Adam Gilson and Clay Tumey of Modern Foos help to put the World Foosball Tour 2025 Hall of Fame Classic in perspective-which is-the tournament was amazing! What does the future hold? Some real surprises coming up on this episode of FoosTalk Live.
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[00:02:18] We're here once again on Foos Talk Live, episode number 251, one week exactly after the World Foosball Tour Hall of Fame Classic in Las Vegas. And what a weekend it was. We all recovered, quote unquote, in one way or the other. And it looks like Randy Raposo is having more difficulty recovering than some of us. He's going to connect with us in just a bit here on Foos Talk Live.
[00:02:46] But in the meantime, the Modern Foos team has also made it back in one piece. It's Adam Gilson and Clay Toomey of Modern Foos. Guys, are you any worse for wear after last week? What did you ask us now? Any worse for wear after last week? I wish I was still there. Yeah? It's fun. Okay. Yeah. Tournaments don't wear me out. People do. But tournaments do. Yeah, people do.
[00:03:14] No, it was just a truly memorable time. And yeah, like I said, I didn't want to see it end. There were, you know, a couple of fringe benefits I have to say that I brought home with me, which included a bit of what they call the Tournament Ick, which is just a touch of the flu for a few days. You guys healthy? Yeah. Good? I got sick. You guys...
[00:03:43] Yeah, it was a fringe with benefits, I guess. And as I was driving home, because I could drive to Vegas, because it's a five and a half hour drive for me. I got in the car and I was driving home and just listening to my Atlantis Morissette records and just having a grand time. And then my throat started itching. And then my Tuesday, it was hell. Yeah. But it only lasted for about three or four days. But then the worst part was I gave it to everybody. My son got it. My wife got it. Everybody.
[00:04:12] But the good news is it hit me way harder than them. And it might have been something to do with being just surrounded by cigarette smoke for five days, not sleeping, being stressed poorly, drinking too much, and just... All of the above. But nonetheless, a really fantastic tournament to talk about for decades, really. I mean, it's just the very first World Foosball Tour Hall of Fame classic with Tony and Billy
[00:04:41] being inducted into the Hall of Fame. Incidentally, I don't know about you, Adam, but my symptoms of this tournament ick was it's really less about nasal congestion and like throat sore. It was more about, I would say, aches, a little bit of shivering, kind of sleeping for 12, 14 hours at a time. Oh, wow. And, you know, some inappropriate language here and there, some non-sequiturs. What?
[00:05:11] Although that has nothing to do with the flu, but that's, you know... Oh. Has nothing to do with the mother flu. Nice timing. That was from behind the back. Woo-hoo! Do my own stunts. That was the reach back. That was the reach back. Reach around, actually. Oh, sorry. That Jackie... What? What'd you say? Actually, I didn't have those kind of symptoms. I just kept digging post holes in river bottoms around 3 o'clock in the morning. Oh. Weird. Post holes?
[00:05:42] In the river bottom? What's the river running through Las Vegas, by the way? No. You know how whenever you see those commercials on TV where they say the side effects of a certain drug will include, like, the desire to gamble? Oh, yes. Of course. Of course. Yes. So I did a reverse joke. And it went really well. So, anyways. Back to you, Clay. Back to you, Tom. Yeah. Well...
[00:06:10] What kind of non-sequiturs are we talking about here, anyway? Speaking of non-sequitur. I think that, well, when it comes to foosball in general, we love to talk about foosball. And non-sequiturs being what they are, we let them fly. Because ultimately, we always get back to that topic of foosball. And the Hall of Fame Classic, etc. I mean, it just, to me, it's one of those things that I just can't stop talking about it.
[00:06:39] Yeah. Foosball. It was a good time. That is. It was great. Yeah. It's one of my favorite tournaments in recent history. Well, so, okay. Let's run down. Let's get the gamut here. Let's begin with you, Adam. Some highlights. What do you think was, what are the most surprising things that happened for you? Wait a minute. Was that your first one, Tom? My first one what? Oh. Oh, yes. Was that your first chicken quesadilla?
[00:07:11] Was that the first time? Since we're talking about non-sequiturs. So, prior to this classic, this Hall of Fame classic, yes, I was a virgin. You brought it back. That's a full circle. Where's the mute button? Yeah. No, good. I've been to a lot of them. And Clay's been to some. I'm curious where you're at with that, Tom.
[00:07:40] Well, I got to say, you know, not going to the Hall of Fame classic prior to this, I guess my expectations were okay. I've always heard that it's always a great time. It's a legendary tournament. But, of course, this year, I had a feeling there was really no comparing because, first of all, it's a World Foosball Tour, brand new production. Plus, you've got two amazing names, you know, Billy and Tony going into the Hall.
[00:08:08] So, I had a feeling there was going to be something special about this one. So, I guess maybe this is a high bar mark for me, just to start with. And if I have something to compare to next year, obviously, I'll have to give you the answer then. But, for now, I mean, astounding. Yeah, I think that's a tough one because I've been to a lot of pre-IFP Hall of Fame events, a lot of IFP Hall of Fame events.
[00:08:38] And that was my first WFT Hall of Fame event. Right. And, obviously, having the marquee inductees that weekend, two of the goats. Mm-hmm. I don't know how you can have two greatest of all times. Two of the greatest. Two of the greatest. Mm-hmm. Of all time. Of all time. Makes sense. Since. Yeah.
[00:09:02] And, anyways, yeah, it was, I feel like there's always these moments that people get into when they're doing things that they don't realize what's actually happening. Maybe in the short term, it makes sense. But, like, think of a Roman emperor that is watching Visigoths coming over the seven hills of Rome. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. They didn't realize that Rome was pretty much going to be done.
[00:09:33] When you see these things happening in real time, these great moments in history, it's always incredible to witness them and, I think, not realize how important that they are. Right. And I think that this weekend was something that we saw with WFT doing what they do, Modern Foos doing what we do, and all the production between and all the experience of the players in between is something that I think is one of those great moments you're in the middle of and don't realize.
[00:10:01] And that's not a horn-tooting situation. I'm not trying to sound like anything better than I am as a human. I'm just telling you, I've been watching foosball for a long time. And I understand when I see a lot of things come together at any given moment that have a lot of people with focus and ability, talent, that are pushing for something new.
[00:10:21] And I think one of those things that it hinges on so much, and I know this with the Modern Foos group, but knowing what I know of Ryan and his ability to take critique and grow with it is something that is wildly important to the WFT.
[00:10:44] And as much as of a watershed moment this tournament was and TKO was and Nationals will be and Worlds definitely will be, 2026, 2027, 2028, it's just an exciting time to be involved in foosball. And it's only going to get more exciting. That was my takeaway. I mean, we could talk about it more on a granular level. We could talk about it more on how, you know, it was just these amazing matches, amazing moments, amazing things that were going on throughout the weekend.
[00:11:08] But I can just tell you that just for me to see this moment over the course of the week was something very special. Clay, anything you care to add to that? What were you laughing at, Adam? Oh, yeah, no, I look for it. Yeah, no, the answer, the truth is this way.
[00:11:38] The humor is that way. And if I look straight up, it's going to be a hilarious fact. Because it's geometry. If I look to the right, it's, if I look to the left, it's, it's all lines and lines. If I look down, I fell asleep or I'm falling asleep. I think, well, there's a lot there to agree with. And I agree with all of it probably, I guess. I don't know. I was thinking about why Randy isn't here for some of that. So there's that. Yeah.
[00:12:09] Oh, he's there. He's in the thing. You know, hey, Tom, a suggestion. Maybe we could just hop over to the channel where he's in. Okay. And if somebody, if somebody shows up unannounced and uninvited, we just boot him. All right. Let's do that. Okay. Let's just hop over there real quick. Here's some, uh, some, uh, foosball radio magic on Foos Talk Live. Never before seen. We're going to jump over to where Randy is. Hold on one second here. And it's a road trip. We're taking us some time. Here we go. We've never done this before.
[00:12:40] Well, I'll, I'll, I'll reserve that. The rest of that sentence for later when we're not. And there, and there's Randy. I'm sorry, guys. I think we got Randy. Do we get Randy back? And now let's see. Everybody. Yes, we have Randy. Turn on your camera. Everybody. Adam and, and, uh, Tom there. And all right. We got him. I do my own stunts. Welcome to Foos Talk Live with Tony Clifton. Tony Clifton. Yeah. I'm sorry. I don't know what happened.
[00:13:09] The link was not, I just, I had nothing. So I'm sorry, guys. Not your fault. We're working through it. Let's see here. Can you, can you hear me? Yeah. Turn on your video. Turn on your camera. Now I got to get my, my, my camera going on here. Oh, now Adam's the one who can't connect. Maybe this is. This is, this is not good here. Okay. Adam Gilson. We got him. And, uh, here's my.
[00:13:39] And all right. I think we're, are we all here yet? Test anything. Are we all here yet? Yeah. I think, I think, I think. Did we make it? Nope. Adam's not making it. Oh, but he's trying. I can tell. It's a, is this like, like the, like a hint. We can only do this three people at a time or something. I mean, what's the, what is the. The, that, that test that meeting 30 minutes prior is actually not a bad idea.
[00:14:09] And it's why I wouldn't. I was so anal about that for so many episodes. Agreed. Agreed. But you know what? I'm right. Most of the time, this is very comfortable territory for me. And, uh, I'll just sit here and watch, watch the wiggle and the squirm and might even get it and get in there with you. Cause I just think teamwork really makes the nightmare realistic. There you go. Or whatever that, I'm not real good with platitudes. Well, so Randy. That's actually not true. You're very, you're very good. What's up, Tom? What's up, man?
[00:14:39] So you, you, you made it. You made it from back from, uh, from Vegas. How you feeling? I'm, I'm, no, I'm still not right. And, uh. You're still not right? No, no, no, no, no. I heard a bunch of people got sick. I didn't really get sick as much as just tired, jet lag. Adam, there you are. You handsome bastard. There you go. We got you. We got you. Um, I'm sorry, Adam. Sorry, guys. Again, I apologize for any inconveniences. No need to worry about it. I'm sorry.
[00:15:09] Sorry, listeners. Listener. No, it was, uh. Uh, no. Anyway, it's, it was, um, it was a long, tiring weekend. Uh, the flight home was, um, I flew to Orlando, then over to Birmingham. It was like a four hour flight. And I, I slept. It was the most uncomfortable four hours of sleep I think I've ever had in my life. But. Wow. I made it home. And, um, you know, life goes on. So.
[00:15:40] That's it. That's the main thing. That's the most important thing, right? Nice. Well. Well, the, the, the, the, the, the, the bottom line is we're back together again. And, uh. I'm so excited. Gotta say, man, this, this has been a, uh, this last week recovering from the, from the, uh, the tournament has been fun. Uh, but it's, you know, nonetheless back on my feet, regular face the world once again. But, uh. Yeah.
[00:16:08] So Randy, we were just talking about, you know, great moments, uh, in, uh, in foosball history. When, uh. When we were hanging out at, uh, the Hall of Fame Classic. What'd you take away from the experience? Uh, the, the, the end. The end. Two things. The induction ceremony and then, uh, the episode we did. Probably most fun I had all weekend. So. That was a blast. Yeah. It's, uh, lots of kudos, lots of, lots of compliments, uh, from folks listening to that.
