FoosTalk Live | Ep 301 | Thomas Dyke

[00:00:00] The following is a presentation of Foosball Radio. It's FoosTalk Live. Are you talking to me? Compelling and lively banter. Are you going to talk to us? Talking Foosball. Foosball was how I measured my value as a man? You took that away! Players and fans, promoters and pros. Unedited and raw. Talk, talk, talk. Living in the moment. We have a lot of important things to talk about. All while practicing social distancing. Cool. We'll talk. No big whoop. Let's get this thing started.

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[00:01:48] Designed and handcrafted in Germany, order online and have it delivered to your door. Visit www.original-leonhardt-usa.com and use promo code FoosTalk to save 10% off your purchase price. And we are live once again on FoosTalk Live. Welcome. I'm Tom Robinson. Episode number 301.

[00:02:17] 300, if you caught it, took place in Dallas, Texas a couple of weeks ago with Steve Murray and Jim Stevens. And we had a lot of Steves hanging out. But we celebrated our 300th there at the ITSF World Series of Tornado and Texas State Championships. Had a great time. Enjoyed a nice IPA in the air. But we missed you last week. We had to take some time off just to recover from Dallas, I have to say. Regardless, we're back.

[00:02:47] And we're wishing well our co-host, Randy Raposo. He is now in recovery from surgery, a successful surgery. And we're looking into, you know, we've got to check in on him once in a while to see if he's still with us. But yeah, from what I understand, he is. And so without further ado, if you're going to talk about foosball, well, you better invite a couple of people along who want to talk about foosball. They'll love the game. First of which would be Chase Pinnell. Hello, Chase. What's up, dude? What's up, Foos family?

[00:03:17] How are you? Yeah, man. Great to see you. Great to have you along. And also from the Knoxville scene, Knoxville, Tennessee, we've got Thomas Dyke. What's up, Thomas? Hey, guys. Glad to be. Yeah, this is great. We're going to be hanging out in the state of Tennessee for a couple of weeks here, by the way. Mike Kelly's coming with us next week. We'll be talking to him about his world or his nationals warmup, which he's doing on the 20th. But meanwhile, so Thomas, how are you doing, man?

[00:03:46] Hey, Tom. I'm doing great, honestly. I'm doing great. I'm playing some of the best foosball I've ever played. Nice. Nice, nice. We got a lot going on on our local scene. There's just a lot of great foosball happening all around us. So it's hard to complain when that's your set in setting. Yeah. Yeah, exactly right. So, Chase, you're holding fast, I hope. You're still practicing on the table, getting ready for the next big one? Oh, yeah, man. Nationals is coming up.

[00:04:16] You've got to be ready. Yeah. And Thomas is right, man. He's been playing some of the best foosball I've ever seen him play. I've been here for five years now. Nice. He's definitely making a bit of a step up. He's got a couple of demons to overcome. But the second he can get over that little hump. He who shall not be named. Yeah. Yeah, he who shall not be named. He's going to be dangerous. What's really obnoxious.

[00:04:46] I got to find that next year that you got. Yeah. Well, what's annoying is you play your absolute best against me and your absolute worst against he who shall not be named. So it's the most frustrating, but I love it. So I can't complain about that at all. Keeps me on my toes. I do. Every now and again. Yeah. You can start to like you play chase enough. You can start to like become chase on the table and you're like, okay, he's going to go this way. You just play everybody enough times.

[00:05:15] You start to catch their little rhythms. Yep. No doubt. So Thomas, are you ranked an expert? Is that what it is? No, I'm not. I'm a newly minted amateur. No kidding. I probably, I, you know, I hope to be an expert one day. But I'm also not one of those people that like looks forward to the next rank. I always want to like win as much as I can in the current rank. You know, the nightmare is, is ranking up without actually having ever won a first place trophy in something.

[00:05:46] So just newly minted amateur. That's all I am. I don't tour enough to be an expert. I wish one day, one day my time will come and I'll be touring a bunch. Well, this, this might change in the very near future, especially if the plans that Ryan Moore may, well, seems to have when it comes to putting together leagues where you play in your local scene and gain points that way. Uh, without having to be on the tour. Yeah. I mean, that's the dream. I keep hearing things and drips and drabs about stuff like that.

[00:06:12] And that would be amazing to, to be able to, especially cause, um, you know, the tour is great, but it is so much fun when you travel to someone else's club on their local night and you can like, suddenly you're like, oh, you know, none of these people know how I play. And you can, you know, you can do it. You can get away with a whole lot by playing just new people and the ability to like, you know, play some of those better players that are maybe higher ranked on the local level.

[00:06:39] When you're all relaxed, you're playing some of the best foosball you've ever played. You're not in the, you know, the pits and then you can beat some good guys and that'd be cool to get some points for it. Yeah. No doubt. Are you, uh, are a four, are you a forward or a goalie? What, uh, what's your favorite? Yeah. Yeah. I'm a, I, yeah, I'm definitely just a forward. Uh, one day, one day I'll take the time and practice and learn how to play goal. Um, but really I'm just primarily forward, you know, boring, boring football too. It's not a primary.

[00:07:09] It's a only, he only plays forward. Okay. All right. Yeah. For the life of me, you know, I've only ever learned the stick and the roll and, uh, I can't square that dadgum ball for anything. I can only spray it all the way across the table. I cannot square it off on like a pool. Right. And then the back, you got to be able to square those balls hard and fast and get it right in that little perfect spot. There's just so much more finesse.

[00:07:37] And like upfront, I can just pour my way in, you know, cram it down the goal. Yeah. It's, it's, uh, pretty much just a port, but I do have, I do have my trademark trademark, my old, my old number seven. That's my one bit of finesse that I can do. So I can cut a rollover and hit the opposite, the opposite side. Oh, nice. Pretty consistently. And that'll break people emotionally, mostly mentally, mostly mentally. Yeah. My favorite thing to do at tournaments is I'll do it and I'll be like, oh,

[00:08:07] I'm so sorry. That was my bad. You know, do like the, the wife on the table, whatever. You just like, don't say anything. And they're like, oh, oh yeah. Okay. You know, and then you just do it like two or three more times. And then eventually you see them whisper to their partner like, oh, this is a guy. Yeah. He's doing this on purpose. Yeah. Yeah. That's hilarious. Man, it's, it's, uh, you know, I got to say when it, when it comes to being out of the road and the tour, you're absolutely correct. Uh, because you can use those things you use against your, your home, your home squad

[00:08:37] that they know forward and backward. They know your takeoff point. They know what you're looking at. They know where, you know, and then you, you go out on tour and you hit a couple of those, those wild, uh, those wild shots like the seven. And they kind of go, yeah, yeah. Lucky you're lucky. Yep. Exactly. Right. But then you do it again. So you do it again. That's a great feeling though. So, uh, I gotta, I gotta say guys, this, this is, we're kind of like on the, on the verge

[00:09:05] of a, of a new era once again. I mean, we've been talking about this now for world, you know, for world foosball tour now a year and a half in, uh, things have changed significantly when it comes to just, uh, the, the excitement and the people that are coming back into the sport. Uh, so Thomas, have you noticed that locally? You've had any, any people that have been out for a while that have come back in? We have had some of those people. We've especially had a lot of what I see that usually is the guys who are traveling.

[00:09:34] So like, not necessarily like a local, but you see these guys like live in the foosball dream and they just like hop in their car and go to club, to club, to club. They're like, yeah, I play in there, you know. They're retired, whatever. They're coming back out and they're joining in that way. That's what I've seen the most of. And, uh, those guys are just a lot of fun. They always have great stories. Oh yeah. Um, and you know, the unique style, you can just, you can feel the history in their play

[00:10:02] a little bit because it just looks and feels different than they set up a back pin and everybody goes, what is that? Yeah. What are you doing, man? Yeah. But I mean, you're right. It is time. Uh, the, the, the club scene has just been so ripe for consolidation for a long time. And I know people aren't begging for it, but I have been begging for it. I would love to see a more structured, unified system there. Everybody's kind of doing their own thing.

[00:10:32] There's a surprising number of software. Some people are still using paper. Um, and it's, it's nobody, nobody knows exactly, I guess the right way to do it. Everybody thinks that they know what's right for them. Um, so it's going to be a real challenge for Ryan to unite everyone. Um, but he's, you know, he set it up well. He set it up well with the tour. Everybody's kind of got behind him on the tour.

[00:11:00] Um, the time, the time is right. And I am anxious for it. I cannot wait. I mean, you know, we've got this big meeting coming up at nationals. Um, boy, that's going to be a big one. Yeah. Yeah. No doubt about it. I mean, it's. I'm going in your stead, by the way. I signed the paperwork like two days ago. Nice. My man. I'll be like live stream it for me. I can't go. It kills me. It kills me that I can't go. I'm going to take the moment of having like all the promoters together to like talk about,

[00:11:30] you know, their issues and what works for everyone. I mean, there's, I mean, you know, we've got the Facebook group that's good and supportive for the promoters. Yep. Be able to ask each other questions and, you know, you can get high quality engagement in the comments and things like that. Shout out Jake and Tom. Um, but, uh, this will be something else to have everybody together. They're getting united with the tour to be able to, you know, do the town hall style situation.

[00:11:59] I think the, the one thing that, that, uh, at least in the conversations we were having yesterday during our smash down, there was a couple of people there that promote and there was this, this idea that, Hey, this, this is awesome. This is a great step forward. You know, the, as long as the software and everything else is ready to go, let's jump in. But there's also a little bit of trepidation like, okay, so is there going to be extra expense on our part? I mean, do we have to charge more for the, uh, for the players to play? I mean, what's, what's going to happen there.

[00:12:27] But from what I understand, and I, and I don't know for sure yet because I haven't heard, but, um, there's, it's more about putting money back into the leagues and providing assistance to, uh, local promoters for, you know, parts and the things they might need to maintain their tables and that kind of stuff. So I'm curious as to how that, that part of it's going to work out. Yeah, I know.

[00:12:52] I think we've heard Ryan on like one of his live things talk a little bit about the financials on it and it definitely is going to cost money. I mean, it costs him a lot of money to do that app. Oh yeah. Uh, you know, it'll be fabulous. I hope he can get it to work. I'm sure he will at some point, you know, um, but it's going to cost him a lot of money to run it. So they haven't been able to run a couple of tournaments on play. Yeah.

[00:13:20] They've ran a few tournaments on play that have run well now. Um, so that's a win and I'm sure it's going to be an offshoot of play that we will be using locally. So, you know, I think the biggest thing there is, I don't, and it's worked probably best so far at the smaller scales tournaments. Um, just cause of the larger scale tournaments is there's just a lot of people. It just takes up a lot of time. Right. But at the local events, I, you know, I think the biggest questions when it comes to that are what's it going to cost everybody to play? Mm-hmm.

[00:13:50] Cause there is going to be a cost involved, but, and we don't know what that is yet. Um, part two of that is what format will it be? Nobody's talked format. Mm-hmm. The thing I've heard the most is it's going to be similar to the old ITSF leagues. I don't know if that's the case or not. Well, I mean, I certainly hope we can do monster because it's become huge in our area. Monster is like the thing now. It's everywhere. Monsters everywhere. It's the thing to do. Yeah.

[00:14:19] And honestly, like I don't like playing as a pro. I don't like playing regular drop, like a regular draw. Right. Um, I like to be able to play with a bunch of different people that night. It makes people happy. Mm-hmm. Right. Like there, you can see them. Oh, I drew chase or, oh, I drew, you know, whoever, like people like that. Mm-hmm. So, you know, giving people that opportunity and not just, you know, essentially maybe 50 opportunities

[00:14:45] throughout the year, you get, you know, a couple thousand opportunities to play a single match or whatever with someone. So it's going to be hard to argue against the monster like system. Right. So I really hope that he's taking that in consideration and we'll find out real soon. I mean, I've got the, I've got the pitch down for the monster. The monster is like a 10 second pitch. It's like you will play for yourself. You'll play with, you know, tons of different people. You never have to worry about dragging anybody down.

[00:15:14] It doesn't cost you anything to play. Mm-hmm. Like we'll just play until X time and then you can leave at any time. We can pause you. You can come back. Yes. You know, it's a, it's a very low key pitch, but if we go into like a league scenario and you've got somebody walking in the door for the first time and you can't explain it quickly and then you ask them for money, that's a harder sell. Right. So they're going to leave. Yeah. 100%. They can potentially leave. Now you can, you can wow them with an app, you know, you might can catch them and be

[00:15:43] like, look how cool this, you know, this is. It tracks you and all that sort of stuff. But sometimes, you know, even with like the monsters, uh, the, the tracking system can be pretty brutal. Uh, when you're staring down a negative 18 goal differential and zero wins, you know, for the first time, it feels a little more hostile if you're just getting started. But, so, but that's footsball, right? You, you gotta, you gotta lose to win in footsball. Oh, no question.

[00:16:11] I mean, there has to be, there's a learning curve no matter what, you know, whether you, no matter what format you're going to choose, there's going to be that point at which the beginner, the person who's just kind of, you know, uh, introduced themselves to the group, they're going to have to get their butt kicked for a while. It's just, it is what it is. The monster makes that easy. Yeah. They don't drag anybody down. Not necessarily. There, I mean, you know, maybe one match at the night, but. Oh, sure. No, I, I remember, uh, God, this is back in 2011 when I, you know, got back in finally

[00:16:39] and, uh, going to the, the local, the local draw and it was, you know, it was standard, you know, double elimination. You get the same partner all night and, you know, there was a couple of folks there in that group, you know, good players that got pretty upset, you know, if they got stuck with someone like me. So, um, and I get it, you know, but, but at the same time, you know, I just kept going back. Just, just kept going back regardless. The problem is that the new age player doesn't do it. Right.

[00:17:07] The new age, the new young players, they, they, that happens to them. And that is, I've seen that happen. It's so many draws across the country that what's, and not to mention, and, and Thomas is so right on this is that players, if they're new, it's you're in it or forever, like you're in it for the night, not with a monster. You can come in, you can play a little bit, you can leave. Yes.

