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EP. 41 | Toronto 2026 Recap
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Hello, everyone! This is Episode 41 of "The Show 6 Podcast", where we bring you the highest quality coverage of the Play! Pokémon Championship Series for Pokémon GO! We explore the plays, the players, and everything else happening in the competitive scene.
Welcome in to the Show 6 Podcast, where we break down the Championship Series for Pokémon GO. Today, we're recording our 1st episode of the 2026 calendar year! We'll be covering the 2026 Toronto Regionals, where 219 trainers competed. Toronto was the city of underdogs, and Kelssseyk and DHCUnited pushed themselves to new heights to reach the Grand Finals. The meta was filled with Empoleon, Altaria, Shadow Kanto Marowak, Florges, and Guzzlord, and it was absolute cinema from start to finish.
In this episode, we'll review the players, the Pokémon, and the epic storylines of this events. We're excited to be back and continue our journey through the Championship Series!
So, if you're ready... go ahead and lock In, and good luck, have fun!
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Transcript
D&C: The Ultimate Underdogs?
00:00:16
Speaker
I mean, where the heck should I really even start? Kelsey Kelly and her girls battled hard. But D&C was the top underdog. Thinking back to the fact they were stacked, thought these stats wasn't facts, but upsets, reads the bars.
00:00:29
Speaker
got two hikes, one press record. Yeah, we win, throw your boots to the board. We got big stats coming on the way. We got storylines coming off the page. got ZZ with me at a day, yeah.
00:00:41
Speaker
There's a big gap between us in the game. In the next life, I'm trying to cast the same. When we drop, yeah, you better press play.
Welcome to 2026: Show 6 Podcast Launch
00:01:20
Speaker
Hello and welcome everyone. Welcome back to the Show 6 Podcast. This is our first episode of calendar year 2026. I'm your co-host, Expedia Chief 2, with my co-host, Ziz Rylas, who's all all big smiles during that intro. Did you find something funny about that?
00:01:37
Speaker
i thought I found a delightful, Speedy. I feel like that's how I want to phrase it. um I did not know what to expect for the intro. You did announce it to me as inspired by the little musical number that I did for our pre-Christmas episode.
Musical Intro: Hit or Miss?
00:01:54
Speaker
and yeah that was that was certainly something i honestly thought that was that was really really good because my last musical impression of you was during the time when i think ah crimson and mish started that where people made um pokemon go inspired music videos and you tried your luck at one of these and i think that was met with mixed responses this one I have to say, not bad.
00:02:21
Speaker
Not bad at all. And not bad is the biggest compliment in Germany. so Yes, yes, absolutely. I mean, honestly, that's yeah yeah that's probably the best I could have hoped for coming from in German.
00:02:35
Speaker
Was it the UDI sponsorship that I did way back then when I was trying to dance like friends? Yes, yes, yes. I do remember that vividly. The visuals are stuck in my head more than the audio, which made me want a bunch of The thing I should have done is I should have cut the dance from Friends right next to my dance. So people wouldn't say, oh he looks like he's gone off the deep end. They could see what I was going for. I would not have gotten the reference back then.
Embracing the Corny: Why It Matters
00:03:00
Speaker
Nobody did. Kind of like the Charlie Brown reels that we're seeing now where people do the Charlie Brown dances out in public. Those are awesome. If I could dance that well, I i definitely would. But yeah, I spent um i spent probably two days writing that that intro and just trying to make it like...
00:03:15
Speaker
the least amount corny as possible, right? Because it could have gotten really corny. Hopefully it wasn't too bad. I think one should allow oneself to be a little corny from time to time. I think life is less fun if you have to take yourself seriously all the time. I try.
00:03:35
Speaker
so This will spiral into so many anecdotes because this in a way also... um your code, not codecaster for this event, but general NA caster Rise to Occasion.
00:03:46
Speaker
um um I don't know, he didn't really go viral with that, I don't think, but some of my friends really enjoyed when he recently did like a mini series of...
NA Casters: Ryze's Antics & More
00:03:58
Speaker
intros that could be drake intros over beats that he posted on i don't know whether that was tiktok or something and yeah i as somebody who does not listen to drake at all um i was like not sure whether he was just like covering a song or making it up and after a while i figured that he made this up on the spot and that made it so much funnier because it could it should be the real thing on unexpected So yeah, certainly a talented bunch of NA cast as we got.
00:04:29
Speaker
um I'm telling you, Ryze is a hilarious person. He comes across as as two things, competitive and shy. But if you ever watch his streams, like you said, making up fake Drake intros, I remember tuning into one of his streams where he was just listening to AI country music the whole time. remember talking to him.
00:04:46
Speaker
Just like hysterical nonsense. And then ah I got a chance to hang out with him a bit this weekend and he's just got like this smirk that he does, right? when He looks like he knows something that you that you don't know or maybe you're both in on the secret. It's hard to tell. But he's got like this smirk that he makes and he just cracks me up. Very, very fun person to be around.
00:05:05
Speaker
But yeah.
Toronto Event Recap: Over 200 Trainers
00:05:06
Speaker
Well, we've got a really fun episode. We're going to do our Toronto recap. It was snowy. It was icy. we had lots of flight delays. a lot of people that I think were kind of up in the air, no pun intended, about whether or not they would make it. But in the end, we had over 200 trainers attend, which is honestly... insane not only for for any regional those weather conditions but one in canada i think that's by far the best attendance we've ever had at a canadian regional and uh yeah we've got some themes to talk about we're goingnna discuss the meta and uh some players too so don't know all the continents too like we had latim representation we had people from europe flying over we even had japanese battles competing so certainly a little more like an international than a regional
00:05:55
Speaker
Exactly.
International Attendance: A Global Gathering
00:05:56
Speaker
i mean, Javier V20 from Peru was a very late registration. I didn't see him on the list, but then he just kind of walked into the venue on Friday. I was like, oh, Javier's here. Marto from Argentina, a ton of Brazilians. Like you said, really good LATAM representation, two trainers from Japan. And yes, some really, really good storylines. So... I'm excited to to hear what you think, though. What are your initial
Fashion Forward: Co-host's Winter Wardrobe
00:06:17
Speaker
thoughts? Because I was there.
00:06:18
Speaker
I think a lot of people at NA watched the stream. Hopefully they enjoyed it. I actually felt really good about our cast this weekend. But from your from your perspective, what is what stood out to you?
00:06:29
Speaker
um First and foremost, your fashion choices. Yeah. layers well yeah We're going there already. yep Former co-caster Wholesome Underscore, No Longer Underscore, No Longer Casting, Jim Lawson, also very well known to have like a little bit of a sense of fashion that goes against the, oh, I'll just get a suit and that's it for the weekend type of like safe way of dressing.
00:07:02
Speaker
um And yeah, I like what you did there. And I feel like that must have been a very cozy way of dealing with the Canadian cold as well. So both practical but practical and elegant. um Certainly one of the positives of this weekend in my eyes.
00:07:19
Speaker
Well, I mean, but the compliments just don't stop, right? i didn't sit to To have a a positive song review and then follow that up with a a positive turtleneck review. I feel like I'm mom walking on on cloud nine right now. No, it's definitely a an ode to Jim. And then, of course, if you're going to wear a turtleneck at any time, um cold weather is the best time. It was funny because I'm...
