Back on My Hobby Horse

Remember Galveston? And VFTD's predictions regarding how the PSP's annual-we-must-make-changes-in-order-to-save-paintball would turn out? Yeah, well, I'm not satisfied with being right once because frankly it hasn't made (enough of) a difference so I'ma do what I always do--continue to bludgeon ignorance into submission with the Baca stick. In the case of the PSP it's my stubborn determination to help the PSP be the best it can be. Sometimes despite itself. Really. (Love you, Lane. No homo.)
Anyway, the plan is simple. VFTD will be charting all matches played in the multi-point format once known as (watered down) xball. (At Galveston more than half of all matches went to time despite the fact the great majority were Race 2-4.) After taking a look at the Chicago layout I see no reason to suspect there will be a different outcome this time around. (Why, btw, was it released on a Wednesday when the oft-stated pre-season change-to-save-paintball was that official field releases would occur on the Thursday prior to the event? I know, it's just a day but how hard is it to consistently do what you say you're gonna do?)
For those outta the loop here's the deal. The longer field matters, in part, because the number of props hasn't changed. Bigger props were supposed to be close to Home to help out the bigger, slower, fatter player the league was trying to entice back into the game and the upshot of the collective changes was supposed to be a more inviting game to a wider pool of potential players. (While I understand conceptually it was never going to work that way in practice.) As a practical matter it was only going to slow matches, extend points, use more paint & generally be less exciting. To make that point after the fact VFTD charted match results.
To sum up: early release & (apparently) those bigger, fatter, slower players are no longer of interest. Even so, it won't change the outcome at all. Results posted after the event--maybe even during. Watch the webcast and enjoy the pro matches. (Trust me, some of those won't be pretty either.)

ProPredictions 2010

In this the winter of our discontent ... VFTD interrupts the cheap theatrics (and other posts patiently waiting to be posted, like the next installment of Year in Review) for a sobering prediction or two. I actually thought about skipping this one but two things changed my mind. Lots of good sites tell you what's happening but who else will tell you what's happening before it happens? And besides, in a week when the EPA has decided we are all pollutant emitters for the anti-social, anti-environmental behavior called breathing it sorta puts things into perspective, doesn't it?

It turns out last year was just a warm-up. A hint of things to come--and it's coming. And what it is, is bad. PBIndustry struggled last year and has spent much of the off season trying to position itself in light of continuing hard times. Recent rumors on diverse industry fronts tell a tale of digging in in the hope of holding on. For VFTD purposes survival mode within the industry will hit the pro game especially hard. No one familiar with the situation expected things to turn around but I'm not sure many expected things to get worse--and possibly substantially worse. This will hit both team sponsorships and league sponsorship hard.

Last year the PSP began with 13 pro teams. In 2010 I now don't expect more than 8 although the PSP may see about pushing that to 10 by encouraging a team or two intending to play semi-pro to move up. There has been talk about trying to make the pro division more appealing so let's say the combined number of pro and semi-pro teams will total 15 to 18 with or without a NPPL. On the NPPL front I'm wondering if reality is finally settling in as industry players and teams keep putting off making decisions and/or commitments for the coming season. In any event there will not be 16 pro NPPL teams regardless of additions as we rapidly approach the point where Paintball cannot even pretend to support two major leagues. The only thing I'm uncertain about is if I'm being too optimistic.

Major League Paintball Held Hostage: Weekly Update

It's that time again. Where I bore you senseless (not always that long a trip) with the numbers as VFTD attempts to track the vitality of big league tourney competition.

But before I get started mark your calendars because I have a prediction for you. This is one you will not want to remember but will hope to be able to throw back in my face at a future date. Conflicted? It gets better. Or worse, depending. Warning: Do NOT read this prediction if you suffer from depression, occasional thoughts of suicide, drug-induced paranoia or if you listen to emo music.

Prediction: Next season, 2010, MLP will be at greater risk than it is/was this year, and I'm not convinced that surviving 2010 will get us over the hump either.