[00:17:32] Like, and for example, we had two, they're new players for the group. They've been playing locally a little bit here and there, but they're true raw beginners, right? Like they've never played a tournament. They've never played really in our events before. And they played, they played one or two rounds, two rounds, I think. Yeah. Um, and then we're able to dip out. Cool. Right. It gives them a taste like, and it allows for them to come and go as they please.

[00:17:59] For these new players, if they want to like play a little bit, that's a big deal. Yeah. Yeah. Not everybody wants to play all night long. Yeah. Or, or even realize what the level of proficiency is there. You know, when you've got experts and pros in your, in your group, uh, suddenly there's this realization, oh damn, this is, this is whole, whole nother level from my basement. Uh, I, I never dreamed it could be like that. Damn. Yeah.

[00:18:29] I thought my dad was good. Yeah. Well, now I will say the one thing on that monster that, you know, shout out Sam price, uh, it's, it's tough on a goalie. It can be really, it can be really harsh on a goalie. It's rare that you see the goalies finish in the top four. Right. Um, you know, the guys that like just play goalie, cause at some point they're going to draw another guy that plays just goalie and they're going to play the two pros. And it's going to be eight Oh, you know, they're just going to get smoked.

[00:18:58] Um, and it's hard to come back, you know, if you're really wanting to win those things. Yeah. So it is hard on the goalie, but overall it's still the best balance. I'm curious when it comes to your, your, your average weekly. Now, how many draws do you have a week? Do you have one or two? What, what, uh, just one, just one, just one. Gotcha. So if everybody in your area were to show up for a draw, how many do you think you'd get? Everybody in our area, like all the, the one, you know, the had-beens and, uh,

[00:19:27] would-be's and we could easily, we could, I mean, it's strictly 30. 30. Yeah. At least. At least. Probably really could. That's a good scene. Probably could hit 30. No doubt. So, and that would give us two pros, three or four experts. Mm-hmm. Yeah. There's a bunch that just hang around that come up every once in a while. So, a lot of our guys, I mean, we definitely still have some that played back when, like

[00:19:54] Brian and Benji and a couple others that are like, they play really good, but they just don't play that often. You know, and foosball is such a season of life for everyone. You just kind of come in and out. And some of these guys will be back. Like Benji will be back. You know, his, his kids will grow up and leave the house. He's just savoring down the last few years. But, it's a season of life. So, people float in and out of the sport. Yeah. Which is what it is.

[00:20:21] But, we recently, we kind of tested our theory on just like how much support can we get from us and the surrounding areas. And we ran a two-day event. We had eight tables. I think we just had eight tables. Okay. And we got 75 players for that. 75? That was. Wow. Yeah. We felt like that was pretty darn good for our first little two-day event. Wow. And it went smooth. It went real smooth. I felt like we finished. We had our times good. Our payouts were great.

[00:20:51] It was an awesome event. The location was amazing. You know, I really couldn't think of too much that we could have done a lot better. Mm-hmm. So, it was really nice. However, it was hard as hell to like make happen. Like on the promoter, that's tough. Yeah. It was tough. It's a lot of work. It's a lot of effort. And I don't know how these, I don't know how Ryan does it. Let's put it that way. Yeah.

[00:21:20] I don't know how Ryan does it. A lot of team, a lot of crew is how he does it. That's it. A lot of people. People you can rely on. He's on. You got to be on. Like it is so exhausting. I can be sitting doing nothing. I can be sitting. But if it's my tournament, I'm going to be like, you've just got eyes in the back of your head. You're watching everything that's going on. You're like, you're listening to all these conversations. Like, oh, that person's complaining about a ball. Oh, that table is maybe not level. You know, whatever.

[00:21:58] Mm-hmm. Yeah. Crazy hard. Yeah. And I mean, how many, how many years have you been promoting now? We just hit our 10th year. Yeah. 10 years. Wow. Yeah. That's hard to believe. But yeah, it's been 10 years now. Fantastic. Well, congratulations. And it's changed. It's changed a lot over the years. But yeah. Wow. Dang. No, it's, I've just been at this now for the better part of a year and a half, give or take, since Chuck Duhler. I was going to ask, are you running your scene up there? I am actually.

[00:22:28] Um, with, with, with a, with a tutelage, uh, him under the, the tutelage of, uh, our former promoter, Chuck Dooley, uh, who had some, some serious surgery this last year and needed to back away. So, uh, but you know, he's been really great. I gotta say just very patient and, uh, he's a great teacher and, uh, but yeah, it's been, let's see, three, three or four, four smash downs that I've actually had to run. Um, and I'm getting it. It ain't easy. Yeah.

[00:22:58] And we have old software. We use Netfuz, uh, which is ancient, you know, ancient. I've seen that Netfuz thing. I never considered it, but why, why do you use Netfuz? It's really good. Was. Was, yeah. Yeah. I mean, for, for the standard that we were going by in the past and I've seen, uh, you know, a few other examples, but it was okay. It worked well.

[00:23:21] Um, it just has so many idiosyncrasies and so many things you have to remember in order to make, let's say if you have a change or there's some sort of a, uh, an error, you know, some sort of information is put in wrong. Uh, which, you know, is going to happen once in a while. Um, it's, it's very challenging to know what to do next. Okay. Oh God. Uh, we just had, uh, oh, we put the wrong score in here. What are we going to do? Uh, okay. We have to come out of this and then go into this and then go into that and then go into this and then go into that. Oh, there we can make that change. So it's.

[00:23:50] You got to keep in mind that was created in 2006. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. 20 years ago. I'll say that. Yeah. Okay. That was created 20 years ago. 20 years ago. Yeah. And for Mark Winker. Okay. Good friend of mine made that 20 years ago. I remember when it came out. The reason, so we were one of Athens foosball shout out real quick was one of the first local groups to use it. Okay.

[00:24:16] And what was awesome about it back then is it kept stats on who you played, who you beat, what your percentages were of beating each person, how much money you've made throughout the year. Like it was really cool for that. It was also a deterrent, just like what's it? Just like the monster is where it's like that negative stat. Like it shows the rankings one to however many. And you now know you're the last place. Yeah. It can get ugly.

[00:24:46] Yeah. So, which when you're in the top couple, when you're not, it hurts. Yeah. Yeah. No, I did like that feature of it. And it's nice to be able to go back into the history of the, of the tournaments. They're all there. And you can see how you did, how you fared, you know, how many times you actually, you know, finished in the top five or whatever the case. And it's just, you know, it, it, it works. Okay.

[00:25:10] It's just, I'm, I'm seeing new things obviously with play, uh, some other stuff I'm excited about that we can institute, you know, easily to. There's some other stuff coming too. Yeah. Okay. There's some stuff in the works. Okay. I'm not saying what, where, why. Um, I've been given access to somebody that's in development of something right now. Um, that will be coming soon. Can I ask a question? Maybe. Is his name Sean?

[00:25:39] Maybe. Okay. Not another word. Um, by the way, um, just to say, uh, uh, on public knowledge that Sean sat down for a foosball radio on the road episode of Dallas, uh, to talk about. The thing that you may not be. Oh, to talk about that. I did not. I missed that. Okay. Good to know that. All right. I feel better. Good. So we had that to look forward to. Yeah. Foos app is the. Yep. Yep.

[00:26:05] And I, and forgive me, Sean, for being so, so shy about it, but it is, uh, it is pretty amazing. And I have the, uh, I have, uh, it on my phone. Oh yeah. It's on my phone. And it's pretty cool. It's pretty intense. It's pretty awesome. Yeah. Yeah. You can do all the things. Mm hmm. All the formats, all the things is the game. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. It's pretty cool. And here's a, one of the features I really, that's part of the challenge that Ryan's going to have. I mean, you know what I mean?

[00:26:33] Like there's, it's like, that's great, but like we're pushing towards consolidation. Now what's going to happen when there's like some legit competition that's going to come in? Well, I was going to do it for free or, you know, or who knows? Yeah. It's a, it's a free app. That's the other thing. Uh, and the software is actually open source. So you have an idea. You say, Hey, what about blah, blah, blah. Why don't we have a blah, blah, blah. And Sean will say, well, let's try it. Let's do it. You know, it's, uh, it's pretty cool. Yeah.

[00:27:03] I like, I like the idea. Now it was, um, the, uh, one of the things I like about the, the, the features he was showing me that are active where if you're in a tournament or you want to go play in a tournament, you walk into the venue, if you've got the app on your phone and it's turned on, you just say, I'm here. And it automatically puts you in the, in the tournament. So it's like, okay. Yeah. It uses location. That's, that's kind of cool. I like that.

[00:27:30] If memory serves, it also has like a partner finding aspect to it. Yep. Yep. Um, there's like a lot of, I'm not, I'm not saying that there's any on there, but I mean, there might be some foosball tutorials to check out. Yeah. I don't know how they got there. Learn to play. Um, the, uh, it is true. It is true. I, a true confession. No, it's, it's, uh, it's exciting.

[00:27:59] I think that, that this is what we need. We need innovation. We need people willing to contribute and do things like this. And Sean's a brilliant guy. He's just a, you know, he's a great coder and he's been at this for a long time. And, uh, just, just looking at what the, the stuff I've been seeing from him. And, and actually when he was on the show, we came up with an idea, quote unquote, uh, that he's going to institute pretty soon. And we can't talk about it until it happens, but it's still something that somebody else

[00:28:26] has tried once before, but it didn't succeed, but we'll see, you know, maybe it'll, it'll work out on the app, but, but, uh, what, uh, and I will say this, what he's doing reminds me a lot of the old, uh, do you remember the website Thu's world? I don't. Were you around when that was, okay. Yeah. So Thu's world, you can check it out on way back machine. If you use way back machine. Um, but basically it, it had everybody's rank in it, like sort of what number you were in

[00:28:54] the world, like one through five bajillion, whatever it was, it showed all of your results, who your partners were. I wish there were five bajillion players. I'm sorry, going. Yeah. Right. Um, but like, I mean, it, and it wasn't just major events. It was local events. Like if a local event got the results, they'd put it in there. So any event you went to, you got the results from that event in Thu's world. Got it. It showed money winnings.

[00:29:21] It showed, I mean, how many championships somebody would have. It was amazing. What happened to it? Why did it die? Uh, people didn't want to take care of it anymore. Huh? Yeah. Well, see, that's the, that's the, the story, right? The history is littered with, uh, the, the, the corpses of, uh, former ideas, right? Yeah. Especially in Fuzel. Yeah. So you kind of, you know, you do, do the autopsy and kind of go, well, what happened here?

[00:29:50] This was a great thing. What, you know, what, what exactly occurred? And then, you know, if you've got somebody who's willing to pick up the mantle and say, Hey, this was done before, let's do it again. Or, uh, let's modify it and make it, make it more usable or whatever, whatever they do. Um, that's what this is all about, man. You have to, you have to let people, uh, think about it and innovate. And if they've got things like this, they can do. Why not? You know, it's for the better. Competition's good. Yeah. Right.

[00:30:17] Like, you know, everything that comes out right now is a little bit different and everybody's pulling from everybody else's ideas right now. Right. All that's going to do is elevate everything together. Yes. Yep. It's not going to hurt. I mean, ideally speaking, you know, I, I, I, aside from AI running the thing, uh, I like the idea of just making it so simple to walk into a tournament and not have to do anything,

[00:30:47] but just click a button. I'm here, ready to go. Um, tells you what table you're on, all the things. That's it. Promoter likes that too. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. The promoter would enjoy that very much. Especially if it's like, you're looking for that player and you're like, they're not in the room right now. Yeah. Yeah. Where are they? Yeah. We're, uh, you know, we're, we're, uh, well, I know yesterday when we were, you know, setting up, we, we get there pretty early in the day and we start at noon for our

[00:31:16] DYP and yet they're, you know, five minutes of the DYP people are still walking in the door saying, Hey, I want to play the DYP. It's like, dang. Okay guys. Well, we were going to launch this at noon. So, you know, let's get busy, but you know, they got to pay their money. They got to get registered. And thank goodness, you know, uh, again, kudos to the people that I work with, uh, Johnny Petrofessa and, uh, Betty Savokashe. They were both there yesterday killing it. Uh, and just no, no problem guys. Come on in. Let's get you signed up. Get you right in there. Just a few minutes and we're, we're done.

[00:31:46] But if they, if we had this app, all of that would be, you know, there's no need to worry. Yeah. Yeah. So that's, uh, something for the future. And, uh, again, we'll, we'll be chatting about this. Um, just, I hope it's not taken in the wrong way, uh, by others that are also working on, on great software. So that's my only hope. Like I said, it can't hurt. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It can't hurt. All it's going to do is elevate all the others.

[00:32:16] Somebody is going to come up with a great idea. I mean, it sounds bad. Everybody else is going to copy it to some level, not identically probably, but to some degree, right? Like the monster DYP, somebody came up with that. I couldn't tell you who, I don't have the history on it, but whoever that was and whatever app that was that did it. Now all of them can do it to some degree, right? Like, so I mean, like I said, it's not, all it does is promote foosball in a positive way. Right.

[00:32:45] Because there was a time, the only thing that we had for locals was the regular DYP that everyone hated. Yeah. It was horrible. And now we've got monsters. Holdouts. There's holdouts on that one. Yeah. There's quite a few. Yeah. They're the ones that are older than me. There's a time. Not you, Tom. Not you. Okay. All right. Just checking. No, it's, so let's, let's make a list. I mean, you've got, okay, we have play.

[00:33:13] We have, we have modern foos and their, their, their software. We have coral. We have net foos. Kicker tool is one we use for our DYP. Uh, and then of course foos app for like a lack of a, lack of a better, uh, term, but there is, uh, there's gotta be others. The one McCrory uses. Let's foos. Let's foos. Yeah. Let's foos. Yep. And that one sounds, that's when he talks about that one, I'm like, why isn't everyone just using that one?

