?