[00:16:36] They, uh, they seem to get a pretty big kick out of it. We, uh, we, uh, I don't know what it was. It was spontaneous, I guess. Well, I, I, I mean, all our shows are spontaneous. That's true. But I think, uh, just all of us there together, you know, a little bit of chemistry. I failed chemistry like three times. But one time I stuck a, I stuck a pair of scissors in a, uh, an electric socket. Yes. I was not expecting that. Shocker. Call that the shocker.
[00:17:06] Don't do drugs. Don't make me laugh. Don't do drugs. But, um, yeah. High five years. Five years of high school. Five years. Did you really? I'd still be there. Yeah. I'd still be there if you let me. Yeah. I was in the ninth grade three times. Tenth grade twice. Yeah. That's wild, man. Okay. It took me the same amount of time to finish the ninth grade as it took me to finish prison. Interesting. Interesting. A little longer in prison, but basically, yeah.
[00:17:35] I was in ninth grade for about three and a half years. Yeah. Yeah. I, I, I changed schools. I went from like a regular school to vocational school and then sophomore year, they made me repeat it. And I, I didn't, whatever. It was cool. I, I do it again if they let me. So, so what. Not as a 44 year old man, but anyway, go ahead, Tom. So, no, I was just going to say. I'd love to go back to school as a 45 year old. I'd be the best at everything. The fact that there's four members of the team tonight, four of us together and two out
[00:18:04] of the four, um, you know, the, the public systems failed them somehow. Whoa. Oh. You know? Slow down. Yeah. This is a foosball podcast, bro. Settle down. Well, what happened? No. Yeah. No. Those are valid questions. Right. So anyway. I wouldn't blame the system so much as just, you know, my, um. Mom? I blame my mom. No, my dad. The amount of work, probably more my dad, but the amount of work I put in, it was probably more me than the system.
[00:18:34] Same. Yeah. Well, I mean, there's, there's something to be said for, uh, you know, when, when, uh, especially if you're younger and you're trying new stuff and you're testing boundaries and just, you know, just trying to, uh, to live your life. It's, uh, it ain't easy, man. It's a, it's a challenge. And, you know. When you say trying new stuff, are we talking about. Oh. Drugs and alcohol. Or are we talking about like. Foosball. You know. No, I didn't do that till. Till later. Okay.
[00:19:03] It was like right after high school is when I found. When I found foosball. But anyway, I digress. The tournament though. Uh, so Clay and I were actually talking before the show, just about like open double specifically. 128 teams. The top 50 teams were at least the top 50 seeds were pro teams. Okay. Yeah. What I mean, what I mean by that is at least one player on the team was a pro rated player. So almost half the field was pro teams.
[00:19:33] That's a deep field dude. Yeah. And if you look at the, you know. Okay. So like Tommy and Eric just won the kickoff. They finished. I think they finished like 17th or something. Like they were the one seed. There was a bunch of upsets. So. The fact that, um. The fact that Trevor and Jacob got to the finals. I think one that says a lot about Trevor. I mean, Jake Barnett is, is, uh, definitely improving as a player, but I think that says a lot about Trevor.
[00:20:03] Uh, Trevor's now. So worlds kickoff and now the hall of fame, this is, this is two finals and three majors for that guy. Um, I mean, Trevor has always been solid, but I feel like now he's just, he's essentially just there. Right. With all these other guys. Um, and then, uh, Tony, Tony and Rob, I don't think that was really, uh, so much, uh, of, uh, well, uh, a secret or a, what's the word I'm looking for?
[00:20:34] Surprise. A surprise. Right. That's, that's probably not a shocker, not a shocker, not a shocker. Yeah. Not a shocker. But I, I definitely think Trevor and, um, Trevor and Jake were more of a shocker. So, uh, but I think this is the thing people fail to understand when it comes to foosball and brackets. Um, for me particular, and obviously you guys can speak to this, you know, but like early in foosball, I would always get worried about brackets, right? I would look at brackets and see players.
[00:21:02] And like, I, my mind would be, it would be me versus the bracket. And now I've learned that I only have to beat the team in front of me because brackets fall apart. So in order for Trevor and Jake to get there, their bracket had to break down. Now, again, I'm not saying they can't beat Eric and Tommy, but that's a, that's a tall task, but that bracket to break down for them to kind of make their way into that final. They did beat a bunch of really tough teams to get there.
[00:21:32] But anyway, uh, that was not the final I was expecting for open doubles. If I'm just being honest. Right. Yeah. I agree with you on that one. That's, that was kind of, uh, kind of different, but it was, it was still nonetheless exciting. And, uh, I would, you know, love to see, uh, take Jacob, you know, uh, done a little better obviously, but I mean, talk about the competition, uh, Rob and Tony. I mean, that's, uh, yeah, that's a challenge. You said Jake could have done a little better. Jacob. Yeah.
[00:22:02] Then second place. Well, no, I'm just saying that, that, uh, in the finals, I mean, obviously you got to go up against Tony and Rob. I mean, I think psychologically just to start with that. I, I think, I think, I think he was the reason it was a possibility for them to even win. I think, I think Trev, you look at them, forget the ranks and forget everything else. And you just say, how would they have won? How could it have gone differently? Absolutely. The answer is Trevor and not Jake, in my opinion. Okay. I, that's, that's how I think.
[00:22:30] And we, I don't have all the numbers from that match, but man, Jake was, he was the anchor that the, every match that we saw them in, he was clearing 70%, which is like nightmare. Clearing percentage for the opponent. He's doing good numbers. When they switched, he was coming up and scoring from the three bar. Like he, if Trevor plays better, they win. This is how I would, this is how I would say it. Now, granted, if Trevor plays better, it's a, now maybe Tony and Rob play better.
[00:22:58] Um, but it was a three game final. So obviously it wasn't as close as it could have been, but I don't, I, I, I think Trevor, like look at Trevor and go, what, what could he have done differently? He's been on fire. Jake was pretty maxed out. Yeah. I mean, it's, it's, it's, uh, just because of the echelon of players. I mean, you think about Tony and Rob, their experience in, in the finals of open doubles, how many times together? How many times? I mean, what is it? Um, it's gotta be what? Well, just 7 million. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:23:28] Just at this, just at this event, just at the hall of fame, this was their eighth win. Just at the eighth. Okay. Just at the hall of fame. Yeah. That's, uh, those are difficult odds to come up against. And what can you do? You kind of have to, you have to do the best you possibly can. And I think you're right. I think Trevor is, was, uh, was on fire, uh, playing his best game. And, and, uh, of course, you know, Jacob is right there. I mean, he did, did what he had to do as a, as a, as a, especially as a goalie, but, um, I'll tell you what though.
[00:23:57] Jake didn't do what he had to do. I mean, Jake did what he had to do in the, in the matches, but whatever Jake did between the last time I saw him really seriously play on table one and now is worlds apart. There's so many different subtleties and nuances. If you want to get better at foosball, watch, watch videos of him. It's a, um, the last time him and Trevor played versus this time. So much of that has changed. That's money ball less than a year ago, right? Money ball. Yeah. Money ball.
[00:24:24] And it was, it's his, his, if you watch, I'm going to do this. He used to hold the handle like this. He started holding it like that. You might think that's not that big of a deal. It is huge. It is huge. It's not just so much the power that you have. It's not just so much the precision you can have from holding it like that on the two I'm talking about. Um, it's not so much how much energy you save over the course of the weekend. Cause you're not doing this hammering it like that. You're you, it's part of your body motion.
[00:24:53] It's also how much you can disguise your takeoff and everything else after that. And it is hugely important to be able to do that against anybody, but against the, the difference between he doesn't, if he doesn't do that seventh, eighth, ninth, whatever does that. I'm not shocked to see them in the, in the final four. And that's the, they ended up against, I am not shocked to see Tony and, and, and,
[00:25:18] and Rob in the finals, uh, at all, but, but those kinds of adjustments, they're small, but they're huge. You know what I mean? And he made them and that was important. And again, it just cannot be understated. How amazing Tony is somebody who just a few weeks ago got a tornado table into his apartment, he said to come and dominate the way that he did this weekend against people that are just constantly pretty much only playing on tornado tables.
[00:25:48] It's an all time player. It's, it's a, it's a, it's, it's just, it's, I don't know. I don't think I have the ability really in this moment to even say how amazing that really truly is. The accomplishment is for him to come now for two tournaments a year and especially the Vegas to dominate. That's incredible. Well, I talked to him after the singles final, I think it was, and just asked him about it
[00:26:14] because, you know, he's been playing predominantly in heart and whatever else he's playing over there. And he, he just told me, you know, he's like, I'm not, I'm not practicing tornado. Like I was my game's not as, you know, as hard or fast as it was. He said, so I'm going to figure out how to win. And that's just a sign of, of, you know, just greatness. In my opinion, he just, he, he's chock full of experience. Obviously the guy's been playing foosball for a hundred years.
[00:26:40] He's one of the greatest players of all time, but he's just take, he's, he's maximizes the ability. And he's just beating people with experience where before he was kind of just mowing, mowing people over with offense. And obviously I think Tony's defense is really underrated, but now, like you said, Adam, he's, you know, he's barely playing tornado two events a year and he's still coming over and dominating. I think that's just more of his approach and having a plan. And I think that just really says a lot about it.
[00:27:08] I mean, Tony, obviously, you know, newest hall of famer, all that good stuff. The guy's just a beast. And I just, I want to put it into some other kind of perspective, because I don't know from other major league sports, if there's an equivalent, if you go and you do that, dominate on one table or another table, that's impressive. And in foosball, we're like, okay, cool. Fred did it. Billy did it, you know, but what is the equivalent like in baseball?
[00:27:33] Is that like going, and when you're in Coors Field, you play with like a pickleball thing. And if you're in San Diego, you're playing with a aluminum bat. You know what I mean? Like, I don't know how else to ask this question, but what you do when you switch from table to table, it's like being fluent in multiple languages. And being a CEO of a Fortune 500 company. I don't know. I don't know how to.
[00:27:58] I think it's like, I think it's like being a pitcher in the American league and pitching no hitters and throwing like complete game shutouts and then going to the National League and playing shortstop and bombing 40 a year. To me, that's what it's like. We're just doesn't matter. The situation. You're just the best. Yeah. Yeah. You're just you're just dominating the goat. Or what about what about what about tennis where you're playing matches on clay and then you're going over the grass and it doesn't matter what you're playing.
[00:28:28] You could be playing on AstroTurf or hardwood. You're still going to just dominate whoever you're playing. Or I don't honestly I don't know. Is there any other sport where there is an equivalent where you're actually changing the play field? Because like in hockey, like the NHL, the rink is the rink, right? The rink proportions are what they are. But then when you go to like Olympic style play, the rink's bigger behind the net's bigger. The game's faster. It's less physical. So typically the the more skillful, faster teams are going to dominate play.
[00:28:56] But it's the game is still the same game where going from table to table, the game really isn't the same. In my opinion, but I don't know. NASCAR, where they have an oval or a road course. You never see the same person dominating both of those. That's true. Like specialists doing like one or the other. Yeah.