[00:33:42] Like it does a lot of the same stuff you guys talk. We're talking about how it like tracks the individual player and shows you're like your rival and all these sorts of things. It sounds really cool. Yeah. For some reason, nobody wants to use it. Huh? Like he's the only one that I know that uses it in the United States. I think probably a ton of people use it in Europe, but it's interesting. It seems like not a lot of people use it. Yeah. No, I've, I've, yeah, there's a ton out there. Yeah. I mean, like we need, I want consolidation. Let's bring it down to the, to the bare essence in, in one really great foos ball app,

[00:34:11] uh, that you can just take with you wherever you go, no matter where, wherever you might be. I can hear, I can hear Ryan in the background screaming. I'm going to do it. That's what I'm doing. Um, yeah. And, uh, you know, kudos, man, because he and the team again, you know, Reed and Kenny, uh, they've been working really hard to get a play underway, man. It's a, it's a, it's a big undertaking and they're, they're, uh, yeah, they're not messing around with those guys. Those guys are geniuses, plain and simple. Uh, read and yeah.

[00:34:41] Foosball has been blessed with a lot of autistic people. Some really high performing nerds out there that are just killing it. And I mean, they're, you know, they're getting, they're making progress. They really are. Oh, and, uh, you need that kind of focus. You really do to, to do this kind of, it's a, it's a, it's a monumental task. Uh, especially if it means the future of the sport, you know, if you're going to, you're going to, this thing is going to continue, you know, obviously it's got to be accessible. It's got to be popular.

[00:35:10] It's got to be watchable. I mean, there are all these, these factors. Speaking of which chase, are you going to be back on the, on the mic for, uh, for play by play nationals? I am. Yeah. I'm actually staffed up this time. Nice. Um, so Ryan has me like Ryan officially has me like listed as staff for this offense. It's really the short and long of it. Um, so yeah, if I'm not playing a match, I'm going to be in the booth.

[00:35:39] Um, pretty much from the moment I wake up to the moment my eyes shut in front of the mic with my headphones on. Um, so there's going to be a lot of that, which is going to be cool. Um, I'm actually really, really excited about it. I love commentating. It's one of my favorite things to do. Um, I hope people like my style, whatever it might be. Um, you wouldn't have gotten hired if that were the case.

[00:36:06] I mean, there's obviously there's going to be people, but there's always people that are going to hate on me and I'm fine with that. That's never going to hurt my feelings. Honestly, all it does is look at Ryan. Nobody cheers for Ryan. Yeah, exactly. He wins, he wins championships. Yep, exactly. Yep. Yep. So yeah, I'm looking forward to it. Um, yeah, it'll be fun. It's gonna be really fun. Yeah. Uh, in Dallas, they experimented with a, with a, a Spanish, uh, uh, commentator, which was great. Yep. Brandon got on there. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:36:35] Brandon, I, I had, I had every expectation that he would because it made so much sense. Um, and, uh, Aaron Croft jumped in to help out, uh, with, uh, Victor Ilabas, I believe his, his last name is pronounced, but he's, he is the, uh, the Spanish commentator for the, the Dallas Mavericks and the Dallas Cowboys. I thought, man, how did they hook that up? And then, uh, Jim Provost said that, uh, Jim Provost had, had been talking to us on air and he said

[00:37:02] that, uh, his, his brother Neil knows Victor, uh, socially. Oh, wow. And just turned, turned to him and said, Hey dude, we're going to do this, this tournament. Could you do Spanish, Spanish commentary? He had no idea what foosball necessarily would require, but he still did it. And, uh, apparently people were very, very impressed. He's very enthusiastic. Oh, that's awesome. And Aaron was with him most of the time. And Aaron, by the way, is bilingual, which I didn't know. Yeah. When I heard his name, I was like, yeah.

[00:37:31] Wisconsin guy, Wisconsin guy. Michigan guy. runs foos gadgets and, uh, yeah. He's a good dude. Nice dude, by the way. Yeah. Really good. Really nice dude. Uh, but, uh, I was, I was so shocked. I listened to him do his thing. I'm like, dang, that's Aaron. But, uh, but yeah, it was kind of neat because you think, okay, this is the, another audience. Yeah. Yeah. That guy. Yeah. One of the guys making the change, being the change. It's great. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

[00:38:00] Uh, innovation, you know, making the, making things easier for the rest of us. That's, uh, that's, uh, that's great. Um, but yeah, so, so there's another thing that hasn't been done before and, uh, other, hopefully others will, will imitate that same idea. I know it's, it's, uh, logistically, you know, more difficult, but still, you know, there's an audience. So. I do want to see, I think what, one thing I'd like to see more in the, uh, like foosball

[00:38:26] sports casting is we tend to get the match and that's it. You just see people playing. And you don't really hear them talking. You don't know, like the, you may hear the announcer, like give a little during the match, like, Oh, these guys have been, you know, give some backstory. Yep. I would love to have like hammer in their face style, you know, getting in beforehand and be like, what are you going to do in this match? What's, what's your game plan? You know, like talking to them and then break it down after. I want to see, I want to see.

[00:38:56] You're going to get some of that. Yeah. Good. Yeah. The goal at nationals is a lot of those matches will be mic'd up. Yeah. I think that's so cool. So you'll be able to hear the, the information given to partners away from the table. Yeah. There were, we've talked about that a lot. It's something that we all think is huge for the sport. Like we think a lot of that stuff would be really, really good for people.

[00:39:21] There's a lot of terminology that a lot of people just don't know, right. That is used between people. Like I know, for example, with my partner for nationals, Sean Green, we have like our own language that we use for when we're playing. Like we will say things to each other, like on, when we're off the table, like, Hey, you know, these certain things and nobody around us has a clue what we're talking about.

[00:39:48] Um, because we've sat down and talked exactly out, like, Hey, if this, then this, like, you know what I'm looking for because of that. Like there's certain things that we've game planned out. Like we've sat on the table for a few hours and talk to these things through. Like if I'm struggling, this is what's coming. You know, this because of this, like, and we have different names for them and we call them play like certain plays. So, um, to get the backstory, I think, you know, hearing.

[00:40:18] Yeah. Hearing some of that, like that other people are doing is going to be really fun. Oh, sure. Yeah. It's good. And they've already done so much, like the camera angles that catch like a little bits of nonverbal communication you may have with your partner that click like, yeah, you did it. You did it again, didn't you? Good job. We talked about it. We're going to do that. Well, you think about, uh, like when, uh, when, when poker was first coming on the scene with, uh, with Texas hold them and the world series of poker you had, uh, at first

[00:40:48] it was kind of okay because you couldn't see the whole cards. You couldn't see what people were holding up. So I didn't know what they had. Yeah, exactly. Now, as soon as I started using the camera that showed you the whole cards, uh, then suddenly, wow. Now there's a whole new dimension because now we know what they're trying to do. They're they, we know, uh, what, what their strength of their hand might be and how they react to everybody else. Right. And each player had their own kind of, you know, their own way of, uh, of, uh, you know,

[00:41:17] I guess you would say not giving too much information to the other players. Well, then it adds drama. Yeah. It adds drama. Yes. A hundred percent adds drama. Like imagine I'm, you know, I'm playing with my partner and he, I'm like, Hey man, man, I'm not seeing it. Like I'm not clearing the ball. If I'm playing goalie and I'm not clearing the ball. Well, right. I go, Hey man, what are you seeing? Like, I'm, I'm not getting a good read here. And he goes, Oh shoot, you know, a short talk. Right. And then next ball.

[00:41:47] Boom. Like, Oh, like, and, and the conversation that everybody that's watching has now heard this and dude hits it. Oh, like everybody's going to lose their minds. It's going to be like, Oh, he did it. Like all the, just the whole storyline changes. Yeah. Right. Like you learn all this insider information that feels like it's been held from you. Just like you were saying with poker, right? Oh yeah. Like the inside information of what those cards were is being held from you.

[00:42:16] Now that you have that information, it changes the whole narrative. Yeah. And that's the next level in like the promoter scene too. Right. Like I, eventually we're going to figure it out and we're going to have a mic sitting off to the side and we're going to be able to have commentating on like our weekly streams. Nice. We haven't figured out. We just haven't, we don't have a space for it. Oh yeah. I know it is hard audio wise and all those things. I mean, we just got to commit to do it. We just got to do it at some point. It makes it so much more fun.

[00:42:45] And honestly, we don't have the internet for it. That is a problem up there. Yeah. But I would love, I would love to hear the commentating from the guys who see your, see your shit every week. And now they're watching you play and they've got that insider information watching you playing like, yeah, there he goes. He did that thing. You know, like you can just rag on each other and those, in those mics and it would actually make a really good, a good stream would just be to people having a mic. I know Frank Crabtree's setting. I don't know if you guys have seen that.

[00:43:15] It's like full force foos page. Um, he's setting up, I mean, he has done it up right. He's, I mean, it's on his like, it's on his personal property, but he's got like, I think two, at least two or three tables and he's got like a whole audio video booth. Cool. And his like man cave where he's like mic'd up and interviewing and commentating and doing it all. This is called full force foos. Yeah. Full force foos is what he's doing. Yeah. That's right. Somerset, Somerset, Kentucky. Got it.

[00:43:44] Full force foos. Wow. That's, that's the first I've heard of it. Um, no, is it, is it just for his local scene? Is that what he does? Yeah. Yeah. It's just for his locals. It's just fashion project. You know, he's just saw, saw the need and kind of did it. I mean, what was his name again? What? Frank Crabtree. Frank Crabtree. Got it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Him. I got to play with his son, Levi and, uh, and, uh, what did we play? Amateur doubles or something at our big tournament here.

[00:44:13] And it was like, he'd been playing for like three months or something and it was killing it. I couldn't believe it. So he's going to be one of those next generation players. I'm really certain. I'm curious about your scene there. How many of the younger players do you have? Do you have, uh, any that show up on a regular basis? Probably Chase's kids. Okay. Nice. Uh, we've made, I haven't, I mean, that will come in time. I mean, as my kids get older, I imagine that's when I'll start, you know, leaning in more on the junior scene, but I haven't done anything at all.

[00:44:42] I mean, my passion is always still just finding the, like the young professionals, the like 20 to 30 somethings. Those are the ones that I want to hook and get. They ended up playing. Cause that's, that's unbiased. That's where I started. And that's when we had a ton of success was when we had like 30 players a night of everyone just in that age, all beginner rank. It was amazing. COVID, COVID killed that pretty hard, but, um, we were, we were on our way up.

[00:45:11] We were on our way up in a big way, but, um, but that's what I want to get back to. And that's what we're going to try and get back to. We're, we've, we've made a pitch for a new location where we're going to try and put in eight tables. We're going to try and take a hundred percent of the take, the quarter take, put a hundred percent of it back into the location, uh, into promoting. And the idea being that we're going to try and find, um, some pay someone potentially to

[00:45:37] be a promoter to add the beginner to, you know, novice, whatever level, because I just can't do it. You know, like I'm, I'm too good now. You know what I mean? Like it really takes someone that is on that lower level to draw those people in and play with them and, and build them up together as a group. You know, it's hard to see that as a, as a higher player trying to see the lower guys. It can be, it's a tough sell, but everybody just wants a chance to win. Yeah. And that's the thing.

[00:46:07] I mean, if you had, uh, the people that, like you say, that have the interest in, in, uh, just playing with, with some beginners saying, Hey, listen, we're going to have one night only of the week. And like, uh, I know, uh, Matt McCrory does it in Buffalo where they have a beginner night and they're not, you know, they're, they're basically glorified bar players, that kind of thing, but they want to know how to play the game more, more, uh, more fairly and then come in and get some basic instruction and get, get, get, get addicted, you know, and hopefully move on up through the ranks.

[00:46:37] But, uh, you know, that's, that's the key, right? You're seeing, you've got to have a fresh, shall we say, fresh blood coming through. Um, I, I don't know about you, but, um, we're seeing in our scene, uh, you know, there's certainly new people that have come along. However, they're rare. They're very rare. Yeah. The foosball population pyramid is terribly unhealthy and completely inverted. You know, you see, you know what I'm talking about? Like the demographic pyramid where you see it's the zero to 18 is the base of your

[00:47:06] pyramid and all the way at the top should be the old guys in foosball. It is just completely flipped. And that is how, that's how, that's how the sports dies. Yep. I don't think we're, I don't think we're going to die. I think foosball's going into the modern era and things are getting a lot better. But for a minute there, I would, I was not rosy on that picture when I first started and I first was learning about foosball, but things are changing, but we got to get that pyramid flipped.

[00:47:33] And, um, I mean, our, our idea is that we don't need eight tables right now for a local night, but we want to be able to have like the pro style players on four tables and then the beginner style players on four tables. And we're playing side by side, two different, you know, monster DIPs and then they can dip their toes, you know, when they start feeling ready or we do something where we say like,

[00:47:56] if you won the monster on the beginner side, you got to play up next time to make room for the next, you know, and then they can go back, but one, the next week they got it. You know, something like that. Yeah, no, that makes sense. That'd be really cool. So Thomas, we've, uh, you and I have talked a lot recently about specifically behind the scenes of what you and I think would be awesome for Knoxville foosball. Yeah. Um, I I'm actually curious. It's, it's kind of a two part question.

[00:48:26] What is your like ideal grand vision of where this goes? And like, what do you see? Like your perfect, like that, that just perfect, like night foosball night being. Oh yeah. Well, it'd be a smoky old basement bar with eight tables and rock music. And like, I mean, that would be, but you know, I just love, I love a good foosball

[00:48:52] dive bar, but, uh, I mean, for us really, they were really lucky that we've got a lot of clubs in our surrounding areas. We've got like, and a lot of these places are within a two hour drive and they're full standalone clubs with their own player bases. So I don't think a lot of players or clubs in the country have that luxury of being able to pull in from that close by in that many directions. Like we've got two to the North of us. We've got Johnson city.

[00:49:21] We've got Boone over in North Carolina. We've got Jeff Smith with his foos cave, uh, his foos therapy lounge. We've got Asheville right over the other side of the mountains. We've got Chattanooga's coming online now, Nashville over there, Somerset, Kentucky up there. And even like the North Alabama guys and the Georgia guys are great about driving and coming to people's tournaments. Um, so we've got so much that we can pull from, um, that we kind of want to be the, uh, the,

[00:49:50] the meeting ground, you know, the part where it brings all of those kind of like regional capital for foods ball. That's the goal. And so if we can have a location that has eight tables where I don't have to set up more additional or whatever, or move eight tables for a tournament every time, then we could have like bombing weeklies where we have the pro and the novice and work and develop that up.