00:07:42
Speaker
I'm a a profuse sweater. I sweat constantly all the time. And on Saturday when I wore the black turtleneck, I had to take off my jacket and like air it out a little bit from in between casting rotations.
00:07:57
Speaker
But then on Sunday, I was actually accustomed to the cold and there was a Starbucks like two blocks away from the hotel. So i got ah got out of the room, went downstairs, and I just wore my sweater and my vest and pants, and I just walked to the Starbucks. And it felt great, actually, because it was pretty cold outside. But um the only thing that really bothered me were my ears. It really cold for the ears for some reason.
00:08:21
Speaker
Otherwise, it was good. um Yeah, I thought we had a really good ah
Toronto Meta: Unexpected Picks & Trends
00:08:25
Speaker
team there. Always a pleasure to work with Butters. So Caleb, Butters' birthday, which is always a big event. And I feel like we had a lot of fun. So yeah, let's so let's talk about meta though, because some things were big surprises and other things were kind of expected. We knew Empolion Altaria was going to be good. We knew Farratt would be everywhere. Yeah.
00:08:46
Speaker
But then other things, like for example, our are brilliant casters ah picked Shadow, Canto, and Merowai to be on the downslide terms of usage. And then it was like all over the top cut. We picked Gastrodon to be the better Mud Slapper. And also Corviknight kind of popping up out of nowhere. um Double Flyers was a big theme as well, like Altaria, Corviknight as a duo. And then as you pointed out before we turned the camera, ah three flying types on the winning team, which feels like, you know, a Sunfist Prey. And to that point, Where's the European pancake?
00:09:19
Speaker
Yeah, like it it very much only ah um featured on the teams of the European top cutters in Colin Six and Stone Collection, who took home a bronze medal, which is like um' very impressive to do it on two continents. And now um with with a little bit of ah of a buffer ahead of the second placed European sitting atop the leaderboards.
00:09:42
Speaker
um But also, as he pointed out in his third place interview, um Can't actually put that much more space between himself and the second best person in Europe right now, because this was already his sixth regional international event. So every event from now on that he has a high finish in, it will only replace one of his previous ones. But to just have that high level consistency is already impressive enough.
Meta Evolution: Precious Paths Continuity
00:10:11
Speaker
but yeah north america not really um on the pancake train there's like ah a pseudo pancake as i like to call it on ss thorn's team with the shadow steelix um that is also kind of a ground type that does electric damage um kind of can function in a similar role but overall yeah a european staple almost nowhere to be found in north america And another thing that I think we should point out is that this is the first regional of the current Precious Paths meta, which feels strange to say because we've been in that meta for a month and a half, but we did have the lengthy winter break.
00:10:50
Speaker
Now we're back to consistent regionals. We have the triple header this weekend in Auckland, Merida, and Birmingham. But yeah, this was essentially a first look at the meta. And what I would say,
00:11:04
Speaker
first and foremost is that this is a continuation rather than a disruption, right? Because the Pokemon that we see succeed are for the most part still Pokemon that we already saw on many, many top cutting teams in the previous meta.
00:11:24
Speaker
think the cores are pretty much similar. We have dragons like Ataria and Ghazalord. We have steel types like Corviknight and Shadow Scizor, Empoleon as well.
00:11:35
Speaker
Then we have neutral Pokemon like Furret that made a splash. We have, oh yeah, exactly. That is that is something that you brought up just now. um The Mud Slab role on
Pokémon Favorites: Canto Marowak & Gastrodon
00:11:47
Speaker
a team. Like every team has, or like almost every team has a ground type.
00:11:52
Speaker
um Many, many episodes ago, you once brought up that a very small percentage of tournament winning teams ever i did so without a ground type. So was like a very essential role on every line of six.
00:12:06
Speaker
um And yeah, why is it Cantu Merouac that takes it here featuring on both of the grand finalist teams rather than the a little bit bulkier, a little bit um less exciting but more reliable Gastrodon?
00:12:21
Speaker
And I think the answer to that lies in the big uptick in Altaria as well as in the capability of Marowak to win some two-shield scenarios that Gastrodon struggles with. For example, against Suferit, you can Brute Force through it with your Mud Slabs, with your Bone Clubs.
00:12:43
Speaker
In the two-shield scenario, you can't really do that with Gastrodon as easily. And also, if you have your Gastrodon on an Altaria, that will just lead to you losing that matchup and the Altaria having Charter deck and a half loaded for the next matchup.
00:12:57
Speaker
Whereas a Cantor Marowak, you can answer that with your Altaria, but at least the non-shadow Artaria will always have to invest a shield to counterswap and win the matchup in the zero shield scenario. So um just a little more well positioned in into the other meta staples.
00:13:16
Speaker
Yeah, as you look at the top meta here for Toronto, it looks like the only team without a ground type is actually Doombug's team, and he had the Shadow Primate. I thought that was a really good pick because if you want to break up the Empoleon Altaria core, there are a few Pokémon that do that better than Primate. Just the Ice Punch utility, the Karate Chops, the Rage Fist, it seems like a very solid pick. Also, it helps counter all the normal types in the meta, like the the new Licky Licky, which I think is is a relative newcomer, and the Furret that we always expect to see. But to your point about Shadowcantamera, we have those like little slides that pop up on stream, and they just talk about like Pokemon that are on the rise or on the decline. And our ah brilliant all-knowing casters put Shadowcantamera on the decline because we thought it was just wasn't as durable as Gastrodon. But you make an excellent point. I did see at least two or three walk slides connecting to Altario's over the weekend. And the potency of the mudslap is really a defining role for the Marowak. I think if Gastron ever gets a shadow form, which we have to assume eventually it will, it might be little bit of an equalizer just because that water subtype being superior bulk helps it a lot. But if you look at a lot of these teams with the Cantor Marowak, I mean...
00:14:26
Speaker
That is one of their high offense Pokemon, and when they had it in their trio, they were shielding it quite often, right? You don't need to shield your Azumarill, Altaria, Furr, and Lickilickie if you're lost in Cody because you have your Cantumarowak and your Scizor, right? So it's all about rules and I guess shield allocation. um Yeah, I'd say the Shadow Scizor, like you pointed out, we come to expect that. and come to expect the Empoleon. Corvinet was a bit of a surprise. It's such a neutral wedge in a lot of these teams, and it's pretty difficult to deal with if you don't have ah a Townflame or an Electrotype on your side. So we always talk about the meta as being a moving target. I feel like the lack of fighters, the lack of electrics have both informed kind of this dual flyer plus water style meta with one Mud Slapper. There were some interesting teams as well. Will D's team was diabolical, to say the least. I mean, Will D had Toe Skrull, Volt Switch Fortress, Furl, Bastiodon, Rikli Tuff, and Azumarill. And I know Will D from GBLA. He's definitely a a leaderboard climber. But I mean, this was just devious. And then you look at the trainers he was taking down. It's like, man, I bet they are raging right now having lost to a Toe Skrull.
00:15:37
Speaker
I will say, um this is a very Wieldy style of team, so it does have some experience with the Pokémon. um But yeah, like if you have World Switch Fortress on your team, what are the Empoleon plus Flying-type cores really going to do to you?
00:15:53
Speaker
So I think that in particular was a really solid meta read. And Toadscrew kind of doubles down on Gastrodon's weakness of having no play into Flying-types.