[00:29:19] No, it's just just when you think about the difference between NASCAR and Monte Carlo. I mean, wow. You know, huge change. And of course, a completely different group of people winning in those those different kinds of even though they're road racing at the extreme. Yeah, that's a great comparison. It's like, well, in foosball, then how is that possible to be able to dominate on all the surfaces the way Tony does?
[00:29:49] I could definitely see I could definitely see Tony driving NASCAR. I could. Yeah. And and and definitely winning. Yeah. No question. Sponsored by Bush Bush Light or or. Yeah. Yeah, I could. Yeah, I could see that. I think he trying to think now, what was the name of the he had an IPA that he really like we probably space, space, space dust. Yeah, there you go. Yeah. But she tricked me into he tricked me into having one with him when we recorded a podcast
[00:30:19] a couple of years ago. And I, a I don't know anything about alcohol because I don't really drink and B or two. Did I say one or anyways? Anyways. So two, I also didn't know that IPAs are apparently stronger. And then this was even more. So I'm like, it tastes. So I'm like, you know, like I do Dr. Pepper.
[00:30:40] And about halfway through the episode, I was like, oh, yeah, this is this is let's go. That kind of explains what used to happen on this show way back when when we were having the IPA of the week and all these memories. Yeah. Anyways. Yeah. It's called Space Dust. Oh, yeah. I'm familiar. That was one of the ones that he liked. I don't think it was like the space dust and space cake.
[00:31:09] And there's a there's a couple of spaces. Yeah. Space Dust is a totally different thing to me these days. But yes. Yeah. Oof. Yes. Yeah. So this is open. Open doubles was open doubles was a gauntlet. Obviously. Open. How many players were in open singles? 162. 162. That's. Damn. So 163. They slid one in at the end, which they didn't know they did until I just looked.
[00:31:39] I was. I was. All right. Yeah. 163 players. When when was the last time open singles had a field of this equivalent? Does anybody know? I think it's been a minute. I mean, worlds hasn't had that number. Well, I mean, what's wild about that, though? I don't know. Claire, you're looking at the numbers. I was I was gonna. But that depends on what your next sentence is. And I might not. No pressure. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know that amount. Maybe there was more than the last 20 years.
[00:32:08] All I know is, is that top 30 was unreal. You could drop those that top 30 anywhere else in the world and they would be competing on any day. Mm hmm. Incredible. And to see that there that weekend. Not shocking. Not surprising. But amazing. The depth. Yeah. Saturday was action packed, man. Saturday was great. You guys were killing it on Saturday for sure. Yeah. Did you for singles or doubles? For singles. No, it's Friday.
[00:32:39] Was it Friday? Was it? Yeah. I lose track. I lose track of days. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Friday. You get in the sky and all frame of reference just goes out the window. I could tell you didn't have your normal toys with you when you drive and I could feel the difference. Yeah. Yeah. What? We could sense it. We could sense it. Oh, there it is. There it is. That one of those. One hell of a letter opener. Yes. Don't send him any mail unless you want it open. That's a pie cutter. What do you want? I mean, he likes pie. So, you know.
[00:33:08] I love pie. That was a quality joke, man. Screw y'all. Yeah. No, I opened my. This is why it's on my desk. I opened my letters with this. Correct. So, no, but I flew. So, I had no bag. I couldn't. I couldn't bring my toys with me, unfortunately. So, yeah. But. I like to drive. I have a connection here, but. I carry weapons, Adam. Lots of weaponry in my bag. Oh. It's kind of a thing. Kind of a thing. It's a smart thing.
[00:33:37] I just feel safe. Yeah. Yeah. No, that's fine. I didn't know. I thought. I used to work at Renaissance. No, toys meant something else, Adam. I know. I used to work at Renaissance. I said toys instead of weapons. Maybe I should have said weapons. I was like, my boy likes to party? Items of interest. The hell. Yeah, you know I like to party. That's right. No, not like that, though. You can get those on planes. I just flew in from Alabama, and boy, are my arms tired. Yeah.
[00:34:06] Especially in Vegas. I'm sure you can get whatever you want in Vegas. We're on the same page now. I'll have the tired arm casserole. Thank you. Let's go. Is there bacon in that? There can be. I like two pieces. Thank you. There can be. I like a good casserole with some dead pig. Notice how. Yeah. So this tournament, this was the largest field I've seen in years. I haven't been to a tournament this stacked in a long, long time, and I've been hitting some tournaments. So it was.
[00:34:34] And again, you know, no surprise. Tony triples, of course. But one, I wouldn't say surprise, but dude, Jacob. Good grief, man. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Hit turn master this year, and he's been right there. Single digits. Single digits. Every tournament, single digits. Beat Brandon in four games. You guys got that. That was on table one. You guys got that one, right? Yes. That's astounding. Four games.
[00:35:03] I mean, it's just, he was on fire there. I mean, that was just, was that probably the best performance of someone his age at this point? Especially in open singles. No. I mean, no. No. Tony was in the open singles finals at Worlds when he was 17. 17. Okay. So. And then he, so. Yeah. But it doesn't have to be an all-time record breaker to just be impressive as hell. Yeah. Jacob was getting it done. He was playing his normal, very athletic, quick, smooth, fun-to-watch game. Mm-hmm.
[00:35:32] But he was also playing smart defense. He was very grounded is the only way I could describe it. Just to, just watch him. He was just there. And it was, I, I, I like watching that kid do that well. Yeah. And it's not to say that I root, you know, against the people he's playing against necessarily, but it's, it was fun to see him go full YOLO. And he, he, I actually for a moment thought he might beat Tony in their match and he couldn't
[00:36:00] quite pull it off, but he was, I mean, Tony really, you know, talk about going in with experience. That is what saved Tony. I think in that match was just all the different, not just defensive tools that he has, but also his ability to just navigate obstacles in a match that just come out of nowhere. And it, it like Tony had to put it in four wheel drive to make that work. Cause he was, he was pretty stuck. His composure. Yeah.
[00:36:26] It's, um, I think there's the added, uh, idea that Tony was there because he's been, he's being inducted into the hall of fame for the weekend and to, to really show people why. I think there was something that extra added desire to win. Um, I think Clay, you've used the term gas factor, uh, many times, especially when it comes to Ryan. But I think Tony, it also comes into play that, Hey, he really wanted to, to, uh, to prove to everybody.
[00:36:56] Hey, this is what I've done. This is why I'm here in the hall of fame. And I'm going to continue to, to dominate. But, uh, I mean, and he won last year too. So he was there last year and did, did work as well there. And his, his gas, his, his switch is broken off. Like it's always on and it's never disengaged. Like he, I've seen him, I've seen him play like third chance D Y P's on almost a D Y please. That's a, write that down. That sounds good. I'll make a joke someday. Hold on. D Y please. Yep. We'll work.
[00:37:25] D Y please. D Y please. Anyways. Um, I've seen him do third chance D Y P's on Sunday night and him be bothered about not winning. And he is a, he is a winner's winner. He always goes for the win. And yeah, he is, he is, he is all gas. No break. Right. Absolutely. And go funny. Wide open dirt track.
[00:37:52] One of my favorite memories of watching him play foosball was at Florida state. Speaking of Florida state, we'll be there in a few weeks, but Florida state three years ago, four years ago, maybe I think it was four. Whatever. It was four. It was in the past. Yeah. It was in the past. Four 30th morning, Monday morning. And the final was, was, uh, him and Brandon Munoz and designated versus, uh, MF MF, MF's
[00:38:19] own, uh, Danilo Fatale and, um, somebody else. And it was, they were, that was designated mixed. It was designated mixed. Yeah. Or handicapped or something. I think it might've been handicapped. There we go. A little bit different. It was handicapped. And they were just going back and forth, back and forth. And, and, uh, they were obviously if you know foosball and you know, being at a tournament at, on a Monday morning, you understand that you're probably, um, in a different kind of way, you know, you're wasted. Yeah. Wasted.
[00:38:50] Drunk, hammered, serpentined, whatever. And so they were, and that was fine. You know what? It just happened fun. And then somebody in the, in, in, in, by somebody, I mean, it was the only two people watching this match for me and David Kala and David started going, yeah. And, and, and, and talking smack. And he more like David holla. Am I right? Hold on. Wait, let me here. This is you. I'm doing a visual joke, dude.
[00:39:20] Let me just finish my story here. Finish your mother story. Good one. I beat myself, by the way. What? You beat yourself. I beeped my meat. Oh, beep. No, I beat. I beat. Yeah. Anyways. I finished your story. I had a good grief. Tony just comes back from the dead because somebody was poking the bear. And it's just, it's an incredible thing to watch.
[00:39:50] It's just so amazing. He's good. He's a goat. That's my point. Moving on. Nice. Okay. Thank you. Well, let's, let's, let's talk about women's open. I mean, that, that to me was also really spectacular play. You know, we saw, of course, Hannah and, and Sullivan do their thing. But I mean, think about the two people that were standing opposite.
[00:40:14] I mean, really, I mean, Tracy and, and, uh, uh, of course, Cindy, I mean, these guys, they've seen it. Man, they've done that. I mean, they've been around the field of foosball for probably a collective of 40 or 50 years between the two of them. Cindy, Cindy by herself is 40 years. 40 years. Yeah. So we're talking probably 60 years, 60 or 70 years. I mean, the collective experience. Hey, hey, hey. But, you know, talk about staying power.
[00:40:44] Um, quick question though. Did you guys notice, uh, that, that, uh, Tracy was wearing headphones and the, the, the official said you have to take those off. Yeah. Well, it's in the rules. It's in the rules. No, no. But it's, I know it's in the ITSF rules though, right? It's not in the, the IFP. IFP is using ITSF rules. Well, WFT is using ITSF rules. Gotcha. Gotcha. So one of those things where it's the, the, uh, the exceptions to the rules are not published. Okay.
[00:41:14] And you just got to know them. And so people are starting to learn that. That's why even, even if it's an exception to the rule, you got to know those two. And we're starting to learn them. But yeah. If you're a Tor player. Yes. If you're a Tor player, learn the rules. Okay. Learn the rules. I got you. Go ahead. Yeah. Learn the mother rules. Mother rules. Okay. I'm ready now. I'm ready this time. Learn the mother.
[00:41:48] So it's kind of look learning the rules at one. I mean, you need it. If you play a game, you should know that. I play games with my nephew. He's four years old. He knows his rules one. And then it's definitely going to make you a better player. It makes a difference. You should definitely know the rules. So, but it is an ITSF rules. No, no electronics. No, nothing on your, on your cranium. In between games, in between balls, fine. But you can't have headphones or earbuds in.
[00:42:16] It's so apparently, according to what I read earlier, is that she had been wearing the headphones in prior matches before they got to the finals. Yeah. Does that? She always does. That's normal for her. Right. She wore them during the final at TKO and women's singles final there, too. So there was no ruling then? There was no ITSF certified rep there. Okay. Also. Got it. Okay. So there's really no way. If Rich is doing the match, you're going to play by the rules. Yeah, yeah.
[00:42:45] For the record, I love it. Oh, yeah. I'm absolutely for it. Totally appreciate it. But I'm just a little, you know, wondering, okay, you know, the headphone thing, it's, you know, it's accepted during the weekend until you get to the finals. And then suddenly. Everything is accepted until you get called on it. You can jar, you can spin, you can pull down your pants and urinate right in the middle of the table. And if nobody calls it, it is not an infraction.