[00:50:15] Um, but then we would have huge monthlies like single day monthlies and then like three day quarterlies. And that becomes possible when you don't have to do all that setup. If all I had to do was just show up and run brackets, that's very doable. I can do that. Uh, but when I have to like build it up and break it down and play and run the brackets, that's not very sustainable. That's what I learned at the last month. I was like, I can't do this every time.

[00:50:43] I'm just like way too exhausted after that. So that's the goal. That's the goal is for us to be the, the United sort of Appalachian foosball. Um, cause we've got a ton of, we've got a ton of great players. There's just a bunch of them and they're all so close and we all know each other. We're already all friends. It's like, let's, we need to find a way to get together more often. And so, uh, how about, I don't want to take everybody's tournament scenes away from them, but I do want to be the big.

[00:51:11] How about, uh, the Appalachian open? Yeah. I mean, there's tons, there's tons of opportunities for, we're looking for branding. So if you got branding ideas, I'm at me cause we've talked about it. Yeah, I do like, I mean, you know, I do like the Appalachia cause that's where we are, you know, and it sort of covers like the whole region and it's kind of, you know, a unique thing. Um, so we can lean into the Scottish heritage. We can do all kinds of stuff. Yeah. If you look at all the different corners of the, of the country, I mean, you know, uh,

[00:51:41] not the least of which would be the Northeast. Uh, we really have very rarely had anything significant beyond what 2016, I believe was the last time we did in New York state championships. Uh, new, new, New Hampshire is doing a state championship each year and, uh, you know, it's their building. Uh, Kenny Donahue is the one running that, uh, with Rob Marchant, Marchant Kowski, uh, they're doing the best they can. And, you know, it's still, it's, it's, it's a real challenge just to, to find the date because

[00:52:09] there's so many other tournaments happening right now. And then of course, a venue, a venue that can hold, you know, as many as eight to 10 tables and, you know, and of course there has to be a hotel nearby. And, or, or maybe in the hotel itself. And while there are all these other logistic things, um, Thomas, what can you recommend to promoters that are going through this, this right now? What would you say to them? Oh, well, I mean, that's how I kind of evolved to the mission that we were just talking about

[00:52:38] was because we went and tried to find hotel and we tried to, you know, do all that stuff and it costs a lot of money. Oh yeah. It costs a lot of money and you're really rolling the dice on it. And, and like where we are too, there's a lot of tourism, you know, there's a lot of competition. It's hard to line up the season with a hotel that's going to actually want you and want your players there at a time when, you know, there's not like some other tour stop too.

[00:53:04] Like it's, you have to find this like perfect little Goldilocks zone in the calendar for when you can do it. And then you got a front, a shitload of money to do it. And, and for me, I'm not interested in doing it somewhere. If it's just a hotel, like if it's just a hotel out in the suburbs, off the side of the interstate, I'm not interested in that. Like, that's not, I want to showcase like, you know, I want to be in the downtown area. I want to be in like a cool space.

[00:53:31] I want to have somewhere where people can walk out of it and go get food and hang out if they're not playing whatever, you know, I want to show them more than just a holiday in off the side of the interstate. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, and that was what we like could get. And I just wasn't passionate enough about it. So, I mean, you got to find whatever your passion is and what motivates you. Cause it's going to be really hard. It's going to be a lot of work.

[00:53:57] You got to have a really good team and you got to be really committed, you know, financially even, um, it's hard. It's a tough formula. I honestly don't know how so many people do it. I really don't. Right. Um, right, right. I really, I mean, I can do it on the local level, but to do a big state tournament is so hard and it's, you know, it's, it's somewhat thankless. Like, you know, you're going to get some, some nice people, but you're also going to get some really not nice people. It's, it's still foosball.

[00:54:26] Right. Uh, so I don't have a whole lot of advice for them. I mean, I couldn't do it myself. Yeah. I mean, I may still try and do it one day. Um, but it's all those things have to line up and be right. We tried. Yeah. We tried to get a Tennessee state for 2026. Okay. And by trying, I mean, between Thomas and myself, we reached out to probably over a hundred hotels. Ooh. Like, and that's not even a joke. Like that's like a real number.

[00:54:53] And every place that had this possible space to do this wanted like five grand on the loan number. Thousands of dollars a night. Yep. Thousands of dollars a night. I mean, and you're going to have to charge your players quite a bit, you know? It's hard. It would be hard. I, it's just hard. And especially with the university of Tennessee here, like there's a lot of times the hotels

[00:55:22] are booked for the university. Of course. So, I mean, we even looked outside of town, which, you know, Thomas was obviously not a big fan of. He's already talked to that, but like, that was our only option and none of that was good. Yeah. None of that was even remotely good. Um, it's kind of weird. It's like, even on like the, the club level, right? Like so many of like the bigger cities don't really have great foosball.

[00:55:49] It tends to grow in these like mid-sized, uh, maybe not too small. There's like a sort of a Goldilocks zone for foosball too. Yep. You know, these towns that are like less than a million people with like not a whole lot else to do, but, or like where it's really, it's probably a square footage issue. It's a price for square foot issue. Like the big cities, they're like, you need, you know, five, five, 10 feet for a table in my bar when I could put three tables in there, you know, like it's a hard, it can be

[00:56:19] a hard sell. Right. It's somewhere in there. There's like these, these mid-sized towns like, like us. It just, it can, it can really work. Yeah. You need a, you need a venue that really believes in what you're doing. You know, there's, there's plenty of owners out there that are like, yeah, yeah. You know, foosball, whatever. If it brings a couple of people in and they buy some drinks and eat some food. Okay. A couple of tables, that's fine. But, uh, a lot of times they don't see the value. They just don't see it. So you have to have somebody who's really.

[00:56:48] How long have you guys been in your location? Uh, it's going to be about 25 years in the same spot. Holy cow. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, yeah. Uh, Tim, uh, Berlin who runs the place, uh, has always been a believer. And in fact, a few of his employees were playing, you know, pretty steadily. And so he buys the tables. He maintains the tables. We, we have six all together. Yeah. So we don't have to worry about, uh, you know, we, we do help out with parts and stuff and,

[00:57:17] uh, you know, we do pay him a fee when we're having a tournament, but nonetheless, he's just really enthusiastic. Yeah. You know? So, oh yeah. For our tournaments. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Um, I'm a big fan of like the club owning the tables. I'm not going to lie. I think that's the very best scenario is where. Yep. I mean, traditionally most everybody does a 50%, 50, 50 with the bar. Yeah. Um, you know, but you may have to pay for a license and they better have a coin machine and all those sorts of things. Those are things we're kind of looking at now.

[00:57:47] Yeah. Um, but the 50, 50 take has worked phenomenal for us. I mean, it's been, that's how we own eight tables and the storage unit and can put money into buy-ins and, you know, give everybody, we wrap all the rods every week, you know? Nice. Things like little things to get back to the players. I need to, uh, I need to cross this, this threshold because it's been such a hot topic and I can't let you go without it. Uh, the balls. Do you have the balls?

[00:58:20] You know, I've always been one that says like, uh, what's the dodge ball quote? If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball. Like if you can play with some slicker and shit ball, you can play with an ice ball. And so that's what I've always told the ball snobs. But, uh, now, uh, I have a pretty vociferous ball snob, uh, next to me. Uh-oh. Uh-oh. Look out. No, no. I mean, so we. I'm a fair ball snob though. It's true. It's true. It's not bad. It's really not bad.

[00:58:49] We do have bad, but that's not bad. Um, so I think, I think if you're a promoter, you got to figure it out. Everybody kind of holds these little secrets and there's all these tricks of the trade for how to refurbish your own balls. You got to do it. You got to figure it out. Talk to somebody that knows. Nobody will like, I can't, it blows my mind that people don't like publicly share that information very much. Uh-huh. And it's like some trademark secret. Like they're going to make a million dollars on it.

[00:59:18] I'm not that way at all, but like you got to go out there, get a tumbler, put some sandpaper in it. Yep. Wash the balls with whatever you need to do. Like talk to somebody. Yeah. Because it's way too expensive. You can't just sit there and buy new balls. Yeah. If you're going to run a tournament every week, especially if you're going to do coin op. Right. And you're going to have nine balls in there on each table and they're all going to wear out. And yeah, you know, as quickly as some of these balls wear out.

[00:59:45] Well, here's a quick anecdote here for us yesterday during the smash down. We had a supply of new tornado balls that we purchased probably six months ago. And now we're getting to the end of that supply. And it's the supply that was the, shall we say, less than adequate tornado balls that people were really having a tough time. And we're out so fast. Yeah. So we had those available.

[01:00:11] Now we have, we had just a few in the, in the building, a few of the Michael Veit balls that are what he calls the grade A or the, the, the four O's. And we have more coming of that by the way, but you know, only a few. So there are some players that were really like, come on, man, you got anything better than this? You know, the, the, the old tornado balls. And it's like, well, you know, we have one or two, uh, that we could, you know, uh,

[01:00:39] toss out there, but you know, we can't, we can't give everybody a ball. You know, we just can't do it. We don't have it. So there was a little consternation about that a little bit of, um, uh, bitching and moaning about, oh, you know, we've got to play on these balls, but then somebody has one of these. I mean, what, what's the deal, what's going on? And there's such a market difference between the two. Oh my goodness. I mean, it's traumatic to see and yeah. Well, I mean, tornado does, they don't have it nailed down to a science by any means at all.

[01:01:09] Oh, so every batch of balls that comes out is going to be slightly different. They're not doing, it's not like somebody's sitting there following a method with a timer, you know, and they're, they know how many cycles they've done before they've replaced the paper. They don't know probably any of that. Oh, I mean, I don't know that for sure, but that is my impression by the batch quality of each type of balls that come out. Yeah. Well, I don't, I can't blame them too much.

[01:01:36] You know, it's worth sitting here, you know, on our high tower talking about, you know, the minutia, but most people don't care. It's the feel, man. It's the feel. Can I, can I grip that? Yeah. I mean, in Dallas, they actually had a new batch that had just been turned up by tornado. Tornado sponsored the, uh, the whole event and they, they provided new balls and they were pretty good. I have to say there, there wasn't too many complaints.

[01:02:03] People seem to be pretty mellow about the whole thing. Um, whether that's going to continue for the next batch, I don't know, but we're, uh, we're trying to get ahold of, uh, uh, just a small group of those newer balls from tornado, just, just to try them out, you know? And then if we feel, okay, they're, they're certainly above of what they were a year ago, then we would certainly buy, you know, a good supply for our next, uh, smash down. But it's either that or the Michael White balls, you know, it's going to be Boise Boozworks. Oh yeah.

[01:02:33] White's killed it. Yeah. We've definitely sent him big old bags of bottles before. It was a lot. It was a lot. I mean, it was more like big old boxes of bottles. Yeah. Right. It was, it was a 100% boxes. Yeah. And what we got back was great, but you know, if that's still, you got to mail them all the way out to Idaho. And it's, it's like, why are we, why are we here? Why are we doing this? I mean, we got to get Ryan's, Ryan, Ryan's ball one day.

[01:03:03] We'll just change the game. Yeah. If we can get a ball that is not as quality is not determined by the, you know, the one millimeter on the outside of the ball. Yep. Yep. Yep. Yep. We're right. We've heard that the newer new balls are, are much better. The question is, is Ryan going to be able to get access to those four nationals? Right. Right. That is a good question. He just needs to get all bites.

[01:03:29] You know, he can't, you obviously, you cannot just trust a batch that you're buying from Tornado. So, unfortunately, you really can't, you're better off finding someone who's actually truly passionate about it. Like he is. Wow. He is exacting. Good Lord. How many dryers of balls can he support? There's a lot of demand out there. Well, we've, we've got this process. Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. Really? Yeah. What we talked about earlier. Yeah.

[01:03:58] Like thankful for those people being out there making a change and being passionate about it. Mm-hmm. And, uh, and playing too. Right. So Michael was in Dallas, did really well. He did, uh, you know, he's, he's also, uh, part of the tour he's going out and helping out, setting up, tearing down tables, but he's been on the tour so much. He's, he's accelerated in his game to, to such a height now. Um, he walked out, I think he had four medals from, uh, from Dallas. Awesome. Yeah. Uh, yeah. He went from zero to hero real quick.

[01:04:28] Yeah. Uh, yeah. I mean, he, he, what, he retired and went all in, right? Mm-hmm. Yep. Is that kind of the situation? Yeah. Yeah. He and his wife are on the road all the time. And, and, uh, you know, he's, you know, his, his home life is, is freed up now. So he can, he can really be out there. Uh, that's living the dream as far as I'm concerned, man. That's, that's awesome. You know, totally. Uh, some, yeah, I, I wish I had gotten into foosball earlier back when I like, you know, really would have cared to play and practice.

[01:04:57] I mean, when I was first starting, I was in my late twenties. I didn't have kids. I wasn't married or anything like that. But I mean, I was like, it was moving in that direction. But when I first started playing, I was just a promoter. I was a promoter more than I was a player. Sure. I didn't really care to be a lot better than the players I was playing with, you know, and most of us were beginners. And so I was just having, I was like, it was more fun to just, just play bar level foosball

[01:05:26] than it was to like, go out and play the tournament once again. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you've got to maintain your own passion. Well, you have to maintain your own passion somehow. You have to, you have to keep interested. And otherwise, if you don't, then it's kind of like, well, I'm doing this again. All right. Whatever. Whatever. I, I got to tell you, man, I mean, I don't know about you guys, but Friday night comes and I am so pumped just to, I get out of work, go straight to the, to the venue, get set up. Yeah. Just, I can't wait. You know, it's, and every week, the same thing, you know.