00:16:04
Speaker
um But what it does is also doubling down on having a little bit of a head-to-head advantage into the other Mudstrappers. So would be kind of nice. Also pretty bulky Pokémon.
00:16:15
Speaker
Overall, a very bulky team. And yeah, certainly a little more alignment-dependent than others. A little. it is It is one of the play styles, right? So you can't ever... like People like Wildy is why...
00:16:30
Speaker
You can't just ignore a certain Pokemon in your team building and go for like, oh, maybe I can put this neutral thing on here. I can put this neutral thing on here. No, you need the Mud Slipper. There is a Basiodon and it is coming for you.
00:16:44
Speaker
Exactly. And we talked about this a little bit on the stream. um i hate always to always do this, but it's just like the best example that I could come up with. But I always talk about Colin facing off against Fletch Ender at EUIC. And i just, it was just a silly example, but I think I brought it up again. And then when i look back at the VOD, I saw people actually typing Fletch Ender in the chat. And at this at this point, Colin's got to, he's got to hate me ah for that. But yeah. Yeah, I think the best trainers are able to handle the curveballs and also the Pokemon you expect.
00:17:13
Speaker
Satyre with the Thievul, when I saw that I thought of you. Definitely um a Fox Pokemon that you have had success with in grassroots. Maybe maybe in a future regional? What do you think? I will i will see about that. I will not compete in any Open Grade League region before the March meta update.
00:17:34
Speaker
I will be at UIC and I'm greatly looking forward to that because... that will mark the end of a three and a half month competitive hiatus. And that is too many months. um So we'll be back soon. We'll have to see about will the Wilder Fox um making waves. But OK, this is a little bit of trivia.
00:17:54
Speaker
Name a trainer who had success. I will define success as making at least a top three placement in your group.
00:18:07
Speaker
um with Sevil before. There's two correct answers.
00:18:15
Speaker
Can you tell me which regions? There is one in Europe and one in North America I'm thinking of. I'm sorry, Zizi. I'm gonna fold immediately. i don't know.
00:18:27
Speaker
Okay, the European trainer who had success with the ZIVOL is E.U. Auden, who piloted a double Fox team with Alola Ninetales and ZIVOL at the Stuttgart Regional.
00:18:39
Speaker
That's right. And the North American trainer who had success with ZIVOL coming, i think, seventeenth in Vegas is none other than DHC United, our Toronto Regional Champion.
00:18:52
Speaker
Wow, ah how the um how the timelines collide, right? I mean, everybody was talking this weekend about how this was DHG's second overall tournament. I didn't even draw that connection. I think this is just like, your your brain is like a ah database, right? But I'm not as well equipped to remember all those things. I just had like reason to look at the foxes after I was like, oh, evil is good.
00:19:17
Speaker
Somebody should run it. And then I look at people who run it. um Yeah, that was the very first tournament that DHC United played in Las Vegas. um And he had the Thiebel on the scene.
00:19:28
Speaker
He did come 17th. And I think another thing, this is all just trivia, but one remarkable thing about his run was that he lost his very first round and then went on a seven-match win streak to finish 17th.
00:19:42
Speaker
Like, some people get medals winning seven games in a row. So the potential was there all along, is what I'm saying. Wow, that's insanely impressive. And I think also, I mean, if you're already there, if you already traveled all the way to the regional, why not just, you know, push yourself as hard as you can and in trying to win some games. So yeah, that's a strong foundation. So it really shouldn't be that big of a surprise that he turned around and won here in s Toronto. So, ah but yeah, I wish we had ah a database where we could track all the Pokemon usage, where we could kind of look over these things. I wanted to make a couple of points about some meta picks. I don't know about you, ZZ, but I am...
00:20:21
Speaker
Absolutely so, so happy that Guzzlord is back in the meta. It's my favorite Pokémon to play. It's a beast, it's a titan, it's so oppressive. The Sludge Bomb tech helps it against the Fairy types, and Grudal Swing is just so fast, only nine turns. I love that Guzzlord is back. That was one prediction that I made that actually stuck. Also, we had Azumarill on the opposing side coming in. Azumarill, I believe, on day number one was only around 28%, but then I think it jumped quite a bit, almost to 50% when we look at ah day number two. Yeah, they're actually 1, 2, 3, 4. They finish in third and in fourth place, so Azu getting two medals.
00:21:00
Speaker
yeah If I was Ossius Aurelius, I would not make a bet that Azu isn't winning a tournament anytime soon. at this point because there appears to be a comeback of the bunny and feel like that could have something to with like not only altaria being so prevalent now but also little bit of a decline in credily usage because if you look the of credily used to be all over the place and now we only really see it on it's a satire's team um so yeah that was it used to be a pretty miserable matchup with this like actually actually a one grass type that i was meta for a little while and now kind of falling to the wayside a little bit, which in turn allows Azu to contend again.
00:21:49
Speaker
That's a really good point. um One Pokemon I did want to ask you about. ZZ, we need a hot take coming from you because we saw this, I think, in the first two or even the first three stream matches. This Pokemon basically took over the entire game when it got the Night Slash boost. Hot take.
00:22:06
Speaker
Do you think that Scizor needs a nerf? I believe so, yeah. thing It just is so oppressive that Like, I don't believe it's bad if a Pokemon is strong, and I also believe that squishy Pokemon, Pokemon with a lower stat product than others, theres need overpowered moves to help them out a little.
00:22:31
Speaker
But what Scizor does is that it can just snowball into such a dominant position that you are not really able to play your way out of that unless you um bring dedicated high-level counters to it and just immediately shut it down like Talonflame, which in turn opens you up to other types of RPS scenarios. So with how bullet punch is only really used on Lucario, which also has False Palm and Metagross, which also has Shadow Claw, I would think that it's a fairly harmless adjustment to maybe just shave off one point of damage per bullet punch and therefore rain and scissor a little.
00:23:18
Speaker
um It still has the ability to run Fury Cutter as well if it wants to. It would make it a pretty different Pokémon, but I think at this point it has dominated the meta for long enough so that we could accept it just getting taken down a notch.
00:23:36
Speaker
So fingers crossed for the March update. We see a little Scizor nerf, perhaps? would I would really like some big changes in March, not because I dislike this meta,
00:23:48
Speaker
but because I feel as if it really has been a continuous evolution of the same meta since June. And i feel like having nine months of essentially the same stuff, it's it's neither too long nor too short. i feel like that's a good amount of time that we can give a meta to breathe.
00:24:09
Speaker
But now a little bit of a shakeup would very much be welcome. That's totally fair. I agree. I think we need a new kind of Murdo Saperandi or MO. We need like a new foundation in order to kind of have an exciting meta. And if you think about it as well, we're we're basically at the halfway point of the season by the time the March updates come around, because then we've got March on through the summer and then Worlds.
00:24:33
Speaker
And we kind of need to set that new foundation now so that we can tweak it and get a really well defined meta going into NAIC, PJCS and Worlds. I think that's a great way to think about it. um One other note that I'll make just before we exit our our meta discussion here is that if you look at DHC United Team a few other teams here,
00:24:53
Speaker
I think that Martyn's Alola Ninetales actually had a lot of play, even in this current existing meta, in this iteration. And if we do see more Univ and Sunfisk in Birmingham ah this upcoming weekend, I think A9 might be the play. Was there anything else that you wanted to say about the meta? Anything that surprised you? um I would say that this wasn't the most surprising of all regionals.