[00:43:12] You have to call before there is an infraction. There is, you have to have a call. So literally no matter what the rule is. So there's a lot of, like I saw the Facebook thread, you know, on whatever Facebook, it's, that's a thing. It's just one of those. Everything was great for the weekend. What can we cry about and complain about? So that just happened to be what the topic is this time. It wasn't that big of a deal. It was a 17 second exchange at most with Rich saying, Hey, just before we get started,
[00:43:41] you have blah, blah, blah. And he explained it by the way, he was mic'd. So we heard the whole thing. You're welcome. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so you can hear him crystal clear explaining and Tracy said, is it because this is an, is this because this is a qualifier? And Rich is like, we're just playing by the rules. And she goes, okay, but is it because of the thing he had, we're just playing by the rules. And so it was, there was no pushback from her. She was not messed up about it at all. She was like, Tracy's cool. Oh yeah. Like she's just, she's just whatever. Put them away. The whole thing was gone.
[00:44:10] And the amount of time it took to type the post was longer than the actual exchange itself. And it's clipped. You can go, go find it on Twitch, of course. And it's, if, if she had known that this is allowed at WFT, she could have just said, actually, um, but dot, dot, dot. Can we, you can always appeal to the tournament director. The ref doesn't have the final say. The ref has the initial say. And if you don't like their call, you can always appeal. This is another rule that's worth knowing, by the way, this is in the rules.
[00:44:40] You can always, you could, you could take that to the tournament director. Hey, can we do the thing? And if they said, yeah, Rich would have been like, oh, okay, cool. Yeah. My bad. It's fine. But that didn't happen. So they just played. Yeah. And there was no issue. And at the next tournament, there will also be no issue because now there's been a discussion and it's very, uh, clear that WFT is totally down. Like where your headphones, it's fine. It's cool. Be coached, get help, do all that. It's totally fine. And it's allowed on tour. Cool. No, it's, it's good to be verified. Have your friends in the crowd watching.
[00:45:10] Have somebody in your ear, even, even the stream. It's fine. Shoot, shoot, shoot the straight, shoot the straight, shoot the straight. It's open. A hundred percent. Yeah. So what was not legal last year is now legal. And that's the way rules work. Like it's not, there is no like hard and fast. This is the gospel for infinity and beyond. That is not how it works. It's just like, what are the rules right now? And just know those. And so now, you know, you can wear your, you can wear your cinnamon bun thing. What are they called? Like the late little, the princess leg.
[00:45:41] Yeah. I was going to say Layla, but that was the Eric Clapton song. You ever brought the sun? Anyways. So. Oh, that's all that. What the hell? Gravity. Newton thought he figured it out. Eric Clapton figured it out too. I digress. Well, somebody say something. See, I don't feel so bad now. I don't feel so bad. It was a good song. It was a good song. Somebody made a Facebook post about it? Somebody. About the headphones.
[00:46:11] Somebody did. About the headphones. My goodness. Yeah. My goodness. Not about the Layla. Not about the Layla. No, no, no, no. That's, that's, that's. It wasn't even Layla. It got me on my knees. Anyways. Tears in heaven. That's flat. Yeah, that's the one. That's the one. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I live, I live in a one floor house and I make sure all my windows are locked at all times. Anyway. So. And you don't even have a four-year-old crawling around.
[00:46:41] No, just a dog. And I don't want her to jump out the window. So anyway. Probably won't. Yeah, right. She's actually really well trained. So. The rules thing, man. I don't, I don't know. I love rules. I really do. Well, it's good to know because it's, you know, this is the beginning of the WFT and we know this is the way it's going to be. Plain and simple. This is a, this is a rule. We're going to stick to it and we'll, we'll enforce it when, when the time comes. So good. Yeah.
[00:47:07] Well, like, like Clay said, you can get away with anything until, you know, somebody calls you want it. Right. One of those things. Right. Well, but I, I, I, I, I'm not going to say I, anyway. Yeah. It's look, Richard Marsh is the head ITSF official. I'm glad he was there. He was at worlds. He refereed the finals. The guy knows the rules like the bag was in and even more than anything else. He's just fair. And he just, he handles business.
[00:47:37] So he's a great official. Great official. Yeah. So. Yeah. Well, yeah. I heard, I heard they got a bunch of new people certified to officiate. Jerry Todd was named the head official for the WFT. Shout out to Jerry. Jerry's an awesome dude. He's an ITSF official. He trains officials. So I heard they got a bunch of new people certified. So hopefully the officiating thing is going to get to be a little bit, you know, a little bit better.
[00:48:04] I know being an official on tour is definitely thankless, man. Nobody wants to officiate. There's always issues, always problems. I don't think people understand if you're losing a match, don't blame an official. And this is not directed towards anybody. I'm just saying like, you know, understand if you have an issue, get a ref. If there's a problem, get a ref. If the ref makes a call, listen to the ref. If you have an issue, get a second ref. Yeah. You can ask for a second official.
[00:48:34] You can ask for it. You can ask for time, get a third official, and then you can appeal to the tournament director if you have a, again, there, there's, there's, there's steps to everything, but I definitely feel like, um, and there, there really wasn't a whole lot of refs called in Vegas, uh, as opposed to other tournaments, especially majors. I thought it was, I thought it was pretty good. Uh, but, um, yeah, I mean the, the, so the finals, the open doubles and the women's doubles
[00:49:02] final, they were both three straight. They were good matches, but if I'm being honest, they really weren't close. So, okay. So with that said, you know, because Tracy and Cindy, you know, legendary players been around forever and ever and ever, all kinds of experience. But have we ever seen a combination like, like Sullivan Rue and Hannah Smith? I mean, how many times have they won women's doubles? How many times?
[00:49:33] A lot. Many. Sully won it. I think they answered this question in one of the interviews they did. They did, yeah. So Sully won it a whole bunch of times in a row and like half was with Midori and half was with Hannah. Yep. Yeah. At the Hall of Fame. Yeah. At the kickoff, they've won it how many years in a row? Five. They did, yeah. It's some ridiculous number. So what, what women's combination from the past would even have come close? None. Nothing. Oh, I got a question for you. Who did they beat in their five in a row?
[00:50:03] Oh. Hmm. Nobody. All five. All five. You mean all five years? Yeah. Hmm. I don't know. Who remembers second place? I do, depending on who it was. I can, when, when, when Tony's winning all those eight in a row, I bet you could guess who they were. It was Tommy last year. Before that, it was, uh, it was Ryan. Ryan. That's, that's just, I don't know why I said that. It's just, I just thought that'd be funny.
[00:50:33] And, uh, update. It wasn't. It wasn't. It wasn't. It wasn't. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know either. I mean, it's like if, if, uh, if it, it, it, I think, I think, I think, I think it requires context, you know, cause they're clearly the dominant team, but like, who are they beating in the fight? Like now, like, so the, the competition is getting pretty intense recently. Yeah. Like when you don't know who's going to win, like you just don't. And, and that, that can be said in the open events.
[00:51:02] It can be said in the women's events. It's, it's not always obvious. Like go back to worlds last year. Who'd you think? I mean, solely and Hannah played together then too. And they got like ninth place and you didn't, nobody predicted Maggie and Jessica. And it's not because they're not good. It's because you can't predict. And, and by the way, nationals, when that happens, come talk to me, you tell me who you're going to, who you're going to ride with and give me your money. I'll take whatever bet you give me and you'll probably lose because it's hard to predict,
[00:51:27] you know, even in, um, even in singles, like in, in women's singles, um, Sully's been dominating for a while, but Hannah's won like three in a row now in worlds TKO and now Vegas. Yeah. And, and by the way, are you going to put money on her at nationals? It's, it's hard to do that because Isabel's making the finals at practically everything. Yes. Singles or doubles. And she's not pulling the W's just yet, but she's, she will beaten a lot of people. Of course she will. Yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah. But it's hard to pick a winner.
[00:51:56] And so to me, I think when, I think it's real easy to go, they've won X amount in a row at this tournament or whatever. And I think years past probably weren't that difficult. It's getting very difficult and the winds now are, are harder to come by. And that's why I think you don't really see, um, people just don't go on like two year winning streaks. I think the way they used to. So, yeah. Well, Cindy and Tracy, Cindy and Tracy scraped by Linda and Keisha. They, they beat them.
[00:52:26] It was over time. They, they really, I don't want to say got lucky, but they scraped by that one. I think if Linda and Keisha win, that's a different final. It's not a three straight final. And again, no disrespect. I love Cindy. I love Tracy, but Linda and Keisha, I mean, Keisha, Keisha blocked Sullivan and Hannah really well at the kickoff. And Linda's Linda's a solid, solid forward. I think it's a different final if that team shows up.
[00:52:55] But I mean, Clay, semi-final. I'm sorry. Go ahead. No, you're fine. No, you're fine. The semi-final, I think is a different match. If they get a ref sooner, like you said, it went over time. They didn't get around until game five. And I was the guy that went there. Yeah. I was the guy that went, it was game five and it was, you know, they, they, I talked to Linda after and she, her, her, her gripe was I should have got a ref from the beginning. Yep. But when the match is called some people you just, and this is with absolutely no disrespect
[00:53:24] or any shade being thrown, there are people just get a ref when the match is called because you're going to need one at some point. Cause they're either, Hey, they're either good enough to just beat you. That sucks. Or they're not good enough and they're going to do their things, which is you have to have a ref to call some of that stuff. And so there, there are people and it needs to, it needs to stop being an insult to call a ref immediately. Like just, especially that deep. It's a semi-final get a ref no matter what. I love that all finals had a ref, all the, all the big finals in Vegas had a ref and it
[00:53:54] wasn't requested. That was just mandated. Yeah. But anyways, I interrupted you. They, they, I watched the whole match. It was on table three and it will be on YouTube cause we didn't record it. And, um, they, they should have got a ref much earlier and I think it would have impacted the outcome. Yeah. No, but you're right. It's, I have a list and again, it's not, there's no way disrespectful, but you just know it's like, I'm, I'm going to get a ref.
[00:54:23] I'm going to get a ref when I play this guy. And just because it's just makes life easy. And there's some people that I'm just, I'm friends with, like I'm friends with them. And it's just, this is just easier. We're just going to get an official. So that way there's no issue. Um, and we can just play foosball and we don't have to worry about it. So, um, I think that would have made a huge difference for them. Like I said, and, and Linda and Keisha pulled that off the finals different, but as far as,
[00:54:49] as far as, you know, it's good to see that it's not just the same people winning all the time because for the longest time it was Tony and it was Ryan and that was it. And, um, now it's, you know, you don't know who's going to get there. I mean, honestly, I was glad to see Rob get to the finals against Tony. Um, I thought, I thought Rob had a chance, but you know, I thought he had the best shot in the room, but Tony, Tony's still Tony.
[00:55:19] So, um, but as far as the ladies go, I mean, Hannah has been dominating women's singles. Isabelle's been, Isabelle's been knocking on the door, but I just don't think Isabelle has the experience yet. I don't think she's seasoned enough to, to beat a player like Hannah or, I mean, she's, she's honestly, she's been beating Sullivan. She beat, she puts Sullivan in the losers and, and with the championship format, it gives anybody a shot, man. It gives anybody has a chance to win that championship. Yeah.