[01:05:57] Oh, totally. It's the best. Tuesday, Tuesday night is, is, is my Friday night. That is like my time. And I don't understand the people who go through life without having like a passion in a community and something to like. Yeah. You know, I mean, just otherwise just do the grind and watch TV and like, you know, do, you know, whatever the grass or world war two. Like, no, I gotta be like playing something that makes me feel alive. And foosball does it. Foosball is so fun.

[01:06:24] I mean, I always tell people it's like the first person shooter of bar games because it is just so intense. Yeah. Yeah. When you really get down to it. It's just, it's hard. And it's, it's, oh God, it's so fun. I'd look forward to those Tuesday nights. Goes right straight to the, the amygdala. You get that. It does. Yeah. I mean, you've got the three legs of the bar stool too, right? Like you've got like the foos, the, uh, the brews and the tunes. Those are the three legs. And that's what holds up a good time. And, uh, uh, yeah, I love it.

[01:06:53] And as a promoter too, like, I love that. I get to like be the DJ as well. I love doing the music. Taking over and doing that sort of stuff. Let's talk about that. So, um, you mentioned, uh, a good tournament would be with rock music. Basically. Um, what are your, what are your staple artists? What do you like to play in your, uh, your rotation? I do. I, you know, I, I've got. You go through a rotation. Yeah. I do try and keep a rotation. So I do. I'm always making playlists.

[01:07:20] I'm always getting inspired to make playlists that like set a vibe. Um, and they always, you know, you need to have a playlist that can be like four to five hours long. Yep. Um, and you want to have a bunch of different ones. Like I've got my like seventies hard rock, which is like, I call it TS streaming for the table soccer days. You know, like I've got, got that one. I've got the millennial rock. That's got all the chili peppers and all the different stuff. You know, you've got your pop rocks. Yeah. Yeah. Pop rocks. You've got your new stuff. The gen Z or stuff. That's going to piss off the old guys.

[01:07:51] That's on there. You got to have some, like some good old stuff. Anything that like, I play the best foosball I play is when I'm moving. Right. Like if there's something that's like getting you grooving and you're feeling good and you're just like playing loose, you know, and you just, it can feel so good. Uh, so usually that's like the, you know, sort of like more of like the dancey, uh, sort of discos kind of having a moment in modern music.

[01:08:17] I would say like, there's a lot of like new age stuff that kind of has those disco-y kind of vibes. Uh, lots of that stuff. Soul R&D. Gotta throw on. I mean, I just, the music is. That's great. Wow. It's so important. I think it's so, so important. We'll have to talk. I've got a, I've got a whole list. I mean, it's just because I worked in the industry for 30 years, I've got this, this kind of playlist built up in my, in my brain. Like, oh, I remember this. But you know, it does take time. I'm standing there.

[01:08:45] Sometimes we have one of those, um, electronic jukeboxes, you know, so either use the app or you can just stuff money in it if you want to. And, uh, it's, you know, just standing there going, okay. I had to think for a second. Oh yeah. I remember this. And there's just this recycling sometimes, you know, there's certain songs that do get played more often than others, but it's. I remember you talking about that once you've got your ones that will just like, yeah, just drive you off a cliff. I mean, so that's, I mean, I've got a classic rock that doesn't suck.

[01:09:13] Like that's, I've got that playlist, you know, ones that just, you just got to avoid the Eagles. You got to avoid, I love the Eagles. Shout out to those guys. But, uh, yeah, I don't want to hear it again. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, you know, life in the, well, I guess. Uh, hotel, California, uh, Boston, no thanks. Boston more than a feeling. Um, stairway to heaven from, from Led Zeppelin. Yeah. Not want to hear that stuff ever again. No, no, but yeah. Yeah.

[01:09:43] Promoters pay attention to your music, share your playlists, get them from other people. That's huge. It can really change the vibe. It can really change the vibe and make it a lot more fun. Okay. You have to, uh, appreciate the fact that, you know, if it is good or if it sounds good, it is good, you know, if it's something that, like you say, keeps the level of energy up because most people like it, they play off it, you know? Uh, you can have one song that just bombs. Yeah.

[01:10:09] It takes, everyone's like, Oh, what was, you know, what is happening here? And there's a time and a place, right? Like if it's your Tuesday night, if it's your, it's your club night, you have a lot of freedom. You know, you're just doing it for the same. If you're doing a tournament, a lot less experimentation allowed in that scenario. I have learned personally as well. Uh, definitely have been in those moments where you hear just like a lot of audible groans when you try and do something a little off, you know, off script.

[01:10:38] And they're like, no, okay. All right. Let's go back to it. A quick word of advice when it comes to general playlists, avoid Yacht Rock. Don't do it. Don't go there. Yeah, sure. It's just, sure. Although I don't know if it's, if it's your club night, you do whatever you want. Oh, of course you do whatever you want. Like it's dangerous though. It is. It's risky. They're there. That's awesome. It's your thing. You can do it. Um, or, uh, Kenny Loggins. Yeah.

[01:11:07] Not, not a foosball crowd. Sorry. Not happening. Do you guys do a pay to play on your Tuesdays on your Fridays? It's, uh, yeah, it's basically 10 bucks. So when you walk in 10 bucks, get you into the monster. Um, and like you say, you know, uh, you can play as many rounds as you want. Um, but we usually do, I don't know, five, maybe, maybe six rounds all told, but, you know, obviously a bigger crowd, we're going to have a bigger payout. But, um, you know, it's, it is paid to play.

[01:11:37] We have, we have, uh, we have to put quarters in the machines every time we play. So yeah, that's, that's, uh, that's fine. And it was for, for years, Timmy kept it at 75 cents a throw. And then just, just about a year or so ago, he bumped it up to a buck. But I mean, you know, he's kept it, kept it very reasonable for sure. You think a dollar is reasonable? That's always a hot topic. We started, we started at 50 and I kept it at 50 totally subsidized for a long time.

[01:12:04] And then eventually I was like, nah, we did 75 for a couple of months and it was like, eh, the dollar. Yeah. It's just nice when everybody just throws up a quarter. It like, oh yeah. The difference between 75 and a dollar is, you know, makes a big difference. But everybody just throws in a quarter. That's it. And at one point too, we used to, we used to do sort of like the, like the loser would have to pay and the winner would just like be playing for free. Yeah. But that's sort of like a, uh, what's the type of tax, a regressive tax.

[01:12:33] That's not the kind of, not the kind of tax you want. We just like the new guys have to pay every time cause they suck. We, uh, we do do that for, for a pickup nights. Cause there'll be a, like a Monday night, a pickup night, you know, I get that. Yeah. It's a, it's a thing. I mean, it can, it can, it feels different when you are sitting there throwing in your money and they're gloating on you. You know, some people even do like the bell, you know, like you skunk somebody, they've got a bell in there and they'll make you go ring. Oh, I like that.

[01:13:01] Like there's all kinds of shame crawling under the table, get skunked. You got to crawl under the table, you know? So I've avoided the shame tactics, but they're fun. I do enjoy them when I go and do it someplace else. But I mean, you have to once in a while, you gotta hit me. And here's the other thing, you know, there's gotta be some trash talking. There's just has to be on a pickup night. Forget it. You know, it's just, there's, you know, we've been so tense and so incredibly, uh, uh,

[01:13:30] should we say closed mouth about, you know, regular tournament night. Now we've got to let loose a little bit and just, you know, say your mom's got, you know, toenail fungus for God's sake, you know, just, just things just off color stuff, you know, trash talking. Yeah. Yeah. There's all, all kinds of skill levels in booze ball and there's all kinds of skill levels in the trash talk. Not everybody can do it, but that's true. Plus those ones that can still try. Here's one that I get. Ball's flat. You shall not be named.

[01:14:01] Here's the thing I get every time I come back from, let's say, you know, going to a tour stop or whatever. I'll, and if I, you know, I'll be, cause I played Goldie all the time and I'll, you know, stripe one from, uh, from the, from let's say from the, uh, from the pole side and, uh, some of the go, Oh, he's a pro now. Cause he went to a tour stop. Yeah. So I get that a lot. It's, it's, it's, it's kind of great too. Cause like, even when like new people show up and you can use those, like just tired

[01:14:30] old banks are open, you know, tired old phrases again. And they feel like new because it is amazing. Like you, that's the book that I would read is like all of the stupid, silly jargon. One of my favorites is like, uh, that Joel always uses is like some nights you're the bug. Some nights you're the windshield. You know, sometimes you're the ball. There's so many. Sometimes you're the Louisville slugger. Yeah.

[01:14:59] All, all things like that. I'd love, I love expressions. Yeah. Well, you guys in the South have lots, lots of euphemisms this way. I mean, you know, that's a, that's a normal thing, right? Yeah. Yeah. The euphemisms. Yeah. But no, but I mean the banter though, the new England guys, Randy, like all those, I just, I shut up. I shut up real quick. I'm in those. Randy's good at it. Right? Yeah. They're too good at it. It's irritating. Oh, well, he's had a lot of practice.

[01:15:26] I have to say, you know, the, the, I love the guys from Massachusetts and New Hampshire and Vermont. Those guys are awesome, but yeah, man, they, they're, they're hardcore. They're definitely hardcore. They fire back quick. There ain't nothing that gets past them at all. You know? No. They're so great. I remember one time I was, I was, I was just being a, I was being a jerk to this guy. He was, he was from new England. He was from five one eight. I I'm sure Randy knows him and has talked about him. He's humongous.

[01:15:56] Giant guy. He's like, I think he was playing rookie at the time. Okay. And, uh, and I was, I could feel that I was like needling, you know, I'm just like getting in there just a little bit on him. Like, yeah, you know, getting hype whenever I would like score slop, you know, things like that. And at one point he goes, he just gave me that finger and I was like, all right, I'm done. I'll stop now. I'll stop. I'm trying to think who that might be. I'm trying to think. Yeah. There's, there's.

[01:16:25] He's been playing on, I know he's been going to a lot of tour stops. I think he's one. I don't know. I'm pretty sure you guys have talked about it. Yeah. But, um. Yeah. Yeah. Big, big guy. Yeah. We've had a few like that. Big, strong man. Guy. Um, God, I'm trying to think. It wasn't Ron Olson, was it? I don't know. I couldn't tell you his name. I mean, Ron's tradition. It would not have been Ron Olson. There's no world where Ron Olson was playing rookie. Yeah. Right. He was playing with, uh, what's the, the New York family that has like all the, uh, I think they're like Filipino kids or something like that.

[01:16:55] Oh, you're talking about, um, uh, Polowski. Was it? The Polowskis. Yeah. He was playing with one of the Polowskis. Oh, got it. Okay. Yeah. I was back when the youngest one was, I doubt my younger one is still a rookie. He was. Yeah. I, I, I forgot the guy's name, but I think I know exactly who you're talking about. And you're right. Yeah. Yeah. He's a big dude. No doubt. He's a big dude. Yeah. Yeah. He's a big dude. But yeah, just those New England guys in general. I love, I love those guys. I just sit and listen.

[01:17:25] We, uh, we've been at this a little longer, just saying when it comes to the culture on this side of the country. But, uh, no, it's, it's, it is. You know what? It's a universal language when it comes to foosball. We all speak it. Maybe we have a slight accent, but that's okay. Uh, but yeah, we all speak it and, uh, we all, we all love the, love the language, uh, whether it's, uh, uh, serious or, or just busting chops. You know, that's, uh, that's the main thing.

[01:17:53] Uh, I gotta say, Thomas, you're, you're, uh, 10 years in, uh, what do you want to, what do you want to be doing 10 years from now? I want to still be doing this. Nice. I mean, I, I, you know, I don't, I don't mind doing it. I there, I've had my moments of doubt, you know, where I'm like, oh gosh, do I still want to do this? But yeah, the answer is almost always yes. Yeah. I really like, I, I love, you know, I love the guys. It's all about the crew.

[01:18:23] It's, it's, it's about seeing the people every week and getting caught up and, and doing something fun. And plus, I mean, the older I get, the less willing I am to have small talk without doing something like this is the ideal way for me to socialize. I have found like, yeah, let's, you know, we're all doing this common thing. We can all talk about this indefinitely in loops, you know, whatever. So I hope to still be promoting. I hope to still be playing. I hope to have my kids playing.

[01:18:51] I hope to be getting our kids involved. Yeah. Yeah. I would love, and I would love to just have, I just want that rocking, that really rocking tournament scene where we're just all united all together. And yeah, I'm happy to have Boosball stay in my life. And then of course, obviously on tour and everything like that, it'd be nice to have. A couple more trophies up there. Yeah. I'll take some of that. Yeah. Got to decorate the, uh, the, the, the, the man. Got to decorate the cave, man.

[01:19:21] Got to decorate the cave. Shout out Wayne Robbins building that, uh, the movie theater stage up there. Wow. That's pretty cool. That is clutch. Wow. Now, now, uh, the movie theater stage, now there must be a TV in front of you then, right? So, so. No, it's just for football. Just the football table. Oh. That's just, there's like a whole, we built a big heavy stage and put four of these, you know, chairs connected there. You can just watch. And got some movie theater seats off of Facebook marketplace. Nice. Uh, you got to build a pretty, pretty substantial stage.

[01:19:51] Uh, carry all that weight. We got some, some big guys. Very nice. Yeah. It sits up high so that you can see easily down in the table. Yeah. It's a nice setup. It's pretty cool. It is nice to have a nice relaxing seat to like watch a game being played. You're just like, hmm. Yeah. This is nice. Who are the guys in the Muppets? That's what it turns into. The guy. Oh yeah. The two old guys from the Muppets. Just watching you play. Just like, ah, yeah, that's not. That one hurt. Huh? You know, just like whatever.

[01:20:21] You hit the wall again. So how often, uh, now both of you guys, you know, have pretty decent spaces to play foosball. How often do y'all go to. We both have young kids. Yeah. Yeah. I can't practice after 8 PM. Yeah. Too much noise. Yeah, it is. It's too much. I can't. I can practice late, but yeah, I don't play well with others.

[01:20:51] You have more singles titles if that was true, but I've got quite a few. All right. Yeah. No, he's going to like do his little finger on all his terms. He's got trophies in the background. It's ridiculous. Yeah. I know. He's got all the things. Yeah. Oh my goodness. Oh, you guys. I'm so jealous. I, I got to clear out some space, man. I got to make it happen. Got to make it happen. Just, you know, I need a foos room. But you got to have him by your foos ball table. So down there, it's not going to work. I know. I know.