00:25:17
Speaker
um One little... a little nugget of information that I want to give to our opponents, our listeners. They're not our opponents, they're our friends, our listeners. on the home is Is that we see some um we see some regular Altaria, we see some Shadow Altaria, for example, on Javier's team in seventh place.
00:25:42
Speaker
And that matchup, that mirror matchup between Altaria and Shadow Altaria, can actually be very one-sided depending on the IVs on your Altaria.
00:25:53
Speaker
You want to get the break point and also the bulk point. So you want a little bit of attack and all the defense you can get, and that makes your Altaria an Altaria Slayer if you are on either side of the Shadow versus non-Shadow matchup.
00:26:10
Speaker
It doesn't matter for Shadow versus Shadow, doesn't matter for non-Shadow versus non-Shadow, but if only one of them is Shadow, defense stat matters a lot so you can run an altaria that is straight up an altaria counter if you're into that we are in the middle of a rocket event right now it's a very short rocket event but if you hit up those normal type rounds not flying type normal type um you may find this problem and if it's a defense weighted one you may be in luck I always, ah this is a this is a small side note, but right now, whenever I face the normal type rocket, my lead is Lucario. And it's not the best lead because sometimes the Swablu has Peck. So if you have any idea what what a great Pokemon that would be that beats normal and flying types in that in that rocket rotation, let me know. Because for some reason, my brain is just blanking on that.
00:27:03
Speaker
I'm just running my Ice Fang Shorum because that thing has more than 5,000 CP, so the neutral matchups are dominant anyway, and we just just take it from there.
00:27:14
Speaker
True. Okay. Well, I'm excited to see what the meta looks like. Like you said, we're heading into a triple header, and that's that's going to tell us a lot about what's going on. it's also kind of the last, in my opinion, the last burst of this meta for a while, because I think after this weekend, everyone is going to shift their focus over towards EUIC, which of course is a limited meta where you're not going to see most of these picks that were popular in s Toronto and beyond. But I'd love to talk about the players a little bit. Toronto had a theme. we mentioned it about 67,000 times on the broadcast. We called it up Upset City.
00:27:48
Speaker
Yeah, I'm just, ah I'm really funny today, huh? We called it Upset City, and for good reason. I'm going to read off some of these upsets to you here, Cece, because it's honestly mind-blowing when you look at this in this way. I'll make a little timestamp here to let us know where we're going.
00:28:05
Speaker
And here we go. Winners round three, LNDS Kanan, beaten by H. Sheera. Magic Mason, beaten by Athie. Sceptile Ice, beaten by Mr. Ace. Ashton Ash, defeated by Phoenix Dark. Jjan Eleven, beaten by Lawson Cody.
00:28:20
Speaker
LNDS Corelash, lost to Ivy Pips. And Marta Galday, lost to Jody Twelve. Also, Dailat Chong, lost to Jello Too Good. If you look at Winners Round 2, Pocket it loses to Kiera Button right at the start the tournament and then is knocked out by Kisen Losers Round 4, a trainer from Japan.
00:28:42
Speaker
Three elite trainers made it to Group B semis before they were knocked down, that being LNDS Harjeff, who lost to Brad Nitsky, EO Merrow losing to Final Boss AJ, and Colin Sixx losing to Battle Bill. But there's an asterisk there because Colin did come back and win 2-0 on stage. I call that matchup Colin's revenge. But I mean, my goodness, you're looking at four regional champions from left to right, from from across multiple regions, all being beaten within the first five or six rounds of competition and a big bulk of them being beaten by round three.
00:29:13
Speaker
Upset City, is it feels like it's more than just a mantra. It feels like that actually was the case. think with a tournament that attracts so many big names, you are bound to have some upsets, but it was quite impressive how well lesser known trainers held their own against some of the more decorated names in the scene.
00:29:34
Speaker
I also remember, think that was like the the last group that Mategra, who is a friend of mine on ah on a friendly faction, Deliberte is the word, actually having a pretty sick loser bracket run and taking out world's number four L&D as Corlash, which is,
00:29:54
Speaker
Also something that probably wasn't really a thing that many people had so suspected before, beating Delusion in the previous round. That's people that we have seen on stage before, just like um really, really like finding their tournament exit fairly early, which goes to show that um if you have so many good players in the scene, but only 16 places in top cut, you can't expect all the 50,
00:30:24
Speaker
players that have reached Top Cut before to make it again. um So certainly no shade to any of the people who may not have met their personal expectations um during this weekend.
00:30:37
Speaker
But it also just shows the depth of talent that we have in the pool. And um the narrative of Upset City was one that I don't know whether I would go as far as to call it controversial. But there was a moment in the grand finals interview between DHC United and Kelsey K. um Where that was like brought up, like, how does it feel to go into these matches as the underdog and having to defeat people who may have multiple original titles to their name? And I think one thing that Kelsey said, what that stuck with me was Rice actually wasn't all that intimidating because I've played him in GBL before. It's still the same guy.
00:31:21
Speaker
And if I can beat them in GBL from time and time again, then I'll probably be able to hold my own on the big stage as well. And I think that's a pretty good attitude. And um I think that highlighting the upset runs, the underdog stories, it's not really being done by you casters to like sort people into categories like, oh these other players that are supposed to succeed And those are the players that aren't supposed to succeed. I don't think it's about that.
00:31:53
Speaker
It's more about highlighting that players who may not think that regional championships are for them to show them that their GBL experience can translate into actually super impressive runs.
00:32:09
Speaker
And I think that is best exemplified by people like Kelsey, by people like DHC. who have their GBL accolades, but maybe not yet their breakout tournaments.
00:32:20
Speaker
And just by like centering that and highlighting that, I think that can be a big inspiration. And i think both of our grand finalists did a great job, like both very articulate, very humble as well.
00:32:35
Speaker
um And I believe that um that was just great represent representation of the depth of talent that have the world. I felt like their answers were great. The interviewer probably could use some work. He wasn't the best, honestly. Didn't didn't ask ah great questions, if I'm being honest. But but no, I think that ah pulling out ah emotional responses is definitely something that I kind of feel is one of my strengths when I do interviews. I really want to focus on how it feels, right? And going beyond the game, i want to focus on what it feels like to invest your time and energy and patience and and attention into something And then turn around and have it actually come to fruition. and um, yeah, it's, it's a tough, tough kind of tightrope to walk, right? Because on the one side, you have multiple regionals where you have like repeat winners, right? Oh, Martijn won two events in one season and we're not even halfway through or, seasons past where Doombug won three events in a single season and Wild Jeffs won the other two. It's like, man, uh, You have a lot of people that say, man, why would I even go to this regional? Because I know that one of these top players is going to be there and they're likely going to sweep. i mean, seriously, I got a a direct message on Sunday morning. I think Elam had just won his first match on stream.