[00:55:47] It has changed the dynamic overall. Um, Randy, let's talk about pro pro division. What about it? What about it? I mean, the pro singles winner, but, uh, what do you know about him? Um, who won pro singles? I believe it was somebody from Europe. You don't even know who won somebody from Europe. Somebody from Europe. Damn Euro. Come over here and took our pro single title. Let me, hold on. Let me tell you. Okay. I can tell you if you want, or you just want to look it up. No. Yeah. Who was it? Uh, Leonardo Stamero.
[00:56:19] Dude's a bomb. Straight up bomb. He beat Junior. He beat Pipkin in the final. Okay. So obviously let me see. There was how many, how many, God, stupid phone. 96. 96 players. Yeah. If you're winning pro singles in Vegas, you're not a, you're not a slouch. Yeah. Jeff Pipkin Jr. Is a master in doubles. Uh, Jeff is, Jeff is a beast. So to beat that guy in the finals of singles, you obviously got to be doing something, something right.
[00:56:46] And then if you look at the pro field, I mean, Sam, Sam's been winning pro singles. Where'd Sam finish? Let me see. He's not high enough to be in that column. No, he finished seventh. Seventh. Yeah. Seventh. And then look, so Robbie, Robbie Hayes, who's solid. Great five. Right. Third. Joel. Joel just won pro singles at the kickoff. He got fourth. Uh, Justin Shaw. How was that? Yeah. How is Justin Shaw still a pro in singles? I don't know. Not good.
[00:57:16] Uh, I mean, just going down the list, there's just a bunch of really, really, really solid players in this pro field. So obviously, um, Mr. Leonardo Stamara. Yeah. I don't, he, he must be a master on one of those European tables. He's like five time Leo champion. I think five times like for five in a row, maybe. And he's a bad-ass that dude can play ball. He's one of those people that, um, I just recognize his name from watching a lot of everything.
[00:57:43] And if he's, if he's on a stream or if I see him at a table, he's, he's, he's gut game. He's fun to watch. He's very good. Is he, is he the black, black haired guy with a beard, black beard? Like that guy. I don't, I don't know. He's, uh, I think it's more like a goatee kind of like he's from Luxembourg. He has a brother. You're thinking of cousin. It's his cousin. They're cousins. Yeah. I found that out last weekend. I thought they were brothers too. He played, um, and actually they played in the DYP final against each other.
[00:58:13] You'd recognize him if you saw him because he's in a lot of the videos that we've had. Yeah. Definitely saw him play. Um, but he, yeah, he's a, he's a younger dude too. Probably maybe late 20. I don't know how old he is, but he's younger than we are for sure. Yeah. And, and again, these kids, they're kids. These kids, they're so talented. They're so talented. They play a bunch of foosball. They play multi-table and they come over here and they just win pro singles. So screw them.
[00:58:43] Screw you, Leonardo. Yeah. Called Donatello and Michelangelo. And anyway, um, and then no, you're going to leave out Raphael. What the, what the hell? I never liked him. Don't be discriminating against Raphael. Wow. We finally found a place where we like have absolute friction. How, how do you not like Raphael? Who's your turtle then? Don't tell me Michelangelo. You're not dumb enough for that. Who's your, who's your, yeah, really? You are, you dumb enough for that? That's a yes. No, I like Leonardo.
[00:59:13] That makes sense. He had the sword. I'm a knife guy. I mean, anyway, but, but, but Raphael had the size. He had the, he had what I mean. I'm not a side guy. Not a side guy. Yeah. But he had cool lines. He was the one that cussed in the movie. He said, yeah. He cussed? He said hell. He was the only one. He was the only one. He was the only one. He was, damn it. Damn it. He said that like three times because he lost one of his size. And then later he said hell. That's the only four cuss words in the movie.
[00:59:42] I'm freestyling some of that. I might not. Don't fact check me on that. That's probably not true, but yeah. He's. Well, they, they, they did a, they did a version that never made it to the theaters. And Leonardo was like mother. Anyway. So, uh, mother. Oh, get it. Mother. Funny thing is the button's blue, which is Leonardo's mother. Oh my God. You guys know the colors. Wow. I'm impressed. Yeah. Raphael was red.
[01:00:11] Don't call him that anymore, Tom, but yes. You know, I'm out of my depth here, completely out of my depth, but that's not. Okay. So nothing unusual. Let's talk. Let's talk pro doubles. Let's talk pro doubles. So, so Sam. So again, this is, this is what I mean when I talk about the brackets, right?
[01:00:38] Looking at the brackets and becoming overwhelmed, looking at a bracket for any of you players or newer players that are listening. Don't become overwhelmed looking at a bracket, right? You only have to beat the team in front of you. We Bruce Welton and myself, we had a pretty tough bracket. We had Joe Ellen Sparky in our bracket. I think there were the one seed. And, and then they ended up getting beat by Chris Marks and Deiter, or Dieter, however you say his name. Yeah. And, and I wouldn't say that that's an upset because, dude, Chris Marks is a beast. That dude can play ball. Yeah.
[01:01:08] Um, but, uh, I mean, that just kind of, that for me, that gave us some, because, uh, Joel and Sparky. Yeah. That's Joel and Sparky. That's, that's a, that's a bill, a big hill to climb, but we ended up beating Chris Marks and Dieter in overtime. And then, um, and then we play Sam and Alex. And if we, I, I feel like if we play them on Saturday, it's different.
[01:01:34] It still went overtime, but, uh, I was playing much better on Saturday than I was on Sunday. But Sam, dude, Sam's just, Sam's a beast, man. The kid is just so stinking good. And, uh, the final, I watched the final. I ended up going back and watching the final and man, it was not close. Mm-hmm. It wasn't. Sorry. At all. Sorry. Sorry to team ski. Uh, but it was, it was not close. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
[01:02:04] That, that kid, man. And, uh, he had Jacob beat. I don't know if any of you guys watched the singles match, but he had Jacob beat. He had him down in four. Jacob came back, won the fourth game, and then he beat him in the fifth. But, um, for, you know, being a 16 year old kid, man, he's, uh, he's right there, dude. I think he had a birthday. He did. April 11th. So, yeah. Uh, he's 17. 17. 17. Oh, man.
[01:02:34] I'll just skip it. Tommy got it covered. I thought it was April 10th because my nephew is on April 10th. No, it's, uh. But it's the 11th. Um, I think the only reason I remember is just because, um, uh, last year. You're a Sam fanboy. You don't have to. What can I tell you? We know this already. What can I tell you? No, it's okay. Yeah. Do you think we don't know that? He's my man. He's my man. Yeah. He's your boy. Yeah. He's your, he's your pre-master. That's it. That's it. By the way, let the record show that I am correct. It was April 10th. April 10th.
[01:03:04] Oh. Yeah. I thought it was the 11th. Well. I can tell. I'm always one step behind you. What can I tell you? Well, I, nothing that I can't tell you first. There you go. That's pretty damn funny. I will say. And I don't find anything funny. Well, my nephew's birthday is April 10th. Nobody cares about the background, dude. It's just funny. Yeah. Well, nobody cares about the foreground, if I'm being honest. Yeah. Anyway, I don't want to circumvent the conversation.
[01:03:33] Well, I totally get what he's doing there. Yeah. It's easy. So, Adam, how was Vegas for you, Adam? Oh. Well, let's see. How was Vegas for me? I think Vegas was good. I like the food at that place. It's really nice. Yes. Food. I got introduced to their chicken parmesan at that one restaurant, the Italia Fresca place. So good.
[01:04:03] You know, I don't know. Clay and I do a lot of tournaments, and it's always funny because, like, something that is really helpful to survive these things is to have, like, a supply of food in the room. We're going to make a sandwich or something like that, right? And just hope for the best. And then if you go to one of the restaurants within walking distance, you hope that you don't get chlamydia from it or something like that. Is that a new Italian dish or something? Hold the chlamydia. Thank you very much. Yeah. Hold the chlamydia.
[01:04:33] But what I'm saying is, and I think everybody knows this with the grand tournaments, you just hope that the food's going to be good, right? And the food at the Westgate is quite good at all the different little restaurants there. The ones that I can't afford, and based on what I looked at when I was staring at people's plates at the places I can't afford, it does look good, too. Yeah. Talking about the steakhouse. Even down to the sports book. Yeah. It's pretty good on there. Oh, God. We had, like, two. That's a wild place. Non-corporate pie. Yeah. Non-corporate. Non-corporate pie. What?
[01:05:02] And contains what? Yeah. But I ordered extra cheese and extra pepperoni, and I got it. Usually when you go to places like that and you ask for that, they just, you know, give you one of those. So it was nice. Beep! Anyways. Yeah. Anyway, I think I was touching upon it earlier, but I will say that this tournament, I think, is a game changer for foosball, even though people maybe might not notice it because they're just in the middle of it as well.
[01:05:34] And I will say this, and I had a question for you all I wanted to throw out there, because the only negative things I've heard about TKO and the negative things that I heard about Hall of Fame were these pauses that happened. Forget the Hall of Fame ceremony. That's necessary. It's always going to happen. It happens. And I think that it was very agreeable. Lengthwise, everybody did a good job. Yep. And I'm glad that a certain someone wasn't there spending 45 minutes of our time talking about the history of foosball in a way that should have been done differently.
[01:06:04] So it was nice. It was compact, and I appreciate it. But my question is, for you all, we've had, what is it set up? There's been eight final matches at these two tournaments combined where they stop everything, and that becomes the center of attention. And then that's four or five hours total of tournament time-ish, maybe more, throughout the weekend. People complain about that.
[01:06:31] If there's any complaint that maybe holds any water to me in any way whatsoever, it's that maybe the matches haven't been super interesting. They've been blowouts, maybe, except for maybe one at TKO. But for the most part, I feel personally that that is – well, no, I'm just curious. Like, do you feel me? Like, Clay, like, do you know what I'm saying? Like, what are your thoughts on that holding the matches stuff? Here's what I think about it.
[01:07:00] What's the thing that the conductors do to, like, tap the – yes. Matches are stopped for about an hour for the finals. And the people who are losing their mind – by the way, it's like seven and a half people. It's not a lot of people. But the people who are like, man, we shouldn't. Bam, bam, bam, bam. All that crying and all that – and moaning.
[01:07:21] Man, they're so dumb that they don't even know that the matches were stopped for four hours while Open Singles was running exclusively. They are so unaware of tournament structure, format, running operations. They're so stupid and ignorant and without reasonable thought worth listening to.
[01:07:44] They are saying, hey, it's like complaining about the $8 in sales tax when really you just paid $100 for a steak or whatever. Complain about something that matters. So if it's an hour of your life that you lost because the matches were stopped for a final, which is how much time it was, shut up. And then go – I mean, like, if you're going to complain, complain about the four hours. Don't complain about the one hour. That doesn't make any damn sense.
[01:08:14] And if they knew – like, they don't because they're dumb. But if they knew, like, hey, the four hours here, but it makes sense because blah, blah, blah, insert logical thought that they probably don't have anyways. Like, then I would listen to them. But they're just complaining about the most obvious thing they can complain about. And this is how it works. People complain for the thing that they can see. Thankfully, they're mostly blind because they don't see that much. And they only complain about this tiny little thing that they don't like because probably their favorite player doesn't like it either.