[01:21:19] I mean, I'm where I'm standing right now is where I work every day. You know, it's just, this part of my gig, you know, so it has to be. You always pick up and move where it's a little cheaper to live. Yeah. Very true. Like Tennessee. Whoa. I'm telling you, we're going to poach your boy. I'm going to poach your boy. I'm going to get him. All right. All right. I'm actually thinking about coming to Tennessee in the not too distant future. In fact, Mike Kelly and I, who we'll be talking to Mike next week, but he wants me

[01:21:46] to come down for, you know, one of the, one of the tournaments there in Nashville. How far is it from Knoxville? We're like two and a half, about two and a half hours. Yeah. Not bad. Like that. Yeah. It's not too far. Maybe I can make a tour, do a tour for that. I was about to say, you need to let me know. Okay. Let's, let's really line you up a tour because a lot, we can, we can map out. That's one of my favorite things to do. I don't ever get to do it, but I love to do that for people. Like if you're driving through, like you stop here one night, here one night,

[01:22:16] and you're running through that. Yeah. You can kind of make a chain. That would be sweet. Yeah. We can let something up. I think that if we can make it happen this year, that'd be fantastic. Of course, then the schedule, it's like, well, when? But we're planning another smash down for August before Worlds. But other than that, I think July is probably pretty wide open at least, but we'll see. You're going to have fun. You're going to have fun if you go to Nashville. That is one of the coolest, coolest spots to play.

[01:22:44] I mean, right there in the university district, big happen city, you know, really nice. I mean, it is a hotel bar. It's like a hotel. The Moxie? Yeah. It doesn't really feel that kind of way. I don't think, you know, it's different. Yeah. And it's nice. And I mean, obviously the players are great. Yeah. The guys are great. Mike's great. There's not much to hate on there in Nashville. They're doing great. And one of the regulars is a 12-time Grammy winner.

[01:23:15] So just saying. Yeah. Yeah. Old Dan. Dan. Dan Tomenzky, man of Constance Saro show I will play. Man. Yeah. I've had the privilege of getting my ass whipped by him. No kidding. Lord. Have you played him before? I played with him. Let's see. It was TKO a couple of years ago. Just it was like a last minute because his partner had a heart attack. So I jumped in last second to play with him.

[01:23:38] And I had no idea initially who I was playing with until I realized, oh, you're that guy. Oh. You know, I had heard briefly. You're that guy. Yeah. You're that guy. Crazy fast hands. Oh, my goodness. He's good. It's interesting. That kind of brings up the whole like when you get to go and play at other people's clubs, you know, clubs tend to develop these like cultures running off the table.

[01:24:06] And you'll see like these influences. Like for us, the closer you get to the Carolinas, you'll start catching more of these pin shots, these weird pin shooters that do weird stuff. It's like the Bonzini influence coming in. And, you know, you'll see, you know, like there you go to Nashville, you're going to see a lot more like with Cunningham and Tominsky and these guys that play non-traditional foosball.

[01:24:31] It's like fast or super tricky or, you know, all these other things that we don't see in our eggs to chase. Boring foosball. I mean, occasionally Chase will shoot like a rolling, a beautiful rolling pull. But like generally speaking, we're just, you know, very methodical and very precise in power and, you know, whatever, you know, do your thing and do it well. But it's nice going to play into other clubs. Yeah. They got going on.

[01:25:01] See the differences. There are a couple of people. There's one guy out of New Hampshire and I've played with him a couple of times, but he does a back pin. That's his, that's his go-to shot. And he, and he hits it all the time and it looks slow as hell, but he splits men all the time with this thing. It's just, it's extraordinary. But yeah, I like to see that, right? Something different. But, uh, you kind of have to think.

[01:25:25] I know like even when I went and go and played in Memphis, like those guys, their core is a group that grew up playing in the, you know, they've been playing with each other for like 40 years or something. They're playing in the roller rink as teenagers together now. And they've developed, you know, their own unique thing there. It's just, it's just a lot of fun. I don't know. I, that's my favorite part of the game. Honestly, it's, it's more than going to any tour stop is going to somebody else's club and playing them. Yeah. That is the thing.

[01:25:54] I think one of these days we'll, we'll have to, uh, well, it all depends upon my, my full-time employment, but someday just taking this thing called Foos Talk Live Foosball Radio and just going to a different club every month. Just, you know, go across the country, you know, just try and do that. Studio right here. Yeah. There you go. Done deal. Let's go. Done deal. To the Foosball RV. Yeah. Yeah. Everybody's probably seen that picture of the RV. And you guys seen that where they'd like had like the slide out. Oh yeah. Pable slides out. Yeah. Yeah.

[01:26:24] Out into the open in the back, you know, that's, that's living the life. You know, they, they say there's, you know, there's retirement for everybody, but I'm not, I'm not doing that. I mean, not, not technically anyway. I'm doing that. Are you? Oh, the moment my guy says I can retire. Done. Done. You buy it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. Well. 13 more years. 13. Oh God. Jeez. I know. I'm a brag.

[01:26:54] 13 years. That's a, that's a lifetime. Um, at least 13 years. A portion of a lifetime anyway. Um, but no, I just walk. Yeah, no, I've just seen, you know, I look back 13 years and what I was doing then. God. Oh, wow. Yeah. I guess, I guess just a different perspective really. But, uh. I've got my date set. Yeah, you do. No doubt. Okay. Okay. Thanks. Yeah. Well, it's, it's, it's happening in our, in, in our, uh, in our household.

[01:27:24] My wife is, is right on the edge. She doesn't know exactly when, uh, she is eligible now after 33 years in the same gig, uh, that she can take a pension and go, but, but she's just every day. It's like, yeah, I'm going to, I'm going to do it. No, no, no, no. Oh, they suck her in. Oh. You get just a little bit more if you stay just a little bit longer. Yes, exactly. That's it. That's exactly it. Yeah. They get you. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Well, if I wait one more year. Most people, most pensions are not a thing anymore. Not hardly. No, I know.

[01:27:53] It's very rare. Uh, this is, this is quasi state state government, but, uh, you know, it's still got it so rare for, for most, most industries. You just don't see it. You know, it's like you got a 401k. Good. Good luck. There you go. Just start make foosball your retirement plan. Just start winning. There you go. That's all you gotta do. Just go out there and start winning. All right. Pots are growing every year. Thanks, Ryan. Yeah. It's the hardest part is convincing Tommy Yor to play every time. That would be, that'd be the hard part.

[01:28:22] You know, that'd be a beautiful return. So real talk, do you, would you want Tommy Yor to come out every time he plays your events? Oh, absolutely. Are you kidding? Really? People. Wouldn't he win every single time? Well, he does typically, but people come out because they want to see what they can do against him. Yeah. In fact, we had two guys from Montreal. They came down. Mathis, I believe is his name, and Stephen. They come down.

[01:28:49] They've come down a few times now, and they're there specifically seeking out. They want to catch. They want to get in the finals or at least some greatness. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're there for that. And that's cool, you know? And then we have Sam, who's out of town this time, but when those two are going against each other on the table, there's some fireworks. That's some fun stuff to watch. Yeah. Because they know each other pretty well, and they practice a lot together.

[01:29:17] So there's a – now Sam is also at a crossroads. There's a possibility, and not to talk out of turn here, but he may be going into the military. So that's – I was about to say, changes are going to start coming for him soon. I figured – I was going to ask. I was like, is he going to be going out to school? Do we know? Like, what's he going to do? Yeah. Yeah, he's going to – It's an option that he's looking at. So – but, you know, who knows? I hope he does the thing that suits him best.

[01:29:47] You know, it's his life. Yeah, of course. It worked out for Butchkowski. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I mean – He just turned ProMaster last year. No doubt. Well, you know, there's several people that I've known since, you know, like kindergarten that went into the military as career people. And one guy, he retired at 47, lieutenant commander, and, you know, has had a wonderful life. It's really worked out well. Yep.

[01:30:15] So it can be a great thing to choose. Not necessarily for careers, but it can be, you know, especially if you're looking for a direction. Great idea. I'm hoping to steal Tommy. Tommy's the one that I'm going to try and steal. Steal. Okay. Yeah. I mean, really, I truly think that it would be, you know, good for his career. I'm a nuke worker. He's a nuke worker. Yeah. You know, we're down here. We're in Knoxville, which is right next door to Oak Ridge, which is, you know, history back to the Manhattan Project.

[01:30:45] And so – Right. The whole industry is really blown up in a big way here. We've got all kinds of stuff happening. You know, you're talking tens of thousands of nuclear jobs in this area. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So whenever he's ready to take that next step, I'm here for you, Tommy. I'll hook you up. You hear that, Tommy? Now, are you also a chemical engineer? What's your official – I'm not a chemical engineer. I'm a radio chemist. Gotcha. Gotcha, gotcha. So radioactive chemistry type of stuff.

[01:31:15] Something – I think Tommy is also something similar to that, although he can't talk about what he does. Yeah, he is. Yeah. He cannot speak of it. Yeah, I know a little bit about what he does. It's a small – it's a small world. Yeah. It's a small world. And there's only so much – like, you know, nuke jobs, you don't get to pick where you live necessarily. Okay. Like, there's – they're not in every town. Yep. You know, you kind of – so you kind of get what industries are where. Right. Yeah.

[01:31:40] No, he – I guess when he was applying for this particular position that he's in now, it took, God, it was like three or four months of just security checks, just background stuff, before they would even consider his application. It's like, dang. Oh, yeah. They got to go talk to all his neighbors and his friends and call, you know, all the long-lost family members and things. They're going to be digging for some dirt. Yep. Yep. Exactly right. And he's a pretty straight-laced guy.

[01:32:08] I mean, there's nothing you could really find on him at all. He's just a really good person. So – but, yeah, when he got in, I'm like, dude, that's really cool. Of course, we're more than happy to have him hanging out in our area, but, you know. I don't know, man. We're not going to give him up right away. You're going to have to bribe us somehow. I don't know. Oh, yeah. He's going to see those pots. We're going to have those eight-table tournaments rocking every month, and he's going to be able to supplement his income.

[01:32:38] Stealing all our money. Right. Great. Well, I think the other thing, too, is his wife, Deanna, she's really motivating him to get out, you know, to come out to Friday nights. And, of course, he does it oftentimes before he goes to a big tournament stop, too. But, you know, when he first got here, he wasn't coming out very often. It was maybe once every other month, something like that. But now that he's married – Yeah, I saw where he won with a kid, right? He drew somebody. Oh, yeah. He came out to a draw recently, right?

[01:33:08] Yeah, Cole Dragoon. He played with Cole during the DYP yesterday, and the kid was thrilled. You could see it in his face, man. Yeah. I'm playing with the top master, and they won the DYP. And just, dude, the kid was just so, so ecstatic. Yeah, he'll remember it forever. Yeah, it's a big deal. Yeah, he was just – I think he's 12? 12 or 13, something like that. Very young guy. Yeah. He came down with Mark Jolette from Plattsburgh. Mark had six kids with him yesterday.

[01:33:38] And, of course, Mark, you know, Foosball Clubs USA and all that. But, yeah, these kids are talented. They're really good. In fact, Tommy's partner, Cole, was hitting this – first of all, he was passing like a pro. I mean, he kept hitting this one lane pass that just got everybody every single time.

[01:33:59] And then he hit this corner – it was a push shot from the two rod that just slid behind the – it would slide right behind your goalie. And it happened to me several times when we were playing him in the finals. That backdoor shot. Oh, dude. It's like, what the – what's going on? And he did it every time. It wasn't like he was an accident. It was intentional. So he really had some talent, got to say. Good player. The kids, man, our brains are all smooth and, you know, we're done. Yeah.

[01:34:28] Those – their little brains are just – they're just ready. They just take it all. And they can do so much and learn so quick. I mean, it really – Foosball is one of those sports where you just see it so much. Like there's the physical ability and like whatever other bigger sports, but like this one that is just the finesse and the learning and it just happens so much faster. Oh, yeah. It really does. They don't have that other clutter going on, you know, that adults have, you know, the self-doubt or any of that stuff. They don't – none of that matters to them.

[01:34:58] They just – like you say, they're like a sponge and they can do it right away. You know, it's a few tries and they got it down. And, man, I mean, I've tried that straight line pass up the wall from the two rod over and over and over and I still can't get the damn thing. So – I was working on a wall pass earlier today. Okay. Yeah. Same old thing I've done 10,000 times. Like, you know what? I think I need to – yeah. It kills me.

[01:35:26] Well, you know, the brain cells just ain't what they used to be. So – well, by the way, what – are you planning on Worlds or you're just – you're not sure about that yet? I don't know about Worlds yet. Worlds is logistically kind of tough to get to. I'll probably be at Ohio, right? Okay. I think it's – Ohio one is coming up pretty soon. So that one's easy. So I may jump up there for that one. I'll miss nationals. Okay. That's going to kill me. Yeah.

[01:35:56] But I've definitely got to make it to Worlds. I've missed the last – what? We've done two now? Mm-hmm. New Orleans. New Orleans. We'll make you a deal. Thomas. It's awesome. You can ride with me. We will ride together. Yeah. And I will let you even crash in my room. Well, I – Come on. There's very few people that I would actually consider sharing a hotel room with, but I probably wouldn't. Come on. Yeah. I need somebody to ride with.

[01:36:26] Yeah. I might just take you up on that. Yeah. Just take you up. Let's do it. I bet you Randy – All right, man. Maybe Randy would go with you guys. Who knows? Maybe it'll – We can pick Randy up on the way. Yeah. Let's do it. Throw everything in the truck. That would be fun. It's New Orleans, man. And the hotel is amazing. It's so, so nice. It's the best hotel. It's unreal. Yeah. It really is. Yeah. It's fabulous. And the best ballroom. Good Lord. Oh, yeah. I mean, they – It's bananas. It really is crazy.