00:33:50
Speaker
He got a direct message. Wow, this is crazy. They're really going to let Elam just win another tournament is the message I got. I'm just thinking like, man. this this This is wild, right? Like the expectations are so high for these players that have already won events. We just expect them to win again. um So yeah, it's it's tough to kind of highlight the players ah because you don't want to pigeonhole them. You don't want to say, well, you are the beat team or you are the lesser player and you just are getting really lucky. That's not at all what we're saying whatsoever. We're just trying to highlight that players that aren't consistently top cutting, consistently winning, that doesn't mean that you can't break through and find find your moment. I mean, if you look at the winner side bracket, right, we had It's a Satire, Lawson Cody, D&C United, Kelsey K, Neuro Dillon, and then we had the three regional champions in Elam, Javier V20, and Nighttime Clasher.
00:34:38
Speaker
But then you look at the loser side bracket, Stone Collection, Carlin, SS Thorn, Rise, Doom Bug, Jackaloco, and the only two to not win events were Will D and HD MV. And when you look at players like HGMV, I said this a couple of times during the cast, I feel like he was actually mechanically one of the better looking players the entire weekend. I was very, very impressed by HGMV.
00:34:59
Speaker
um But yeah, to your point, it's it's not to like demean anyone or to put anybody in a spot. It's just... um Yeah, we we just want to tell new players that you don't have to be calling six to win an event. You don't have to be Pato man, right? You can actually just come in, do your best and and succeed. And I think yeah and I talked about this before the camera went on. We should have gotten a hint that DHC might have been the real deal based on his performance in Vegas, right?
00:35:27
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And also kind of his performance at LAIC where he did make top cut and he did so with a Galarian Rapidash. I feel as if one thing that DHC hasn't gotten any credit for yet is how spicy of a player he is because his three runs came with aie a Thievul, a Galarian Rapidash, and a Shadow Gyarados. He in IC, he won an event, and then he came 17th in his very first event.
00:35:53
Speaker
So, like, there's something there. He's, like, kind of the the Spice Lord that I aspire to be, and he's only three tournaments in. So I don't know if you can relate to this, ZZ, but i've I've been watching some clips on Instagram of people reacting to watching Naruto for the first time. i don't know if you've ever watched the the anime. It's fantastic. But some of the moments, right, like Rock Lee's fight versus Gaara, all the weeps that are listening will get this, or, you know, Madara taking on the five Kage in the fourth great ninja war.
00:36:26
Speaker
These moments, just watching people react for the first time, It's so awesome to see them just be like, ah oh, my God, you know this is happening, and and now this person's dead, and i don't know what to do, and they're just panicking. and All the emotions, right? All the emotions.
00:36:40
Speaker
What I get when I look at DHC is kind of like somebody who's looking at competitive Pokemon Go with fresh eyes, just like that. And it's really cool to see him kind of look at a meta and not be kind of, don't want to say burdened, but kind of not not to carry all this baggage from these past years about what you expect to be good, what your friends say is good, what your screen partners tell you is good, what the top usage says is good. And he just picks something that he thinks is cool and viable and just makes it work.
00:37:09
Speaker
And I don't know, sometimes I really wish just for a little while, I could just have fresh eyes looking at competitive Pokemon Go because I think it'd be so cool. And I see so many things that are right now I just kind of miss. I don't know if you relate to that at all, but that's how I feel. he Also, I think another thing is if you're expected to do well, if there's like a baseline expectation that people may have of you, whether that's something that you you largely imagine because of what like maybe in previous broadcasts has been your baseline. Maybe it's because you have a lot of friends who are also very competitive and really successful and you just want to keep up with them.
00:37:47
Speaker
um I think that discourages you from taking risks and that also influences your team building. Whereas DHC, I think in one of his interviews, he said, oh, like I've been playing PVP since like 2020, 2021.
00:38:02
Speaker
I've been getting more into show six ever since joining a faction playing in better frontier. And then I just decided, oh, this would be the year where I start competing in the official series. And my goal is to qualify for worlds and qualifying for worlds is not an easy feat.
00:38:19
Speaker
Um, but you only have to come within like the top 80 something trainers in North America, probably, which is easier said than done given the level of talent we see at events like Toronto.
00:38:31
Speaker
Um, But it's something where you may feel as if if you trust your baseline skill level, then you can afford to maybe run a pick that's little more out there. Because, like, what what do you have to lose?
00:38:48
Speaker
Like, as long as you get some points every time, you'll reach your goal. You don't have to, like, play it super safe because, oh, maybe maybe it's it's too risky. Maybe I shouldn't try that. Maybe I should just get, like, a the consistent, the the boring team every time and nobody can judge me for it.
00:39:08
Speaker
um But yeah, if you just go in there to to have fun and that is probably a good way of exploring teams that are more potent than what is general, like the the public so opinion of a good team. Because if everybody just runs the top six meta Pokemon, nobody will have an edge over everybody.
00:39:31
Speaker
i agree I actually agree with you completely. i think that's also an aspect that I missed out on when I made my explanation earlier. But the social pressure, right, to to run specific Pokemon or you show a team to a friend and they say, oh, well, you know, don't run by noon because fur is better. They have, you know, opinions about what you should and shouldn't do. i think it's good to take risk. And that's part of the reason why I really respect players like DeSync, players like Arrow that just kind of Pick what they want to pick, play it, play it to the best of their ability and win or lose. You know, they're not kind of shackled by the expectations and the social pressures. I don't, I don't quite want to call it like the crab in the bucket issue, but it kind of is like that. If everybody's dragging everyone else back to the mean and I'm just, I'm just glad that DHC and also,
00:40:18
Speaker
H.D. Envy decided to run the Shadow Gyarados because, yeah, that was so that was a really cool pick. And hope you see more of that. I think we always get that in Europe, which is actually ironic and segues a little bit into the final point I wanted us to make before Grand Finals.
00:40:32
Speaker
a Stone Collection coming in third overall. He had a bit of a spicy interview with me, which I thought was pretty fun. And he also was probably running the least spicy team that we've ever seen Stone Collection run. I mean, this is the Samrock guy.
00:40:46
Speaker
I remember like he's a samurai guy. He has been the Shadow Geridos this season already. i think in G'dansk was when he actually made, I think, a top eight even or like a top nine. Like certainly one of the better placements um with a Shadow Geridos up until that point. I think both Paul Asher and Stone Collection utilized it at that specific regional. He was also the guy who made grand finals with a Stone Edge Sludge Bomb Klotzire before, his previous season in Stuttgart.
00:41:16
Speaker
um So somebody who is willing to experiment, but also this is like the other the other side of the coin in a way. Like, are you playing with training weights if you always run the weird stuff?
00:41:30
Speaker
Like, I personally believe that, okay, this is just from somebody who runs a lot of a lot of stupid Pokemon in GBL in particular. um I think running those Pokemon helps train your instincts because It makes winning winning your battle, winning your GPL battle, a lot more of an active task than just running the good stuff or just running RPS Pokemon and aligning to shielding your Mud Slapper.
00:42:01
Speaker
There's like very easy wins of winning a battle, but there's also ways of winning a battle that expand your catalog of plays. And I think just forcing yourself to run Pokemon that are not entirely unviable like you shouldn't run Pokemon that just has nothing going for it right but if you have Pokemon that has something going for it but also a lot of weaknesses playing around those weaknesses can help you grow as a battler and if you then
00:42:32
Speaker
have that knowledge from playing the bad Pokemon, but play the good Pokemon, you will see win conditions that you may have never seen if you never played the bad Pokemon. Well said. i agree. It also just feels more rewarding to win with something crazy, right? netflix Yes.
