On Saturday, Fiction won the one-day SoCal regional Saving Mr. Lombardi over Captain Faceroll, additionally taking home a win in the event’s premier exhibition match: him vs. Ginger.

Notably at the tourney came early upsets on its top two seeds, SFAT and S2J, who respectively lost to Bimbo Mexico and Santi: two premier victories for the tournament’s titular character. As for other results of the one-day regional’s hyped up exhibition matches, Azel and Santiago both defeated Magi, while Westballz beat Bimbo Mexico.

In other news, Hungrybox won Overlords of Orlando: Ultimate Edition, iBDW won the Scarlet Classic V in New Jersey and Frenzy won Nangest Regionals 2 in the U.K., becoming the first native U.K. player to win a tournament over Professor Pro in many years. Meanwhile, TheRealThing outdueled Ryan Ford at Ohio’s Kent Combo 100, and over in NorCal, Ralph won the Golden Bair 10.

1. The Publicity of Beef

Something that surprised me over the weekend was how many people were invested in the Fiction-Ginger beef. Even outside of active smashers, a few of my friends who only watched GRSmash videos asked me if I was going to watch Saving Mr. Lombardi.

The simplest explanation is probably the best one, right? Beef and grudge matches are simple to understand and follow, with two sides, two differing goals, and one medium to settle it. It’s a lot easier for people to consume beef and binary outcomes than it is to follow the scene.

I’m not sure what my conclusion is here, but I do think that it’s interesting that the concept of exhibition matches between two specific individuals in Melee seemed to have cooled down after the Apex Salty Suites. You could say that exhibitions are still common at majors, but I wouldn’t compare Big House crew battles directly to something like Leffen vs. Chillin.

Either way, props to the EGTV team for coming up with the Saving Mr. Lombardi concept and centering the marketing for the event around its promised bouts. Perhaps we’ll see more tournaments take a similar approach.

2. I am attending Pound 2019!

This is a note to anyone who reads my column, please feel free to say hello to me after bracket! I’m always game to play friendlies and I promise, I’m usually agreeable.

I’ll be reaching the event a little late on Friday and am heading out Sunday night. Hoping to meet some of you here!

3. Monday Morning Mailbag

“When PPMD returns, how long (if at all), do you think it will take him to get back into top player status?” – V0lttackle

I’d say three months for him to start consistently making major top eights. The main areas of focus for him would center around avoiding reversal situations and familiarizing himself more with how ledge and platform interactions have changed. Thankfully, adjusting to these changes requires situational knowledge and smart decision making: two areas where PPMD shines in, pun fully intended.

Quite frankly, his fundamentals, even as far away as four years ago, remain miles beyond a good amount of lower half Top 20 players. I’ll wager that if he enters a national, he will finish at least 17th at his first one back. I’ll give him three months to start making top eights, assuming consistent attendance, and six months to reach the Leffen and Plup tier of play.

“When do you think melees first 3k entrants event will occur?” – scorpion_17

I feel really dumb for saying this, but a small part of me had faith before the year that it might happen in 2020, if Metagame came out on Netflix. It’s so difficult to predict these things. For now, I’m going to take a 180 and say it’s not happening any time soon.

“A few corrections/expansions on Fight Pitt if you don’t mind. Fight Pitt changed hands with the changing of the Student Club’s officers. 1-4 were under bearsfan092, 5 and 6 were run by Kofi, Mordicon, and beanwolf. 6/7 Were Sonar, Bambi, Gumball, and 8 is with Gumball as the new president and Zalephyrix.

I(Kofi) tried to upgrade Fight Pitt to national status by converting it to 2 days, but annoyingly, both Mango and M2k moved around the same time right before FP5.

We had issues booking the venue for April so we decided to wait a year and a half for FP6. This lead to the current yearly April schedule and allowed us to save venue fees from weeklies and locals to fly players out. The “disappears and returns” between 6 and 7 seem off with the intentional yearly schedule in mind. We started a semesterly series called Pitt Smash Presents to fill in the gap locally.

With the hyper saturation of tournaments around FP7, Sonar’s crew made the decision to go back to 1-day, which I personally think was correct in the current tournament climate.

The Logo/Numeral change coincided with the University Of Pittsburgh changing its font back to its classic rounded script.

Hax has been supposed to show up for Fight Pitt 3-6 and I can’t tell if his DQ was a joke or not.

“the shifting leadership around the series and what seems to be sustained efforts to keep it alive through generations of different TOs” I’m really glad you said this, one of my goals coming in as president was to set up the club to run without me. It seemed like bearsfan shouldered a huge amount of burden and FP4 running over time looked like it stressed him out. I wanted to not have to worry about the health of the Pittsburgh tournament scene and I’m glad to see such a good event 3 years removed from me being a TO and a year removed from me going to any events at all.

Thanks for the write up.” – Kofi

Thanks for your response!

“If Melee Stats comes to Fight Pitt next year, would they be down to get drunk and party to all hell before, during, and after the tournament?!” – Jonny Gamble

Yes.