[01:36:55] It's the level of effort that is put into that. Incredible. 30,000 square foot ballroom. And, you know, and 10,000 square feet of that is, you know, for tables and chairs and food and stuff, you know. But the arena, I mean, bar none, it's the best ever. Just amazing. It is really good. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, we'll definitely – if you do it, I have a couple of places we can go to. There's a couple of locations in New Orleans you've got to go to.

[01:37:26] One of which is – Oh, yeah. I love New Orleans. Café du Monde, which is like the best ever coffee. And they serve these – Classic. These – they're kind of like a – it's hard to describe. It's like a piece of pastry. It's like a pillow. But it's – Beignet? The Beignet. There you go. The Beignet. Yeah. Oh, unbelievable. So good. So good. But – and, of course, there's a casino nearby. But there's, you know – oh, yeah, Chick-fil-A is next door. Which is – Now that I can get –

[01:37:55] You won't watch the two crackheads have a fight outside of it. That's fine. Yeah. Not the casino, not the Chick-fil-A. Right. No, outside of the Chick-fil-A. The Chick-fil-A? Yeah. That was the story. Yeah, there was a crack fight right on the corner there. It is New Orleans. Anything can happen. It is New Orleans. I love it. I'm from a Delta city, too. Oh, you are? Okay. I got you. From Memphis, yeah. Bourbon Street, of course. Everybody on the Mississippi kind of has a similar – Ah, interesting. Okay.

[01:38:26] That – the whole idea of – Monday night was – just before I had to fly out at 6 a.m. on a Tuesday morning, I'm on Bourbon Street at 1.30. And I was with a bunch of crazy Canadians, you know, walking up and down. Matt McCrory actually was also there. But we just – you know, we found this jazz club. It was just unbelievable. You paid like – you know, it was at one drink admission, and you sit there and watch this world-class jazz band. You know, just incredible. Only in New Orleans. That's kind of nice. Yeah. It really is amazing.

[01:38:55] So – but there's – you got to go. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we'll hound you. Okay. Please do. Make me do it. Just my arm. I'll give you my wife's number. There. I was going to say, if you need us to write a note, we'll write a note for you. Your challenge accepted. Yeah. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. For the French school. Very cool. Well, guys, Chase, you got any other questions for – that you've always wanted to ask Thomas, but were afraid to? No.

[01:39:27] I'm afraid to? I'm not – Thomas will tell you. I'm not afraid to ask questions. No. But, you know, the biggest thing – and actually, we've had this conversation for a long time – is, you know, we've talked about getting a beginner night going. We've talked about how – what are the logistics of that? And he said, like, hey, we got to hire somebody. But the biggest problem is, is where do we find the players, right?

[01:39:57] Like, what is the avenue of bringing these people in to play, right? They've been playing maybe down in the college area for a while, or they've been playing in one – there's a ton of foosball tables in Knoxville, just to be clear. There's a ton of bars that have foosball tables, and we only go to one. Yeah.

[01:40:18] What is – like, is there a plan or a concept or a general idea of getting the word out of, hey – you know, and we wouldn't call it a beginner night, I'm sure, because nobody would think whatever, right? That's a very – I don't want to say derogatory, but, like, people don't look at, like, oh, it's a beginner. Like, it sounds terrible. Yeah. How do we get those people to come in? Well, you know, you got to find them where they are.

[01:40:47] Usually that's the best thing you can do is, like, find them in a place that they already are, that they're already playing. Like, for us, that's Cool Beams, the campus bar. There's already guys down there. There's guys down there right now probably showboating and doing all kinds of bullshit to show off to each other. It's just, you know, whatever. It's a jungle in there. It's all college kids. Like, that's where the recruiting has probably got to happen because we could just easily pick up a few people that are going to have fun and play.

[01:41:14] But, I mean, we've had all kinds of interesting ideas for how to do that. One of the things we even thought about was getting a different kind of table. Interesting. So that, like, we're all beginners, you know, and trying to, like, launch a beginner night on a new table that we all suck at. Leonhard. You know, get a Bonzini bar. Yeah.

[01:41:36] Going, you know, and have something where we're all going to be frustrated and then we can kind of, like, level that playing field, you know, and then whatever and have two different nights. Now, the issue for me is I can't do more than one night a week. That's not going to happen for me. Not now. In the future, absolutely. Probably could. But you find the influencers, right?

[01:41:57] That sounds lame to say, but, like, the people who are kind of already somewhat magnanimous and, like, will bring their friends and they have, like, their groups. And then if you can get two of those people who have, like, two different friend groups and they kind of all coalesce together, then it just happens so organically. Like, that's what happened when we first started.

[01:42:17] We had a shout out to Megan and then a couple other guys that were able to, like, really bring in a lot of just, like, preloaded friends and community that were all just interested in hanging out and playing. And then eventually they started to get good and started to get competitive. And then they grew and became, some of us grew and became real foosballers out of it. So, I mean, it always goes back to that sort of community.

[01:42:42] The more you can build a community, the more they can be friends and be kind of united in your location through that sport, whatever. And they have the cheers vibe going. They walk in. Everybody knows their name. That's what you want. That's what's going to keep them coming back. And then you've got to keep it so that they always feel like they have a chance to win and they don't have to go out and buy a table and go on tour to continue with the hobby. You want to make room for the people that are there just to hang out and play, you know, and just whatever, drink a beer.

[01:43:14] So there's opportunities, but it's just going to take more time. And as far as, like, getting the word out, that chance of doing that on social media, I mean, as everybody knows, like, it's pretty hard to market foosball over the Internet. It's mostly going to come probably through you showing up where they are. Like, for us, we were lucky that, like, Setry's was already that cool place where people were, like,

[01:43:40] interacting and playing foosball and lining up quarters organically, you know, like just the old school style. It was just a popular bar. There happened to be one table. And you could go in any night of the week and meet somebody who was there playing. If you could put up quarters and challenge them, then somebody would see that happen. They put up, you know, just like the best ideal scenario. So your location is crazy important. It's really, really important that you have a good location. And some people, to some people, that may be a parking lot out front.

[01:44:10] You know, for me, it ain't that. I want where there's a lot of, like, cross, you know, cross people happening, people, spectators walking by and stuff like that. So that's my two cents. Nice. All right. Yeah, no, it used to be you'd just run through the parking lot of a college campus and put on flyers in everybody's windshield back in the day. Oh, yeah. That doesn't work anymore. No.

[01:44:37] So I've even considered trying to put tables in, like, frat houses. Yeah. Like, how can we make, like, intercollegiate, you know, style, you know, kind of breed that competition? Because that's where my dad learned to play, you know, was a table in the frat house. Right. Yep. A lot of guys have their stories of tables in the frat house. So I was like, well, we could risk it all and put a $2,000 piece of equipment in a frat house and see what the hell happens. But, you know, maybe they'll be into it. And then maybe they play a different frat.

[01:45:05] And then there's no better force for success than that. Oh, absolutely. In terms of generating players. They'll get good quick when it's, you know, my tribe versus your tribe. Well, there's no better way to distract from a higher education, that's for sure, than a foosball table. Yeah. It would be. The collegiate level is one that's waiting to be tapped into. I'm sure Ryan's thought about that at some point. But if we can get foosball in on the collegiate level.

[01:45:35] You better believe it. So hit me up, Ryan, whenever you're ready to launch that. Do it up. I'll be walking. So my university had an inner, like, college, like, tournament. It didn't last long. Oh, interesting. Because you showed up and played? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So I showed up to the first day and it was, like, singles.

[01:46:03] And then doubles was supposed to be the next day. There was a ton of people for singles and most of them dropped out, like, 30 minutes in. No one showed up for doubles. Oh, boy. Yeah. No one showed up at all. Oh, dude. You know how to ruin a party. Dang. Yeah. And we weren't even playing on Tornado. We were playing on, like, four different weird tables that they put in. That's why. The Corona table, right? Didn't you win some Corona table? I did win the Corona tournament, yeah. And the El Hemador one, too.

[01:46:33] I play good on crap tables, actually. That's funny. No, that's actually. I'm, like, way better on a really crappy table. Yeah. The hard soccer ball that's just, like, breaking the toe off every day. That's the thing that's waiting to be discovered, really, when you think about, okay, Corona, you mean Corona beer? The Corona table was, like, a Corona. Yeah, Corona light. Yeah, yeah. Corona light table. Yeah, so Corona light had a foosball tournament. They had their own table. Oh, there you go. Yeah. They made their own table. So one side was lime wedges.

[01:47:04] The other side was bottles. And they both had, like, a little foot on them. But, like, the bottle table, because it was a bottle, then, like, a little flat foot, you couldn't pin the ball. Because the bottle, like, edge would shoot the ball out on the different angles. Like, it wouldn't pin. Oh, God. Oh, God. So the trick was is you would always get the lime side. Yeah, that's funny. Like, that kind of brings up a little bit, you know, foosball has turned into the sport

[01:47:30] direction under the current, you know, leadership. Mm-hmm. But it very easily could have gone the other way, which is the beer and alcohol direction. Yes. And just lean into what foosball, what I think foosball really is, which is a bar room game. So, like, I would, in my ideal version of the feature, it would be where, like, all these independent breweries that, you know, we have all in these different cities, they all have a table on there. And they have their, like, sponsored team and players.

[01:48:00] Yes. And then there's, like, competitions between the brands. Yeah. And, you know, like. That would be cool. You can get, that's, I mean, there could be big money. And then you could show the games in these breweries where, you know, and have the home team crowds, like, watching their guys on the road playing the Sierra Nevada crew that's, like, whatever, a number one. And you've got your little dog bullshit little town brewery that's playing some big dog team with, like, you know, that sort of stuff. Like, that's what I would like to see.

[01:48:30] And I think that's a lot of fun. But, you know, whatever. We can be. No, it's true. We can pretend to be sportsmen as well. We should go to Cool Beans on Friday. Yeah. It would be so much fun. Yeah. It's so much fun. It's insane. It's so much fun. Want to go? Yeah. Do I want to go? Of course, I will always say, yes, I want to go. But can I go? Can you go? I might can. Can you go? If I haven't, maybe. I can ask. Think about it. Let's do it. I mean, that's the nice part, too. We can go at 10 o'clock after we put the kids back. Now, there's a line out there.

[01:48:59] Anyways, this is legit. Just let me know if you can go. My wife and kids are gone. They leave tomorrow morning. They're gone till Sunday. By the way, this is. That sounds terrible. I love them. I think that would be so lonely. If you're listening to this on Twitch TV or on the podcast, this is what we call parent talk. These guys have their own lingo going on between them. I have no idea what you guys are talking about. No idea. Oh, sorry. No, you don't. No, you don't.

[01:49:25] It's just like when the two partners start communicating and they're mic'd up and nobody knows what they're talking about. Nobody knows what they're saying. It's a code. It's a code. It's a code. No, I was just going to say that there's a couple of breweries on the East Coast here that actually have been holding some impromptu tournaments. There's one south of here in Westchester County, but there's also we went to one in in Delaware. Uh, Jim Provost, who is now the president of the USTSO, uh, is the owner of something called

[01:49:54] I Love Produce. And he sponsored a tournament in Delaware in, in a brewery and it was awesome. And he paid for the entire thing. There was no entry fees. You just went and competed for, for prizes. And it was great beer. This big check here is from El Himidor. Oh, so that was a crap table that they bought on Amazon, uh, American something that we broke

[01:50:24] like three, two rods on this table. Like that's not even a joke. Like we straight up broke them shooting. Um, but that was like five grand they paid out. That's awesome. Oh yeah. All these beer companies, they have promoters, right? They have the reps who go out in the locations and they're always looking for stuff to do. So, um, if you ever want to get like free t-shirts and swag and whatever, they'll show up to your night and you say it's yeehaw night. That's what we used to do.

[01:50:52] We used to every month we would have a, like a sponsored night where like they would come and provide some prize package because they're always looking for stuff to do. Oh yeah. Um, it's, it's just part of their job. They have to do it. So they're ready and they have like real money budgets and stuff. You know, it's, it's not, especially, you know, someone like that, that's nothing to them. So there's a lot of synergy that can happen with the beer and alcohol industry, but you know, that's not family friendly.

[01:51:19] It's not for everybody, but what do you guys on the other, on the side of the, the, uh, the formula here, what do you guys think about McDonald's sponsoring, uh, eight tournaments in New York city this summer? Have you heard about that? That'd be awesome. What? Oh, it's happening. It's actually happening. McDonald's. Wait, what? McDonald's is sponsoring. It's a youth, it's a youth foosball competition. Did Mike do this? Uh, Mike, Mike Stoll. Yeah. Mike, Michael Stoll did this.

[01:51:46] Uh, he, he got McDonald's to agree to pay for the tables. Uh, they're going to put them up in, in McDonald's restaurants. They are yellow, aren't they? Are they going to get the yellow ones? Yeah, yeah. Uh, yeah, exactly right. Uh, but the tables are going to be in locations throughout New York city at different McDonald's restaurants and they're going to hold a preliminary rounds and then there's going to be a finals and it's all, uh, I think it's amazing. I think it's under 16 youth or the, or the eligible players.

[01:52:13] But if you're, if you're an actual beginner, you can go and do it. And I, dude, I, when he first told me about it, this was a couple of months ago, I thought McDonald's really, but he just announced it, uh, was it three weeks ago? Uh, just before Dallas and sure enough. A lot of these companies, all you need is FaceTime. You guys get in on the right person, talk to the right person and they're looking for, you know, that's a creative thing. That's it. You know, and you're going to show up and provide a lot of value being the promoter and knowing how to do it.

[01:52:43] And all they got to do is write a check. Some guys sitting at a desk being like, okay, sure. Yeah. Get me a raise. Yes, please. Yeah. I'm going to, you know, you know, you're going to do all the work for me. But I mean, that's amazing. They're probably going to run into a capacity issue. Oh, it's my guess. They're going to, they're going to be like, oops, there's 200 kids here today. Well, there's a, what are we going to do? And the grand prize is a $5,000 scholarship. So. Yeah. Oh, wow. That's awesome. Yeah. So that's. For this year.