00:42:51
Speaker
ah yeah And you have to think like your opponent on the other side which just must just be raging. They must have considered throwing their phone in the toilet because they saw, you know, Grimstar or something crazy in GBL.
00:43:02
Speaker
So yeah, I think there's there's a lot to love from that. And it also makes for good content, right? If you're a content creator and you run spicy stuff, i think I think it does you well. I will say this is my first time meeting Stone in person.
00:43:13
Speaker
Very, very pleasant guy. Actually very fun to talk to, very easygoing, good humor too. which, you know, coming from Germany, i was impressed by that. I'm just kidding. But the Stone Collection was great. And then I remember we were walking over to do our interview and he said, is it okay if I trash NA a little bit?
00:43:33
Speaker
And I said, said, Yeah, very much. i said I said, that would be interesting, but let's keep it you know PG. Let's keep it audience appropriate and we can definitely make some comments. so He was spicier off camera than he was on camera, which is the way it should be because we are still running a um ah family program. But yeah, Stone was really fun to talk to and I was i was honored to interview him and and chat with him.
00:44:00
Speaker
Yeah, very very strong season of him. I think like Almost two years ago, tipped him as a favorite going into EYC. I want to see what he can do in that meta because that is certainly coming up.
00:44:15
Speaker
And I think, like, we're not going to talk in depth about EYC today, but there is some spice picks that have viability there, and I'm really interested in seeing what he will cook up, or whether he'll just keep it meta now that meta worked so well for him this one time.
00:44:31
Speaker
um But yeah, very, very... international representation for sure between third place, Javier in seventh place. We had Lawson Cody as to the highest ranking Canadian in fifth.
00:44:46
Speaker
And also THC, I feel like little bit of a mixed representation between the US and Hong Kong here as well. Yeah. yes and i Yeah, it's definitely very, very impressive. i think this is also a good time to segue as well because we covered third place Stone Collection. Let's talk about the grand finals because when Kelsey first played against DHC, I feel like um she's just...
00:45:11
Speaker
absolutely crushed him. like It wasn't quite as dominant as what she did to Nightstand Clasher, honestly. In some countries, that would considered a war crime, which she did to him. But in this particular series versus DHC, it was really, really impressive. She looked very, very strong. DHC, though, defeating Stone Collection ah somehow, in spite of his Unovan Sunfisk, was able to beat that team. I need to watch that back. But ascends back to the Grand Finals and takes on Kelsey a second time. Now...
00:45:39
Speaker
I really liked Kelsey's comp. I felt like, obviously I'm a big fan of the Gus Sword. I'm very, very vocal about that. The Jellicent was hit or miss. I feel like when she did bring it out, it was very strong for her, but I feel like her MVP had to be the Florgis. That Pokémon was extremely flexible. She used it basically every single game, and she liked a lot of the Florgis-Empoleon combo. I don't think she played Kanto Marowak, maybe not even a single time in the Grand Finals, but... I'm curious what you thought.
00:46:08
Speaker
Well, Pokemon, right? She played it typically with a combination of Empoleon, Guzzlord, and Flogus. And then there was like two times when the Jellicent came out. And the Jellicent is, I think, a Pokemon that we'll have to talk about later a little bit.
00:46:23
Speaker
But yeah, like game one of the grand finals, it's an Empoleon lead versus an Altaria, Kelsey being the Empoleon in this matchup, but not quite playing it all. But instead, in the Guzzlord and saving a little bit of health, the Empoleon.
00:46:38
Speaker
Gazdod is a very interesting team, a very interesting pick on Kelsey's team here because it feels very much neutral to just about every Pokémon that DHC could bring into this um just because he doesn't have a Fairy type, right? Like, Gazdod is usually strong because it has that Sludge Bomb coverage for the Fairy types, but you still don't want to save swap it because if you don't have the energy advantage, that Sludge Bomb will not help you help you Whereas against a team without a ferry like DHCs, you can save-swap freely, and that is what Kelsey did in this very first match.
00:47:14
Speaker
um But there is one problem with the overall team composition and the alignment that kept happening in the grand finals, and that is the Floges eventually finding the Empolgon. And like with how... some Pokémon were saved on low health in this game. The game one still comes out as a very competitive one.
00:47:42
Speaker
um But eventually ends up with um the Empoleon on DHZ's side taking the match on 1 i feel I don't know what exactly the IVs on that Empoleon are, but this was only one of two 1 HP survivals in that grand final series.
00:48:01
Speaker
So IVs did matter on that penguin, and we just recently had the Piplup Community Day Classic. So better search through your storage and see whether you maybe have a very defense-weighted, a very HP-weighted Empolion there.
00:48:17
Speaker
Sometimes that does make a difference. Yeah, it absolutely does. i think that I think actually Caleb did a best of five deep dive, and he talked about that game number one. Apparently, Kelsey missed a bubble on one of her charge attacks, and it kind of made the, or I guess arguably made the difference in in one of those matches. And that's just how close it it was, even with the unfavorable alignment. I felt like she was getting a lot of those unfavorable matchups, either leading Thorgeson to Empoleon or safe switching it being met by Empoleon. Or there was even a game where they both simul swapped and DHC's Gyarados lined up against the Guzzlord, which is also not ideal. I mean, it's pretty close, honestly, between the two Pokémon because the Gyarados' charge attacks don't do anything, but the Guzzlord's Brutal Swing does. But still, it was very tedious, and it didn't feel as clean-cut as it was in their first go-around when they first met.
00:49:10
Speaker
um But yeah, I mean, Kelsey was a fighter. I'm supposed to be unbiased, right? um Luckily, I was not casting grants, but I was like, man, Kelsey and I have chatted about the Guzzlord. I would love to see it succeed. So I was kind of 60-40 Kelsey K over there. Yeah, i don't I don't really have to pretend to be unbiased because I'm not a master, but Kelsey is a teammate of mine. So I was certainly rooting for her.
00:49:33
Speaker
But yeah, like the floor just was a little bit of an empolyon magnet throughout the Grand Final Series. And yeah, I think like both really had strong picks that had neutral play into just about everything the opponent could throw at them.
00:49:48
Speaker
But the good thing for DHC was that Kelsey essentially needed to get Shields down for his Gyarados to be ineffective, but it's up to him decide whether he wants to shield or not. And as long as he keeps the shields, it's very difficult to really punish that Gyarados. And even the Phlogis would have to invest the shield in the Zero Shield scenario.
00:50:14
Speaker
um Just because the pacing on the Gyarados, nine turns to every Aqua Tail, and Shadow Aqua Tail just does about a half of the Phlogis' health, that It just gets like a truck and gets dead so fast.
00:50:28
Speaker
So always a little bit of a problem. um One thing, another thing that also comes up in the second game where we have an Empoleon Mirror, second game of Grand Finals, and both, that's a simul swap. both Both swap with the Hydro Cannon Banked.
00:50:46
Speaker
And I think one theme of the Grand Finals as well was that I think DHC even mentioned that at one point, how... The Pokémon that is most useful with little health is the Empoleon. Oh, absolutely.
00:51:02
Speaker
It barely ever gets fast moved down by the Pokémon that were actually brought into the battle. On Kelsey's side, the Ferrywins from the Floor just barely do anything. um The Metal Sounds from the Empoleon double resisted.