[01:08:43] So I know I'm usually timid and shy with my opinion, but that's my opinion on this one. Shut up. And you know what? If you don't like it, nobody cares. It's not changing. So this is one of those – it's not like – so, like, some of the things that Vegas people complained about was music. Like, the music was very loud. Please, like, say something about that because that is something that is changeable.
[01:09:12] And by the way, Ryan is all about fixing problems. He is – I will sit here and defend him. No. Not on every decision he makes, but on his – But let's clarify. Willingness to – I will finish this. He will listen to criticism and then make a change when necessary. Yes. This ain't one of those things. But let's clarify the point about music. Are you mean just generally the music during the weekend was too loud when people were just playing in their matches? Or was it too loud during the finals, this kind of thing?
[01:09:40] What exactly do people mean when they complain about that? Well, I'm talking about the sustained elevated volume in the tournament room for several hours on end. Okay. It is well known that this is very bad for the human brain. And if you're not in there for 12 hours, you don't hear 12 hours of it. So it's one of these things where people who are constantly in the room because they're playing foosball or they're watching, they're complaining about it. And I don't want to make the conversation about that.
[01:10:08] All I'm saying is that Ryan will hear concerns and make changes. Yes. Even throughout the weekend, he has heard the music complaint and he's making changes. So give him a high five when you see him and tell him thanks for listening and thanks for giving a shit. Yeah, yeah. And by the way, the thing you can still say this about the finals matches being you can still say, I don't think you should shut him down. All I'm saying is you're wasting your breath. That will never change.
[01:10:34] The spotlight will be on open doubles, open singles, women's doubles, women's singles. It's four matches over two days. It's like an hour and a half or two hours worth of match time that you miss. It's not changing. That is very important for the forward progress of foosball and how he envisions the World Foosball Tour. That is not changing. So just save your breath.
[01:11:00] And by the way, when you get called, show up to your match and don't wait 10 minutes. So you do that five times, you do it six times, that's an hour. By the way, if you show it five minutes late and put in your result five minutes late, that's 10 minutes. Do that six times. That's an hour. So you can find the hour that you're getting back somewhere in the weekend. You're not getting it during the finals. It's not happening. So shut up. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that was a big problem throughout the weekend.
[01:11:25] We talked about it last time was the people showing up to the tables late and then not putting in their results. But I so a few people after the finals on Friday came up to me and were like they were like, dude, the music was too loud. And I I talked to Ryan about the finals on Saturday. And I said, how about we try no music? And Ryan was willing to try it. And and he talked to the players and the players were like, no, we need some music, even if it's just low. And he and he's willing to compromise.
[01:11:54] He I mean, dude, Ryan's Ryan's all about just getting this thing perfect. And I love that about him. But you're absolutely right, Clay. This this is one area where he's just not bending. And I think from a player. No, dude, this is this is he look again. If you were in the final, you would want everybody paying attention to you and watching you. I mean, yes, this is a big deal. This is a big deal. You don't want to be there.
[01:12:19] Hey, if you don't want to be there, go get a bite to eat, go up to your room, relax, get off your feet, take the opportunity to get some rest or go take a dump or do whatever you're going to do. But don't don't complain. Don't complain. Don't be negative. Come on, man. We're trying to grow foosball. Ryan's Ryan's putting a lot into this. And, you know, and we're all trying to do our part. So if you're not part of the solution, then you're part of the problem.
[01:12:46] So the finals are the biggest part of the weekend. Yeah, it's a there's no doubt about this. This event was was the first of its kind for the for World Foosball Tour. Still, there's going to be trial and error. And the fact that that Ryan is being flexible about certain things, that's that's kudos, man. But you're right. You know, halting the matches to watch the finals is why we're there. We want to see the best play the best.
[01:13:16] And if you're off doing amateur singles, what what good is that? You know, why are you there to lose amateur singles? I want to watch the finals. Yeah. I have forfeited matches to watch like Tony versus Ryan. Yeah. Early on when I was only playing and I was a rookie or an amateur or whatever. And I would I was there playing my 10 events and I have forfeited matches so that I could watch the final. And I and I do it again.
[01:13:46] I forfeited matches without having to watch the final. I forfeited a match because I was still pissed about the match before it. I forfeited a match before I even got into the event. I might forfeit the rest of this conversation. Can you imagine if you went to the NHL finals and there's two matches? Hold on. I want to say I've got to say something. Go. Go. I forgot. Damn it.
[01:14:08] No, I just wanted to say back when I was younger and really motivated to play, I was always looking for things to pile on to figure out motivation to get better and better and better because I was poor and had nothing. And so I needed to make sure that I had a reason to be here beating people that I didn't like was a primary motivator. And just getting better for my own good was a primary motivator.
[01:14:31] If I was ever at a tournament in the early 2000s when I was playing more heavily and I saw everything shut down and that spotlight go down onto pit table number one and everything stopped. I would have lost my... Why say it with words? We can do it with a forearm. Poor audio only listeners in the future. I know.
[01:14:59] They have no idea what just happened, but that's okay. It doesn't matter. You can just feel it. This is a stick up. Yeah. It would have actually really very much motivated me to see that. I love that for that reason alone, but also just on our end, streaming and watching it, it is so much fun. Yeah. I love it. Sorry, Tom. No, no. Come on.
[01:15:23] Dammit, it's a privilege to be there to see this happen in person and live and to be distracted by some silly match that you're trying to find your way out of. I mean, come on. What are you doing? You go there. You pay all that money. You want to see the best. End of story. I'm over addressing people's complaints when they have no suggestions. There are so many things that are worth talking about that are better than crybabies. The tournament, the room was amazing. The venue was amazing. Dang.
[01:15:53] The spider was amazing. The layout of the room, we had no bleachers and it was amazing because we had chairs. Yep. Everything about... This was the best setup tournament I've ever seen. It's comfortable. It was so good. It was so comfortable. It was so well run. There were more people than anticipated. There were right at 500. I think I was off by seven in my prediction. I think it ended up being 483. That's a lot of people at a foosball tournament, especially when you consider that there are
[01:16:19] some other international tournaments coming up here very soon that probably pull some of those players away. Nationals is going to be awesome. Worlds is going to be awesome. There's some intense inertia in foosball in North America right now. Oh, yeah. That, to me, is fun to be a part of. I'm kind of just over hearing people cry. You will never please everybody and people are going to cry. We should have a booth. I think I actually might do this. We might set up a crying booth at the next tournament.
[01:16:49] For $5, you can just go cry. No, no. Make it 50. Make it 50. If we got to listen to this, make it 50 bucks and we'll split the difference. I'm not going to listen. I'm not going to listen. I do think it'd be fun to have a bad beat booth and just listen to people talk about how, oh, go. Like, you know, whatever. And to just contain all these people together and let them all cry and feed off each other's tears. There you go. There you go. And it's something that I only brought up because I would have normally just ignored
[01:17:18] it, but I just wanted to bring it up so we could dump on it once, make it very clear what's going on, and then move on because positivity and the sea change that we've been talking about is what's up. It's what is up. This is what we wanted, and it's fucking here, so let's get happy, Dan. Yeah. Dang it. Yeah. Well, it's not about happy, but content and pleased. I also want to say kudos, Randy, for being part of the show when it comes to putting it all together with Ryan.
[01:17:45] You guys did an awesome job just opening up the show and getting the crowd going and really setting the stage, man. I hope you enjoyed that. Thanks. I, yeah, I just want to be involved. So, yeah, I'm having fun. I'm having fun. Dude, it's, I know, you know, and of course Ryan is going to continue to make the, make changes and slight improvements, this kind of thing when it comes to the show. And each.
[01:18:14] Can I tell you what one of them is going to be for nationals? Yeah, that'd be great. You want to know? It's a very, it's a, you'll, you'll get a kick out of this. Everybody will enjoy it. Everybody will appreciate it. Okay. You're an audio guy. You might particularly appreciate this. Don't tell anybody I said this. This is a private thought I'm sharing. Okay. I want nobody here. All right. We're going to mic the goals at nationals and the, like literally the pop of the goals will go out through the PA. Wow. It'll be subtle. It won't be like blast your ears out. But this is an idea.
[01:18:43] This is, this is, you see this in the NBA, you know, with the swish or whatever it goes out through. So it's going to be the sounds of the game will, you won't have to be 10 feet from the table to, to be able to, to hear those as clearly. So we're. That's cool. Actually, I get it tomorrow. It's, I ordered it and it'll be here in about 12 hours and I'm going to start tinkering with it on that table. You may see right behind me. What, what, each, what kind of microphone is it? 57s. A 57? Really? Yeah. I just got a couple of 57s.
[01:19:13] Yeah. Them. We're sorry for people who don't know what we're talking about, but it's not an expensive mic. It's a very good mic for, I mean, this is a standard mic for amps and other voltage snares and stuff like that. So it has the impedance that can. Yeah. Yeah. Definitely not a 58. They're the same. Same guts. It's just a different housing and some minor issues or differences with the, like the electronics, but they're essentially the same mic.
[01:19:43] You can make a 58 into a 7B, a hundred percent for like 50 bucks. Right. But I'm getting off into nerdville. Anyways, the, the, so each goal will have a 57 on it, run through its own separate mixer and then run through our board. Dude. So to get a little bit of compression and then out to the PA so that it'll be a nice, a full, pretty audible sound to the speakers. Who thought of that? At nationals. Who thought of that? Oh, a, a, a thwack mic. Yes. A thwack mic.
[01:20:13] Yes. Nice. It's for the kick drum. Yeah, the thwack mics. You know? Yeah. Well, a kick drum would probably be more like an 80-10. I like, I like the, uh, I like the AKG. I think it's the D10 or not D, what is that? Anyways, I, I, for, but the 57 is perfect for this. Trust me. It'll be great. It'll sound awesome and it may be above the goal or it may be inside the table. That's what I'm going to test. Hmm. So I'm going to test it at Florida state as well. Wow. And then by nationals, we'll have some new sound, sounds of the game. Dude.
[01:20:43] Nice. Now we just saw. And then when, when, when are the player mics coming back? Um, we still have them. It's just a matter of like, so here's the deal with the player mics. We, I love the player mics and they're not for everybody. Not everybody is interesting. Not everybody. I can tell you on one hand, how many matches where it's been like, God, I'm glad we, like actually Randy, you and Bruce, when you wore them, um, at the great lakes classic last year
[01:21:12] with the best, some of the best, uh, you know, timeout chatter we've heard because it was a mix of funny and, and, you know, engagement that you knew you were doing obviously. But then also there would be this switch be like, all right, look, dude, just stop jumping. Stop. And then you have the real conversation and or him telling you, look, man, actually these matches just went up this, this last week. You can go to our, go to our YouTube channel at youtube.com slash at modern foods, um, slash modern foods. There it is.