[01:53:13] Motivating. Yeah. We'll see what they do next. You know what I mean? That's great. Sure. He's doing such a good job. I'm so grateful for him. Michael's. He's really. So dedicated. He's the one. He's the one that's going to flip that pyramid for us. He's going to get us healthy again. He might. Oh, he will. I mean, he's. I really hope so. It's like it doesn't get enough appreciation. I mean, it's because we're all just the old guys sitting around talking about it. But I mean, he's the one that's really building up the population. To become foosballers.

[01:53:41] All these kids are going to go forth and have the basic skill sets for when they turn, you know, 21 and they step into a bar and they're like, oh yeah. You know, like they're going to go pick some butt and all these. I mean, it's, it's a big, big, big deal. Yeah. Single-handedly is doing. Well, not single-handedly, but you know what I mean. Now, I was talking to one of the kids yesterday who came down from Plattsburgh. He's just about to graduate high school and go into college. He wants to be in computer science and he's going to, I think, Clarkson University.

[01:54:10] And he said to me, you know, I want to try and get a table on campus. I said, yeah, that's cool, man. You know, do it because you'll, you'll probably find a lot of people who want to learn. And he, this kid, uh, he's, he's what, 17 or almost 18. And he's, he's really good. He's a really good player. And he's been playing in Mark Gerlatt's program now for the better part of four or five years. And, uh, and he and his, he and his buddy, they're both named Caden, by the way.

[01:54:38] Uh, they always come down to our smash downs and do really well. And, uh, what a super smart guy. He had a, he had a really, uh, level head, you know, carried on a really great conversation, but, uh, he is, he's looking forward to college and going to, uh, to the university and bring, you know, hopefully getting a table there. Uh, that's, that's how you start. That'd be awesome. It's amazing. He's setting up the past. We got to just be ready for the catch. Like we need to be ready to catch all these kids. Yep.

[01:55:05] Cause he's going to start, they're just going to start getting thrown at us as they get older and like really becoming like talented players. There's going to be a lot, a lot of kids that come out of these school programs. Cause again, that's the best, the best scenario to get good is this, like this tribal, you know, competition amongst each other. They're going to want to be the standout. They're going to want to, especially with all those hormones that they got going on. Oh, I know. There's eventually it's going to turn into some serious foosball and, you know, and this

[01:55:35] is just the beginning. Then these kids are going to be playing. And they're going to be the freshmen now have played for four years and they're seniors. And you're going to be walloping, you know, you're going to have the whole, the whole bit. It's going to be beautiful. Yeah. They just got to be ready to get for everything we can to build the sport up, to be ready for them. And the bonus side of it too, is these kids are learning to put the phone down. Just put the phone down. Oh yeah. And play foosball in the real world for a minute. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[01:56:02] And actually just have, you know, personal contact with another person across the, across the table. That's something that they don't get on a regular basis. You know, they're, they're, uh, too many of them are, are, uh, just married to the phone, to the phone and just, you know, they don't build relationships. So, you know, there's, there's a lot of crises because of this. Um, by the way, New York state just recently banned all cell phones in schools. They did that here. Oh, good. Yeah, they did. Yeah. Excellent.

[01:56:30] Uh, a lot of people, people, including teachers are very happy about that. So it's about time. That's one of the pitches I make all the time with people in foosball. I'm like, it's physical. It's like a, you know, everybody takes a break and they're just like, they're there and they're in the moment together for, you know, extended period of time during germs, but also off their screen. Yeah. Well, there's always been that, you know, we've always had that, that risk of being in crowds, but that's good, man.

[01:56:57] I mean, they're, they're learning to, to, uh, exist in, in a society. Um, you know, I think about all the things that, that distract kids today and not just the phone, but all the other things that go with it. Um, there's just, it's so difficult to be young and to, to just, just to live a normal life, uh, just too much pressure and too much, too much information I think is also the, the problem. But, but, uh, foosball. They're all like miniature adults now. Yeah. Oh yeah. So badly.

[01:57:28] Well, think about, here's the thing. Um, if, if you were to take a, I don't know, a rotary phone, I don't think you guys, have you ever seen a rotary phone by the way? I grew up with one of those. Oh yeah. Okay. I was going to say, uh, you're old enough to know, but you know, like the average kid who's playing foosball at the age of 14, 15, 16, I have no idea what that thing is. No idea. If you're plucking down on a table in front of them, they'd say, you got to make a phone call with this thing and not tell them how to use it. Yeah. They would struggle.

[01:57:56] But at the same time, they have so much information at their fingertips, just using their phone. They can tell you anything, anything at all. If you just give them enough time to, to, to, to, to scroll and find out, um, it's just, it doesn't get stored up here. That's the problem. That's the disconnect. They don't have the capacity of saving the information they need to, to, to, to, to relay. So this foosball thing, you got to learn stuff. You got to learn it. You got to remember it.

[01:58:23] You got to understand how to react and, and, uh, adjust to other players. That's a huge deal for, for, for, for. Yeah. You'll learn a lot of emotional regulation on a foosball table. Yes, exactly. Or you may not, you can be one of those players, but yeah, generally speaking, there's a lot of life lessons to be learned on the foosball table. Oh yeah. More than people think. Yeah. It's, it's, uh, it's exciting. And I think, uh, again, like you say, Michael is on the right trail here. He's doing the, he's doing the hard work and, uh, we're going to see the benefits of that very, very soon.

[01:58:53] So, uh, wow. So speaking of, uh, of kids, uh, no, Thomas, you have two. Yep. Got two kids, a six year old girl. And like, I don't want to have your boy. Yeah. And Chase, you have how many? You're holding three boys, three boys. Oh, three boys. That's right. Three boys. Dang. Well, there's, there's, uh, almost, well, if you want to include yourself, that would be definitely a doubles, a doubles match right there for sure. But I try there, they're hit and miss.

[01:59:23] Like they'll want to play like one week. Then all of a sudden they don't want to play. And then one of them never wants to play anymore. Like never. They're kids. They they've got real short attention spans. Yeah. Right. Yeah. I did have my first, like my real proud dad moment when I said to the one and a half year old, I was like, we're going to go play foosball. And he's like, yes. And he knows he goes, okay. And he went running to the door. He knew exactly where to go and he knew exactly what I meant.

[01:59:50] And he comes down and he, he just, you know, I got him a little step up there and he just puts the balls in and spins, you know, a little bit, but like, it's still, it's beginning, you know, it's like exciting. Like it's really hyped to go play football with dad. Oh my God. You're so little. It's just adorable. It's a, it's a, it's a privilege, you know? And, uh, hopefully it continues to be a privilege for, for the foreseeable future. Um, but I say Thomas, it's, uh, it's so great that we got a chance to hang out.

[02:00:18] I know we've been talking about this getting together for quite a while. Um, what, uh, what's on your calendar, by the way, what, what's your next big event there? Uh, I don't think we have anything planned. I mean, the big thing that we're planning right now is I'm just trying to get set up with a, with a big club move and then set up the big tournaments. So it's sort of TBD. Okay. Um, wish us luck. Yeah, absolutely. Cause I'm going to keep looking. I mean, I've got all these tables now.

[02:00:46] Uh, so I'm determined to put them to good use. Very cool. That's, that's, that's the goal. Yeah. Look out for some big ones. And as always, if there's anything we can do to help, you know, and spread the word, we certainly would do that for you. No question. Oh, well, yeah, I appreciate it. I mean, you're doing it. I mean, obviously I know it's tradition. We all have to compliment you, but seriously, this is a really great resource to have this conversation. And, uh, you know, I listened to the pod every, I'm just about every week I'd listen to it.

[02:01:14] I always save it for my Tuesdays when I'm driving to a baseball. Gotcha. Yeah. I like to get hype and get in the boat and listen to what's cool. That's, that's one of the hardest. It's neat. It's one of the hardest things to figure out is when do people actually download a podcast? What's, what's the best time of the week to, to, to release it? I mean, we like to release it on Sunday nights, but you know, when do they actually go in and, and, uh, download it and listen to it? That's, uh, that's a hard thing to figure out. But, um, but of course, as long as they're listening, I guess it doesn't matter when.

[02:01:44] Well, and it, and, uh, you know, last, last time we did a show two weeks ago was 300 episodes where just, well, now we're the first of the next 300. So, uh, there, there's, there's the dubious honor of being on the show. I heard was the one baby number one. There you go. Number one, number one. Um, anyway, by the way, I know you're a patron, uh, it, and thank you so much for that, by the way.

[02:02:10] It's just, it's, it's, it's so nice to know that, uh, the people are willing to, to support this, this cause. Um, what would you like to support all your foosball innovators? Just, just a quick plug. All the foosball innovators out there, people are like, why would you need a goal silencer? I can just stick a sponge in there. I'm like, cause this guy's out here doing it. He's trying hard. Like, it's cool. Like I'm going to support everybody who's, who's doing something for foosball. Gotcha.

[02:02:36] Well, uh, by the way, what, what do you want to hear more of when it comes to, uh, Foos Talk Live or Foosball Radio? What would you like to hear more about? Uh, what would I like to hear more of? Chase, why don't you take this one? Me? Yeah. Personally, I'm, I'm big on strategy. Like I love hearing game plan strategy on the foosball table. That is big for me. Cool. You can ask Thomas. I tell him all the time.

[02:03:05] I'm like, do this, do this. Like, here's your plan to beat this individual. Like I do it often. And, and I've, I've been trying to, you know, coach Thomas for a minute now. Um, and he's one of the few that listen. So I try, I try. Remember this when he can bring conversation. Yeah. It takes a minute to get it in there, but, but, um, to me, yeah, I'm, I love strategy stuff. So anything like that, I'm all in. Yeah. Yeah. It's true.

[02:03:34] There, there are a lot of opportunities to talk, you know, tips and tricks of the trade. Like everything from like, I, I, what Mike, Mike fight the other day was talking about what he ate, you know, like these like little management tips, like how he like regulates his blood sugar throughout the tournament days, you know, like how you can do over, you can get over caffeinated. You can start drinking too early, you know, how you handle the nerves, uh, what you do physically to like, make sure that you're not injuring yourself or what, you know,

[02:04:03] like I'm sure people are, have their little exercise routines that they do literally just for foosball. Uh, you need to be able to stand on your feet. You need to be able to not, you know, rip your bicep in half. Yeah. See, he's got like this little tool here. Some people use like little grippy things. Yeah. No, I mean, there's a lot of topics you guys can still, you can still dive into. I thought the kid thing was kind of interesting. Yeah. Um, you know, talking to the pros, that's always, obviously always good.

[02:04:31] Uh, the promoters are always interesting. I love hearing about their struggles. I think that's, that's, uh, that's a really great idea. We should probably maybe plan something out once a month where we have a specific person on just to talk their, their, uh, their top strategies, you know, just, just for that purpose alone. That's a really good idea. Um, I'm, I'm down for it, man. I think there's, there's so many, so many things we need to talk about. We just haven't had an opportunity to do yet. So, uh, whenever you think of anything, just, you know, by all means, if you're listening

[02:05:00] to this podcast or you're watching on Twitch, Hey, we'd love to hear from you. Love to hear from you. So it's, uh, it's, we can't do this alone. Right, Chase? 100%. I mean, we could, but people may not watch. Right. Exactly. But, uh, no, Thomas, thank you again for, for, for taking the time to talk to us tonight, but also for your support, man. I really, really appreciate it. Oh, of course. This is fun. It's entertaining. It's great.

[02:05:29] Well, uh, last words, Chase, anything? Happy foosin'. Yeah. Happy foosin'. And, uh, you've been listening to episode number 301 of Foos Talk Live with Thomas Dyke from Knoxville, Tennessee, a great promoter and really great, uh, supporter of this, of the sport of foosball. And we're looking forward to the future for both you, Thomas, and everybody else who, who plays in your crew. But, um, we also want to see you out on the road sometime very soon. Yeah, me too. Cool.

[02:05:59] Well, stick around because we have a lot to talk about tonight when it comes to the Foos Talk Live tournament beat. It's coming your way in just a few seconds. Time now for the Foos Talk Live tournament beat brought to you in part by foosgadgets.com. Using technology to create a better foosball experience. And by Boise Foosworks. High Fidelity Refurbished Foosballs. Professional foosball is a game of precision, a matter of accuracy, consistency.

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[02:07:26] 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. The World Foosball Tour presents the 2026 National Championships in North American Cup. June 24th through the 28th. Caesars Casino and Hotel Elizabeth, Indiana. Here comes the 2026 Mississippi State Foosball Championships.

[02:07:54] July 23rd through the 26th at Holiday Inn Pearl, Mississippi. The 2026 Ohio State Championships. July 30th through August 2nd. The competition comes to a new hotel. The Ohio Airport Marriott. Columbus, Ohio. East Coast Foosball presents the Duval Foosball Tournament. August 7th through the 9th at the Dart Bar, Jacksonville, Florida.

[02:08:21] Canada Foosball presents the 2026 Vancouver Island Foosball Championships. August 14th through the 16th. Courtenay Legion. Courtenay, British Columbia. The World Foosball Tour presents the 2026 World Foosball Championships. September 2nd through the 6th at the Hyatt Regency. New Orleans, Louisiana. It's the 2026 Great Lakes Classic. Now scheduled for October 15th through the 18th. We'll keep you posted on the details.

[02:08:50] The North Carolina State Championships. Scheduled for November 26th through the 29th. More details soon to be released. It's the 20th Annual 2026 Louisiana State Championships. December 3rd through the 6th. Stay tuned for lots more details. 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.

[02:09:17] Tune in every week for the Foos Talk Live Tournament Beat. The Foos Talk Live Tournament Beat is brought to you in part by foosgadgets.com. Using technology to create a better foosball experience. And by Boise Foos Works. High-fidelity refurbished foosballs. Foos Talk Live is a product of Foosball Radio. With gratitude, we recognize our Foos Ball Radio Patreons. Our Foos Talk Live sponsor.

[02:09:48] Original-Leonhard-USA.com Tune in again next week for another episode of Foos Talk Live. In the meantime... We'll see you foosin'. END