00:51:14
Speaker
The Dragontails from the Guzzlord single resisted. Very difficult to take that out. um And on DHC's side, he was ah leaning into his Dragon Breathers and into his Empoleon as well. So a lot of resisted damage going around, on meaning that you essentially always needed a charged attack to take out the Empoleon.
00:51:35
Speaker
And both players leveraged it well, but with how... Essential, the floor just was on Kelsey's side to just handle the Dragon Breathers, um the Coral specifically, because the Altaria matchup isn't even that clean, as we also saw time and time again, sponching the energy.
00:51:53
Speaker
are It was just like the Empolion on DHC's side was just a little bit better positioned into the team comp, and that just ended up going really, really far time and time again. Mm-hmm.
00:52:07
Speaker
Yeah, it was really miraculous, right? Because ah I felt like Kelsey K in the winner's finals, I think that was my last set that I commentated with Butters that weekend. I felt like she had all the answers and was just managing everything perfectly. But then DHC just kind of, I guess, you know, turned a page and came out, um,
00:52:24
Speaker
just fierce in this matchup. It was just unafraid. I think that was a big difference as well. So DHC was basically playing like he had nothing to lose. And I think that was also a very dangerous way to kind of deal with the team. Because like you said, when he maintained the shields for the Gyarados in the very end, I mean, that was his trump card. It's very, very hard for Kelsey to beat that Gyarados down a shield with no kind of fast attack pressure. um i think... want to point out... as well is that in the winners finals, I feel as if DHC was still figuring out his best three.
00:52:56
Speaker
eventually he figured out that Corviknight is not one of those. And once he just leaned into his Dragonbreathers and Empoleon, he had a lot more play into into each and every battle.
00:53:09
Speaker
um And yeah, with the Corviknight and its payback threat just being around, being established in the grand finals, Kelsey felt a little bit hesitant to bring out her Jellicent as well.
00:53:22
Speaker
um I think she did a good job of scaring away the Furry, just bringing her Fairy-type Flogers and the Guss Lord in every game. So that makes it very difficult for Furry to find an opening. You still have like that threat of, oh, like the Gyarados is likely coming and the Covenant could be coming. Both have dark coverage.
00:53:39
Speaker
So there is like a little bit of risk when bringing the Jellicent. But it also would have been... the best way of dealing with the Emporion and it also with the Altaria being non-shadow has a pretty positive matchup there. The shadow Altaria is actually um a lot more likely to take that matchup but versus the non-shadow the Jellison is typically favored.
00:54:07
Speaker
It was tough for Kelsey as well because I like the made about Jelicin. Jelicin did a great job when he did come out just because of the absence of the Furret. But if you want to say, oh, well, Kelsey knew the Empolion was coming. She should have played more Kanto Marowak. She's only got a 30% chance of landing that against the Empolion. It could be Altari in the lead. It could be Gerdos in the lead.
00:54:26
Speaker
It's really, really hard to predict. So a lot of the players that get to this level, they don't lean into that RPS that hard because it is just so risky. There's a question that neither Talonflame nor Marowak were bringable at all for Kelsey. Correct, that was my next question. It's always coming and both of those Pokemon get destroyed by Gyarados. Yeah, I was just thinking, I mean, Talonflame up energy might be copier, but it's good against the things that you are not seeing, right? It's good against the Marowak if you're up energy, it's good against the Ferd if you're up energy, but
00:54:59
Speaker
If you know the Corviknight's not coming, if you know it's going to be in Poleon Double Dragonbreath, the Talonflame has like no place. And yeah, I think Kelsey brought it just to support her Florges and to kind of check opposing shadows to source, which makes a lot of sense, but it was just not useful at all in the series.
00:55:16
Speaker
um yeah I actually don't have a play-by-play for the whole Grand Finals, but I was happy that Kelsey was able to get one game in my recap script that I did, which the audio will play, I think, at the next event. I basically said Kelsey was briefly able to get her footing with Jelicent, but then she United ah and his Shadow Garados erupted from the Lake of Rage and just tore through Kelsey's trio. So, Really, really tough grand finals for her, but I honestly hope she's very proud. I mean, again, she's shoulder to shoulder with some of the best. She beat Ryze, she beat Nighttime Clash, she beat a myriad of other trainers that are exceptional. I mean, arguably best in the world, not just NA. So I hope she's proud. And DHC, man, what a start to career. I'm excited to see where he goes. yeah
00:56:02
Speaker
Yeah, I also, I'm really excited to see what other spice picks he's bringing, because we have established that it's always one of the ah six that is a little more out there. And I'm so here for that. So I'm very much forward to his journey further. I also think that he's just like somebody who has a way with words in a way, like um just really outlining his his thought process and his general attitude towards um the competition really well. And was it was nice to to follow along his train of thought when he got interviewed, which happened plenty of times.
00:56:39
Speaker
um But yeah, i will also I also want to stress for Kelsey's Grand Finals experience that I think it makes a difference between whether um you maybe make a misplay that then will haunt you for weeks and weeks on end because you felt like you could have done something different or that it was just like a series against a strong trainer who happened to call your leads a lot of the time and like yeah um reset fizzles out with K-Wag leading into I think the Empoleon in game 3 and then the Shadow Gyarados finding the Jellicent in the lead which is like the one Pokemon in DHC's team that beats the Jellicent so um that was just like what we call tough alignment but um one thing that I want to highlight about DHC and to himself highlighting that he's not just like
00:57:35
Speaker
an RPS merchant. I don't think anybody will believes that before. Somebody who is like a Chino Gyarados player, which is so difficult to position. But um in that game, in that game four of the reset, which is the last game of the tournament, um Kelsey actually decides to soft lose the middle matchup, setting up a Thumbdown. But one thing that DHC does is he stops tapping with this Altaria before taking out the Gaslord.
00:58:02
Speaker
taking two more Dragon Tails and therefore minimizing the calm down. That's right. That was championship level play, which in the end sealed the deal and made it so that the alignment could be converted into a win.
00:58:16
Speaker
I do remember that. And it felt like it was a very risky play in the moment because, I mean, this is literally the championship-clinching game of the Grand Finals, and he was eyeballing the damage for the Dragon Tails. In the moment, for sure. Like, to have both the awareness and the confidence to execute it I think that's pretty rare. And just to show that this was not a fluke.
00:58:41
Speaker
This was just... like two trainers who played the best that weekend and that's why they won the grand finals. Exactly. What a tournament. We dubbed it Upset City. We had a lot of impressive trainers come into the tournament, but then DHC United and Kelsey K in our grand finals. Two trainers that i I fully expect to start to return to those grand finals. And then we're going to ask them what they think of the underdogs coming up here pretty soon because they ah they definitely have shown what they're made of. Yeah. any other thoughts on Toronto? Actually, before I ask you, I just want to give you one quick anecdote. This is backstage. Nobody noticed, right? And this is actually an incredible testament that that the fact that nobody knew about this. But when Brothers and i were commentating our last rotation, I think it was Dunebrug versus Nighttime Clasher because I remember there was a Prineape involved.
00:59:32
Speaker
We both begin the match and then we stand up and i feel this like running in the back of my my throat and And it turns out that as soon as the game started and I stood up, I got a nosebleed in the middle of the cast.