[01:21:41] And, um, these, these matches where, you know, y'all are having dialogue, you and Bruce, and it's great. It's awesome. You're telling him some ideas and some input and no more middles, no more middles, this, that, and the other. He's telling you, Hey man, stop looking at the scoreboard. I think you just need to worry about your game. And you're saying, yeah, you're right. Conversations that all foosers have had except we get to listen and it's great. And so the player mics make that possible. Unfortunately, they also make it possible for people to forget about foosball and turn into
[01:22:10] like these want to be entertainers. And so I'm learning who, and also some people just freeze up. Some people don't do either one of those. They just get the mic on and then they just stop and they just don't ever talk or they do like the cover of their thing. So I'm figuring out who's good for the mics and who's not good for the mics. And since I got, I have a new board for the, for the goal box mics. So I'm going to have more channels. So every match I'll have the, I don't have to pick anymore between table mic or
[01:22:40] our player mic. I can just have it all run through one system and, and it'll just be a matter of, is this a team that I want to hear? Is this a team that I think other people will want to hear? Will they ruin the stream by saying words that I don't want them to say? The player mics are definitely here to stay. And it's just a matter of like finding the right circumstances where we put them on. Nobody dislikes the player mic.
[01:23:06] No viewer has been like, Hey, take, take this guy off my, I don't want to hear what he's thinking. Like nobody says that everybody loves the player mics. So this is like seeing the whole cards in Texas hold them. You know, you're watching people play. You get to see those cards down and what they're holding and you get to hear those conversations that, that the other team is not going to hear. So yeah, that's cool. Definitely dig that. Um, and, and the innovation, the sound of the goal being amplified, man, that I've always
[01:23:36] thought that was a, that was a great idea. Clay, can you take it? Can you take credit for deciding that? I can take, by the way, I had a glitch in internet. Am I live? Are we good? Like, or am I caught up? Don't worry. I think I heard most of that. So the, I, it's not necessary to me for credit to be in the right spot. I, I, this is an idea that has been for a lot of people. People want a better production.
[01:24:02] And I think, I think for a long time, um, suggestions were beyond reach. So can we have a telestrator where we draw on the screen? That's not really a thing we can do. Can we do this? That's not really a thing we could do. Can we do that? That's not really. At the same time. And just because I say it first, doesn't mean it's my idea. It just means that I said it first.
[01:24:32] So this is one of those things where I, I've, I have a, I have a pretty, I have a pretty thick background with, with, um, production and live audio in studio. You know, I have, this is, this is a lot of my life is, is a audio video. And so to me, it's just normal. Like thinking like put a mic on it. If it's a thing, put a mic on it, put a, put a mic on their shoes. I don't care. We mic the whole thing and then mix it accordingly. That's just how I think.
[01:24:58] And so, yeah, of course I, this was one of the ideas that I wanted to do a long time ago. And also there's a million other things I wanted to do. So we did those things too. And I did mention it to Ryan last year when we were talking about this year and it just went down the priority list. So it wasn't a no, it was just like, there's a million other things we want to do. And I believe it was Pipkin, somebody in Vegas, I think it was Jeff Pipkin Jr. said something to somebody. And then also somebody else said something to Ryan.
[01:25:28] And so like a few people saying the same thing at once. And it's like, let's revisit this because even though it was an idea, it just didn't happen. So what would it take? Like, and for me, stuff like that, you give me the green light and then the money side of it works out, you know, however it works out and it just happens. And so I think a lot of people wanted that. I don't think anybody doesn't want it. And so it's going to happen. And credit is not super important to me.
[01:25:56] And when we look back 10 years in the future, 10 years from now, we look back at this, this year especially is like pivotal in the sport. It's pivotal. Just so many things, one thing after the other taking place and happening that things have never, that have never been attempted or occurred before in foosball. Go for it. I hope the lesson in 10 years, I hope people look back and don't know who did what.
[01:26:22] I hope the lesson in 10 years is people heard my idea. Not me. I'm saying I hope the lesson is people learned that their ideas are worth exploring. I don't want anybody to think this one person made everything happen because that's never true. And I just hope that people move like forward into a future where ideas are more open. I'm only shared. Like this is the thing in the tech world, like open sourcing. Like I don't, I don't need to sell my idea.
[01:26:51] It doesn't, it's not all about, and I'm, by the way, I'm extremely pro capitalism. So I'm not like trying to change how things are done as far as making money. But I do think that there's some sort of like, what's your idea? What can you bring to the table? And then you take, this is what I, it's one of the things I freaking love about modern foods is there really is no like, Hey, you shut up because you're on the lower end of the totem pole. It's more like I have an idea. Adam has an idea. Damn might have any of us might have an idea.
[01:27:22] And then it's like, how can it happen? And some of the coolest things we do, I don't know where the idea originated. It's not important. So to me, 10 years from now, I hope we'd look back and go, I don't know who did that. I don't know who, you know? And if somebody jumps up and takes credit for something they didn't do, I can assure you, I will be a part of the conversation to correct that. But as far as like this person did that and that person did this, like whatever, 10 years from now, I want everybody to be a part of what makes it better.
[01:27:49] I think that's actually not to be too like serious, but that's how humanity is at its best where we don't really know who made the thing or invented the thing. But man, I'm glad we have tires. I'm glad we have shoes. Glad we have baseball hat or headset. You know, I don't need to know who made it. I just, I'm glad I have it. And it's just fucking cool. Did it grow the sport? Yes. Good idea. Yeah. Yep. Yep. Cool.
[01:28:17] I think everything can grow the sport. I don't think there's a bad idea. I think there's ideas where it's like, let's put that on the back burner too. We could fully develop it. But man, there's so many cool things to do. Oh. One of my favorites was this. The chip. Yeah. It's such a small detail. And so for the people who are listening without seeing, explain what you're holding. And I'll say that this was such a badass detail. This is a poker chip. And on either side, you have the face printed of Tony Spreneman.
[01:28:47] And then the opposite is Billy Pappas. And people were using this at the table during matches to call sides. You know, call a Billy or a Tony. And I kept hearing that, you know, it's weighted. I think Tony keeps coming up. You know, it keeps coming up Tony. No, it was Billy. It was Billy. Was it? It was a Billy side. Billy side. Okay. Well, regardless, what an innovative idea. And what a great way of honoring these two players for their Hall of Fame weekend.
[01:29:17] Let's do more of that. Yeah. And by the way, which one is that one? Oh, you got one too. Yeah, I have mine around here. Look, look. So look, flip yours. Just flip it. Flip it. Let's see where it lands. All right. Hold on. Here we go. I only saw Tony, by the way. I never saw Billy win any. It came up Tony. Mine just landed Tony. See? There we go. This is why confirmation bias is so much a problem because you could just think a thing and then it's true. And then actually just...
[01:29:45] By the way, this is another one of those things where this is not an Orion original. They have these in Wisconsin. I was in Wisconsin State a few weeks ago. They had their logo and another logo on a wooden disc. Cool. And who knows where the idea originated from? And obviously, who cares? It doesn't matter. This was Ryan went, you know what? Hey, I can do that. Billy on one side, Tony on the other. Let's do it. It probably costs next to nothing. Knoxville. Knoxville Foosball, they do the same thing.
[01:30:14] They have poker chips with their logo on it on each side and they use it to flip instead of quarters. Cool. We've had them at Texas State with the plastic, the Texas logo on one side and like, you know, a middle finger in the shape of Oklahoma on the other side or whatever. I don't know. I have, you know, I have one. It's in my bag. I can't get to it. That was the one I inadvertently picked up that was on the table, the modern foos booth table.
[01:30:43] And I found out later, that's the one that Ryan had when he was flipping for the final matches. I accidentally stole that. Oh, nice. It'll soon be on eBay for about $1,000. So nice. A thousand bucks. Nice. Good luck. This is one. Was that Canadian dollars? OBO? Here's a. Is that a satanic foosball there? Here's a Texas. Is it Texas foosball? Yeah. Right there. I have a red one, a white one and a blue one. Ooh.
[01:31:12] I'm very Texas. I think actually. That's American, baby. Yeah, hell yeah. That's the first time I went down to Texas right there. Yeah. Who'd you get that from, Tom? You, by the way. Oh. Well. In case you're wondering. Talk about credit. Like I said, credit's not always necessary. It has a place of honor. Yeah. I like a good, nice white ball. No, the blue balls are here. I still have the blue balls. That's usually a problem here in the Northeast if you don't have long underwear.
[01:31:49] You know, like all those organ donors. It's been, it's been Tom. It's been Tom the past couple of weeks. You wouldn't figure it'd be Tom, but it's been Tom. It's been Tom. Some stuff that I'm going to edit. Yeah. Hey, Tom, by the way, speaking of non-sequitur, you said last week, because Randy asked you, like, hey, when are we going to update that opening? And you said, I'm going to do it tomorrow. And then tomorrow happened and it's not next week. Still not done. Yeah. So is that just a fib? No, I'm going to blame that on the flu. Okay.
[01:32:19] It was a flub. The flub. It was a flub. Flub. No, it is in the works for sure. Awesome. It can't just be anything though. So it has to be something worthy of taking its place. What are some things that you're going to take out or that you're going to leave? Can we get an inside peek? We're going to lose the socially distancing. We'll take that out. That's a good one. Yeah. That's a good one. What's another one? Oh, calling in. Yeah. Call. Call. No big whoop.
[01:32:50] A couple things. I'm going to take it. It's a new concept, I think. I like it. Yeah. We're going to go in different directions. I'm excited. So we'll have that next week maybe? Could be. You can go on flute out by then? You never know. You never know. Sometimes I know. I get inspired. It's okay. It happens once in a while. But, you know, it's... I'm looking forward to it. Yeah. I think you're still one of those...
[01:33:15] I remember when the first time I saw the foosball radio promos and I was like, oh, we're going to have like legit actual foosball radio content. This is badass. And I still remember as a fan how it was to hear your voice and doing all you do. And you're a rock star at that. So I'm looking forward to hearing the new intro. It's... All jokes and silliness aside, I know that's a bit of a shock for me sometimes, but I'm eager to hear it. Well, thank you. I guess that means I get an encouragement from here. I guess I better get it done.
[01:33:45] But no. You better. Get your shit together. Get out. What the hell? There's a lot of upgrading we got to do around here. We got to change the walls, for God's sake. We got to tear this thing down and start over again. You have a picture of a toilet behind you, Tom. I just realized. You want to see that? I don't. No, I didn't think so. No, but a picture is worth a thousand turds. So why do you have a toilet on your wall? Hold on. Hold on one second here.
[01:34:14] Oh, look what you did. We can't hear us right now. He can barely hear us with his headphones on. He damn sure can't hear us without them. A picture is worth a thousand turds. Let's see. That's how I roll. I like it. What you got, Tom? What you got? Oh, it's. Oh. Oh, that's. It's. How does that. Interesting. It's interesting. That just feels like a reward situation. Every time. Yeah. Got a.
[01:34:43] It's number two bar. That's basically it. A two bar. Broke it. Oh. It's good. It's good. Oh. And I. I'm gearing up for my. My next career in life, which is. It's stand up comedy. So. Number two bar. This is one of my friends. Number two bar. Who does not play foosball. Who's just reminding me to never. Clearly. Never take myself or the sport too seriously. Yeah.