This week over at the PSP Chicago registration is up to 187 with 77 teams paid. That is a solid improvement over last week and, I think, a positive sign. The league continues to work the phones hard trying to drum up vendor participation but it remains an uphill struggle.
On the WC front it would appear that an Orlando venue may be close to being a done deal. This is just speculation on my part but I do know a couple of things that most of you probably don't. (I wonder if I'll get an irate phone call later today.) Do not, in any case, buy your plane tickets just yet.

The May deadline came and went for registration and early payment for the USPL's West Coast Open. Registered teams is up to 59 with 16 paid (not including the pro teams.) That means only a few teams took advantage of the largest possible discounts on their entry fees but lesser discounts remain available and it's hard to quantify where the savings versus the very early payment balances out given that the event isn't scheduled until mid-July. There is still plenty of time to get signed up but it's hard not to look at this as something of a referendum on the viability of 7-man as a major league format going into the future. Next week's Monday Poll will be about the 7-man format.

The Millennium Series staged their second event of the season at Bitburg, Germany last weekend with a total of 116 teams participating compared to the 151 teams at Malaga. Final results for Malaga in the locked upper divisions will not be complete until the Paris event in July. In the open divisions the numbers were down in Germany by 32 teams; 80 D2 & M5 combined in Malaga with only 48 combined in Bitburg. Curiously, there are 27 registered teams in D1 but in both Malaga and Bitburg only 24 D1 teams played. Does that mean, like last year, there are 3 teams each event reffing instead of playing? And how are they chosen? Do they still pay a licensing fee to get a D1 spot so they can ref?

The next Grand Tour event in the Central Conference is scheduled for the end of June in Lviv and there are currently 32 teams registered. That's up 2 over last week.

Richter or Beaufort?

Hah! It's a trick question. The answer is both! They're both scales. Richter of course is the seismic scale that measures shifts in the earth's crust, you know, earthquakes. The Beaufort Scale measures, among other things, wind speed.
While the winds of change are blowing in paintball and we's all distracted a few subterranean rumblings hint at the possibility of an earthquake or two really rearranging the landscape. I can't tell you what the Big One, if it comes, will do to competitive paintball but I can suggest a window of time when it's likely to happen--if it does. (Obviously if I'm calling one possibility the Big One I do have some idea what might happen.) Figure on the Big One to come sometime in the last half of December--if it comes at all. Even without the Big One you can count on some lesser quakes doing a decent job of shaking things up.
I know what you're thinking: Great, it's like a bad Nostradamus prediction but without the rhymes. Anybody can do that and be right once in a while. After all even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in awhile. I don't disagree but nothings set in stone--yet.

Last Word on Relegation

However the final decision from the NPPL shakes out it may not matter much in the larger scheme of things. Be it relegation and promotion or just promotion with no relegation or some one time only expansion to an even number of teams ('cus 18 + 3 = 21) or perhaps the NPPL might say that Philly abandoned their spot and consider them out while choosing not to relegate Dogs and Rage which would put the division at an even 20. And since nobody actually "owns" their spot (and the NPPL can, as a practical matter, do whatever they want) that would leave only one guy unhappy and solve a host of other problems. Admittedly that option would also leave a bunch of team owners more nervous than they already are (or ought to be.) Or who knows, they could opt for some absurd variant involving a clown car, a bunch of rubber noses and calliope music.
I find myself in substantial agreement with be smart's comments from the previous relegation post with regards what's coming. I doubt there will be any relegation though if they are gonna promote I think the pro division is better off also relegating and not being diluted with the addition of more teams (with the greater likelihood of drop-outs.) And for those who like predictions I'm predicting a pro division of 24 teams that never has 24 teams competing in any single event and ends the season around the old 18 teams mark, plus or minus 1 or 2.
The sponsorship issues are even worse in some respects than portrayed--there is little doubt with no direct league involvement in deals--that paint will be a critical issue next season for virtually all the pro teams. Beyond that a lot of the sponsors will delay committing themselves to new deals. The old window of time these things used to happen in no longer applies and teams will occasionally find themselves lowballed at the last minute with few, if any, alternatives but to accept. Beyond that some pro teams are gonna find themselves out in the cold.
In a related prediction: At Commander's Cup (Did the NPPL downplay the whole Cup thing compared to the Pure Promotions days?) there were 8 teams competing pro that are also NXL teams. (At the start of the year it was eleven.) I'm not seeing all eight in both leagues to start next year. Something between 3 and 6 teams competing in both is about right and if you want to pin me down I'm gonna be optimistic and say 5.
As for other decisions that will be made I expect four events but I have doubts about no entry, no prize package [in the pro division] (though it's been talked around) and I see some real problems trying to integrate Semi & D1 mostly related to classifying eligible players and dealing with relegated pros. It might however provide a rationale for restricting (or eliminating) future relegation. Not saying either one won't happen but the teams are ambivalent about aspects of the former and the later will be a problem. Largely because there's already resistance to moving up on the part of a fair number of teams for whatever reasons and top loading a *new* D1 with relegated pros won't be encouraging to most. Of course participation in the lower divisions is already soft.