00:59:48
Speaker
And essentially what had happened was the weekend, um just breathing in the thin cold air, just day after day after being in a a temperate southern humid climate, it just dried up my nose so much. And I actually ended up having a nosebleed. I had to pinch my nose and hold my head up. trying to look at the monitor and also kind of, you know, motion towards production. but i was holding, it was tough because I was holding my nose with one hand and then was holding the cough button with the other one.
01:00:16
Speaker
So then nobody would hear me going, yet you know, trying to recover what's going on with my nose. But the nose bead lasted probably two or three minutes. And Bates actually, my savior, Bates brought me some paper towels in the middle of the cast.
01:00:29
Speaker
And he kind of looked at me, he's oh, you got a little on your mustache here. And i kind of wiped that off. So he got me camera ready. And then the rest of the the commentary, ZZ, whenever I was on camera, I was just praying to Zeus that my bras my my ah my nose just didn't start bleeding again. Because that would have been like Stranger Things level plot twist, right? I think was the only Will who got a nosebleed recently. Fair, fair.
01:00:55
Speaker
Fun fact, by the way, in the earlier seasons, Will in Stranger Things, his birthday is March twenty second which is also my birthday. that is That is very strange. this may yes I think i think in the in the final season, there was a retcon to that. I think they changed his birthday. But if you go back and watch like season three, I can confirm to you it is March 22nd. And final words all hail Vecna. I'm just kidding. um But yeah, that was a that little story that kind of happened off camera. And the fact that nobody noticed, I'm very, very proud of that.
01:01:28
Speaker
Yeah, like, holy shit. I as had yeah i had the white, I had all white. Yeah, I saw that. like if of that if If you had gotten a drop on there, everybody would just think, like, I don't know.
01:01:46
Speaker
Exactly. everybody would say, wow, that's super sus. How is he so high energy? Does he take you some booger sugar? No, that's not the case. It's going here in Toronto. Oh my God. No, that's never been the case in my whole life. But yeah, that was pretty funny. um Any other, any other final thoughts on the, on the tournament? um I think I'm pretty much done, but I'm so glad that we're back because I missed this. I missed this. Like,
01:02:18
Speaker
Having a little bit of a break is nice at times. but Yeah. I definitely ran i want to. Sorry, go ahead, CC. No, I'm just pointing out that the December being is entirely empty is not something that happens a lot.
01:02:32
Speaker
So really like one and a half months without any tournaments. That's it. Yeah, and definitely kind of when you have tournaments back to back to back constantly, there's always something to talk about. The slow times are definitely you can feel them, feel them lot stronger. i will publicly apologize. I have been bit and I do have a rather crippling case of procrastination in terms of the YouTube uploads. So I told, I swore it is easy. would have them done by, by new year's and I went, I failed on my promise. So I'm already in the hole with him. So I got to work on those and I'm going to try to get this one up as well. But once we get that, ah that knocked down, were close some loops and we'll actually have YouTube episodes out. But if you're listening to this on Spotify or Apple podcasts and you don't watch the YouTube version, you should. Cause when those cut out, they're really fun.
01:03:25
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. get to see all the teams on screen. If we talk about like certain matchups and it's very difficult to follow along, much easier if there's a visual to go along with it. Exactly. Well, ZZ and I are definitely going to cover the EUIC meta. We're working on a schedule over the next few months in order to get consistent episodes out to all of you. And we might have finally settled on our first guest, which is actually very, very exciting. And i'm looking forward to that. um But I will say, i think that you're not competing in Birmingham this weekend, correct?
01:03:57
Speaker
I am not. I will celebrate my return to competition at EUIC. Oh, perfect. I'm actually going to start diving into EUIC as well. I think a lot of attention is on the tournaments this weekend, but EUIC, I'm joining the commentary team yet again. I'm really excited for that. And I just want to build off of what was done in LAIC in terms of the limited meta commentary. I feel like there's a lot of room for growth and there's a lot of insights that we could bring casters. So Amanda and I have already started cooking and we have two other very exciting casters as well, being Martijn and Martogalde. it's just uh that's gonna comedy yes yes yes i'm so glad to experience marzo in this role because he was originally built in for any ic already but correct visa issues which robbed us of the opportunity of hearing him in that role but yeah like certainly no stranger to international competitions right so um
01:04:58
Speaker
It's gonna be very fun to experience, maybe even them as a duo like Martijn and Marteau. m Double M&M, right? But here's here's the real kicker. If Inadequates and Marteau Galde are casting instead of competing, then who's gonna win the tournament?
01:05:14
Speaker
That's a very good question. We should get our predictions ready for when we do the preview episode for you. Oh, you're right. Okay, I'm down. i need to start working on that. um But yeah, I'm really excited. It's easy. It's a good start to the calendar year. This is going to be a bit of a shorter episode. We only had one event to cover, and we are just now hitting our hour mark.
01:05:37
Speaker
I feel like we had a lot fun. Talked about the meta. I'm excited to see what kind of twists and turns will occur. I fully expect a Lord of Night Tails and Unova Sunfist to be prominent in Birmingham. We'll have to see what other Pokemon stand out. But other than that,
01:05:49
Speaker
Yeah, it's a good start to new year. we' excited to kick things off and do some EUIC previews and all the other fun stuff we have we have planned. um I have not much more to add to that other than we are currently in a Rocket event. We will not be in that Rocket event for long. It's only Friday to Sunday.
01:06:07
Speaker
But if you are interested in the Shadow Gyarados that DHC piloted to success in Toronto, you can now get a Shadow Shiny Gyarados from cliff Rocket Leader Cliff. Battle him, beat him.
01:06:18
Speaker
hope there's going to be a frustration event in the future again so you can actually jam it away if you don't get it until sunday and you can um get the lake of rage gyarados for yourself to play at home I'm telling you, Cliff and Sierra, right? They both have excellent picks. Sierra had like Sableye and Lapras for several months or even years. That was really a good run for her. And then Cliff, ah I think formerly having Larvitar, now has the Magikarp. S-tier picks. Arlo, i don't know what you're doing, man. I think Arlo had Belsprat at one point.
01:06:50
Speaker
Guy's completely washed. I don't know what he's thinking. But yeah, this is a really good rotation. Yeah. The meme with the dragon, right? Like, two hats, like, really fierce, really, really ferocious. That is our lord.
01:07:01
Speaker
Yeah, the king of Dora.
01:07:05
Speaker
Anyway... I think... two Sorry, ZZ. I was just going mention, last point I'll make, we have 120 days to gather championship points. That is going be the cutoff at NAIC, which is going to be a really fun tournament. All of these trainers, like Stone Collection, are already way out ahead, but make sure that you keep an eye on the overall um top cut for your region. For example, in NA, it is 75. I believe in EU, at last time, it is 65. So you want to maintain your position there. um
01:07:35
Speaker
It'd be really cool. It'd really sick if I could qualify for Worlds this year. So I'm going to compete in a local on Sunday, and then I will likely see you at a regional competition at the end of February. So we're going to see how that goes and if I can earn some points, and I'll be tracking my my placement as well, see if I can get qualified. But yeah, it's been a fun one. I'm going to go back and listen to this so I can see just how bad my intro was. But with that being said, i appreciate you. I'm excited to be back in the saddle, and let's have a great year.
01:08:05
Speaker
yes
01:08:09
Speaker
I clicked the button.