[01:35:12] Or he's also good saying you have a shit game. That too. If he knew anything about foosball. Yes. That would be true. Yeah. A little subtle hint there. Practice your five bar. If I were a forward. Of course. But. Tom. You're not a forward or a goalie. You're a foosball player, Tom. That's pretty much it. Yep. You catch me. Come on, man.
[01:35:39] Taking up space in the old pool hall every Friday night. But you know what? I'm down for that. No problem. How often do you tell people, no, I'm playing forward? Zero. Yeah. You should at a minimum play Roto. Because you have to. Okay. Because if you're only using one arm. It only develops one arm. You got to use both your hands. Arms. I got you. Okay. Don't be a Popeye. Yeah.
[01:36:06] It also, by the way, it'll also help you with your, even playing forward, it'll help your goalie game. Because playing defense as a forward on a two, you know, defending and opposing two bar. Okay. You'll see some things that you wouldn't see as a goalie. So there's some benefits there. And it's a local weekly tournament, man. Right. You don't have to win everyone. And by the way, experience and age and all that other stuff doesn't matter when it comes to who's playing front or back. Nobody tells me what to do. We agree on it before the match. Because if you don't get to tell.
[01:36:35] Last night I played locally and I drew Tommy Atkinson. And he's world champion, all time great. Yeah. Even with him, it's not. He's not telling me to get in the back. We talk about it. What do you want to play? Front or back? I don't care. What do you want to do? And then we agree on it. Doesn't matter who you are, how long you've been playing, how good you are, who your partner is. What do you want to do? And you agree on it before the match. Huh. Nobody tells you what to do. You paid your money. Right. Yeah. Right. Okay. Yeah. And honestly, I think a lot of people would be open to play Roto. I love playing Roto.
[01:37:04] It's a great time. I love playing Roto. It is good. And there's a couple. We switch every time we score. That's a traditional Roto. We switch every two balls, no matter who scores. That's another kind. There's a lot of different ways to do it. And you will develop your game more completely by playing different positions. I say this, if you're a forward and you only play forward, get your ass in the back sometimes. Mm-hmm. There's no reason not to.
[01:37:30] What do they call that type of competition where the better player always has to play goal? What are they? I don't. Oh, it's well. So I don't know about better, but in terms of ranking. So that's what designated mixed is, where the guy plays in the back. Designated. The woman plays up front. But they also have a version of that where it's not based on male or female. It's based on a designated pro-am something or other. Okay.
[01:37:58] And I just, I'm not a fan of fixed position doubles, no matter what it is. I think you should always have the ability to switch. And I get why you play it if you want to. But I would say just play as many positions as you can. Try out all the positions. You think you have a favorite position. Maybe you don't have a favorite position. Try something new. And sometimes it hits different from the back. Like you just get in the back and do your thing. And sometimes it's, you know, you want to be up front.
[01:38:27] So, but you don't know that if you don't move around and try new stuff. Randy has that grin on his face right about now that says more than he needs to say. It's a bad time for me. He's been kicking in. That's what I'm thinking. He's been kicking. He's doing, he's full-blown Katy Perry right now. He's got his six and a half minutes in space and he is basically gone. Full-blown, full-blown. Wow.
[01:38:56] His eyes are closed and his eyebrows are raised. That is not the sign of cognition. Full-blown Katy Perry. Then I got to remember that one. That's going in my notebook for sure. Wow. Thank you. Yeah, damn. Well, you know, when you, you know, it hits different from the back, Tom. So, yeah. Anyway. All right. What have you got? You guys are going to be in Florida a couple weeks? Yeah, May 1st.
[01:39:25] We get there in August week, apparently. I learned a new. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, which is not to be confused with Ash Wednesday. It was just in its religion. There's next Monday and then there's August Monday. So, August is the Monday after the Monday in which you're referring. We'll be there in about a fortnight. About a fortnight. Three-quarter fortnight. This is. We'll be there.
[01:39:49] It's May 1st through the 4th in Florida, in Tampa, Florida, at the place where it is. And we'll be. That's good. I like this. This is good. This is really good. Promoter of the year right here. There you go. There you go. We'll be there in mostly transparent water, Florida. Yeah. It's Clearwater. Oh. You know what, Clay? Details. This is the first. What's funny about this tournament. I don't know if you call it funny.
[01:40:16] But the first tournament you and I ever did any work together was at Florida State, I think, about three or four years ago. Yeah. With that former company. With Inside Tues. It's not a cuss word. We can say the name. We can? It's fine. Sorry. I'm just saying. It's just a nice memory. Yeah. That was the first time that the two of us just did any, like, one-on-one-one-one-one-one. Somebody smacked the jukebox. I don't get it.
[01:40:48] Yeah. We'll be there. The Mohawk will be there in full effect. So we'll have, most likely have the five-bar cam. We got a new table light. That's something I didn't talk about yet. Oh. Let me test try. Cool. Newt, yeah. And the seal approves. That's the seal of approval right there. I'm so excited about that. Shout out to Rob Cadel, who's doing the best he can to get this thing going. It's going to be a good time. It is the same weekend, though, of Minnesota State, correct? I mean, we've got lots going on that same weekend. Yeah.
[01:41:17] This whole thing about foosball growing, it turns out you can have two tournaments on the same weekend. Yep. Because there's a bazillion players who just want to go play foosball. That's it. So, yeah. Minnesota State and Florida State is the same weekend. I have no doubts that people will be watching ours, our stream. Well, shout out to Seth Nelson of Minnesota. He's spoken to us about getting some airtime soon. Yeah. And hopefully we'll... You're going to have him on next week? Yep. I think so.
[01:41:46] I think we'll get Seth on here. I wish we could go to both. It's just not possible. Ryan's going to go to both. Right, right, right. Ryan will be at... Ryan is going to both of them? I don't know. That's ixnay on the Iron Range. I don't know if that was supposed to be said, actually, now that I think about it. But he's going to be at one of them, for sure. Okay. And it's back to you, Tom. Yeah. Good. Yeah. Pass that one off to me. I appreciate that. No, I think... It's... Yes. We'll be in the thing. Back to you. Cool. Nice.
[01:42:16] There. Did that help? Man, when the meds hit, Randy, they... They hit. Not much I can say about that. Oops. We just lost Adam. I think Adam passed out. Oh, no. He Katy Perry. His meds hit, too. Yeah. Wait. I saw everybody laughing, and then I... Can you hear me?
[01:42:46] I wish I could... I wanted to go to Minnesota State. Maybe we go next year, if they're not on the same weekend. It's a good tournament. But we will be in Florida. No question. And actually, I just heard from Rob Cato a couple days ago, making sure, is there anything that we need? Which is... The answer is usually no, and it's always cool to have a tournament director reach out and be like, hey, are we good? Do you need anything? Just do some last-minute checks, and it's nice to be taken care of and for people to have your back and all that stuff. So I'm excited about it, and I wish Minnesota the best in their tournament and how they run it.
[01:43:15] And there is no competition from my perspective. I do make jokes a lot, but at the end of the day, I love foosball, and I hope everybody at both tournaments has a blast. No matter where you turn right now, there's a foosball tournament not far from where you live. So yeah, so we are definitely looking forward to the near future here. Randy, before we let you go night-night... He's not here. He's letting himself go.
[01:43:43] Any things you'd like to say before we... Oh, I can just slide right in. Nothing. He's just shaking your head. No. No. It's been fun, guys. Have a good week. As always. As always. I don't talk to you. Enjoy Florida. And I'm sure we'll talk soon. Right on. Maybe we'll get a shout-out from you guys from Florida. Who knows? Who knows? Yeah. Question Mark.
[01:44:13] Yes, we would love to chat with you and tell you how awesome we are. Let's do that. We'll talk. We'll talk. We'll talk. So, hey, this has been a unique episode of Foos Talk Live, not the least of which, technically speaking, and of course, it happens, man. It's live, and that's the way it goes. But we're looking forward to next week with Foos Talk Live. In the very near future, by the way, you're going to hear some great interviews that were
[01:44:40] recorded during the Hall of Fame, including another interview with the great Dr. Hannah Smith. We'll be hearing from Dan Tominski. Anybody familiar with Dan? Is he a doctor? Dan Tominski, who's the nine-time... He's a foosball player who is at the Hall of Fame Classic, but is also a nine-time Grammy
[01:45:09] winner and a 30-year member of the Alison Cross and Union Station, one of the finer bluegrass guitarists of all time. And Dan Tominski sat down and had a conversation with us at the Classic. So we're looking forward to having that air soon. In addition to, James Sparky Castillo joined us for a brief conversation. So all that's coming your way soon here, Foosball Radio and Foos Talk Live. Meanwhile, we've got stuff happening when it comes to tournaments.
[01:45:38] So guys, thanks for doing it tonight. My pleasure. I've had a nickel. Did you call me? I have no nickels. But you've been listening to Foos Talk Live, episode number 251, with Clay Toomey, Adam Gilson, and yes... I kiss the girl and I like it. Randy Raposo, dumb man. So, later guys. Later, later guys. Have a good night.
[01:46:08] Night, night. Here comes Foos Talk Live Tournament Beat. Foosball tournaments are everywhere. Foos Talk Live proudly presents a weekly update of events near you. With the Foos Talk Live Tournament Beat, here's what's up. RK Foosball presents the 2025 Florida State Championships. May 1st through the 4th, Holiday in St. Petersburg, Clearwater, Florida.
[01:46:37] The 2025 Minnesota State Foosball Championships. May 2nd through the 5th, Wyndham Garden, Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Canadian Foosball Tour presents the Canadian Hall of Fame Open 2025. May 9th through the 11th at Tailgaters in Ottawa, Canada. It's the 2025 Boise Bash. May 16th through the 18th at Q Billiards in Boise, Idaho.
[01:47:02] The ITSF presents the 2025 Tornado World Series and ITSF Gold Series Finals. May 23rd through May 26th at the Westin-Dallas-Fort Worth Airport, Dallas, Texas. It's the 2025 Illinois State Championships. June 5th through the 8th at Poplar Creek Bowl, Hoffman Estates, Illinois. The World Foosball Tour presents the 2025 National Championships.
[01:47:30] July 10th through the 13th at the Millennium Maxwell House Hotel, Nashville, Tennessee. Canada Foosball presents the 2025 Vancouver Island Foosball Championships. August 22nd through the 24th at Courtenay Legion, Courtenay, British Columbia. Just announced, the World Foosball Tour presents the 2025 Tornado World Championship Foosball Tournament.
[01:47:56] August 28th through September 1st, New Orleans, Louisiana. Registration details coming soon. The 2025 Great Lakes Classic is now scheduled for October 2nd through the 5th at the Hilton Garden Inn, Lansing, Michigan. The 2025 Louisiana State Foosball Championship, all set for December 4th through the 7th at the Clarion Hotel, Kenner, New Orleans, Louisiana.
[01:48:23] Each week, we do our best to give you the most up-to-date listing of foosball tournaments near you. If you have an event you'd like to add, send us all the details at foosballradio at gmail.com. Tune in every week for the Foos Talk Live Tournament Beat. Foos Talk Live is a product of Foosball Radio. With gratitude, we recognize our Foosball Radio Patreons.
[01:48:48] Our Foos Talk Live sponsor, original-leonhart-usa.com. Tune in again next week for another episode of Foos Talk Live. In the meantime, we'll see you foosin'.