*Here's a slightly o/t question: How many relegated pro teams competed the following season in semi-pro while maintaining a core roster?*

On the plus side that's not really the worst of it. One of these days I'll screw up my courage, put on my big boy pants and tell you what the NPPL is really all about. I won't be needing my Magic 8-ball (Try again later) nor will I be staring deeply into Mama Lambini's crystal ball. Call it a prediction. Call it a prognostication. Call it an outrage. Call it unbelievable.

The NXL in '09

Where do the days go? Seems I forgot to renew my Prozac prescription and nothing good will come of that. An inclination toward pessimism now heightened by burgeoning chemical dependency issues has me despairing so naturally I began thinking of the future of, what else, competitive paintball. If you thought I was gonna say the economy--the Amazin' Kreskin you ain't--I said I was despairing, not suicidal.
I also thought I'd get ahead of the curve and offer up some predictions early--before the Cup crowd of Paintball Illuminati gather to chart our collective futures (think of this moment in time as the few days leading up to the activation of Skynet)--and save yourselves all the anxiety of waiting for the inevitable rumors and half-truths to start circulating.
The following is a prediction. It is not based on advance information I've been made privy to or disinformation either. It is an educated guess.
8 teams. The league might manage 10 but I'm having a hard time seeing how right now. Some very important decisions are going to made between Cup and, say, Christmas. There's a new variable in the mix I hadn't previously considered (which was stupid on my part because the precursors were there some time ago.) Anyway, I won't name teams as I can't be positive and speculation along those lines would be grossly unfair. 5 or 6 teams are virtually a lock and the shake-out will come from the others and the couple (or so) teams that currently are thinking they want in.
In a previous post I suggested in passing that I hoped the PSP managed '09 with no more than a 30% decline. I'm afraid that may have been too optimistic. Unfortunately there is also no way to implement the Pro Circuit between now and the start of next year--assuming the highly unlikely event of the PBIlluminati actually considering such a change. And without the Pro Circuit alternative methods of supporting the NXL would almost certainly conflict with the operation of the PSP. If the option to restructure the NXL isn't on the table then I hope the simpler course of cutting costs will be seriously considered--and which might add up to 10 teams but there is still a huge complication in the offing. (If you're a newcomer check out the Pro Circuit posts in the Archives to see what it's all about.)
More likely might be a reduced season schedule. Given that one way of looking at dropping one event would be a cost reduction of 20% for teams (and something less for the PSP) intending to compete for a series. And for everybody else a one or two event option would remain. The calculation for the PSP then becomes how many teams do we need over 4 events and when and where are the events held? The other question is how does a 4 event season impact league income from sponsors, etc?
One more prediction: the webshow will not have enough paying customers to make the PSP happy this time around--and if World Cup can't draw the numbers they want then what? Regardless, this is a project that ought to be pursued. Easy for me to say but even so. (I'll have more on the webshow and the Big Picture once I find out what all the PSP has in mind. )