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I didnt sign up but I'll be there.

Sorry for the delay in my recap - I've been utterly exhausted following this year and oh yea, my family and I are currently selling our home (open house this Sunday 2pm - 4pm!) and moving to a newly purchased home. Just minor life events, that's all. Also, quick summary/recap of Tecmo Jam Cleveland 2018: We sold a total of 77 tickets for 2018, beating our 2017 numbers - which was great! We had a fantastic turnout both days and I appreciate the continued support in the community here and beyond. We actually oversold the TSB portion of the tournament, selling close to (or around) 68 - 69 TSB tickets (some ppl buy the joint two-day pass and others buying one-day pass) with day-of registrations, last minute purchases, etc. We had 16 stations playing TSB with Group Play starting a little late, around 12:30 - 12:45pm, following the national anthem and Tecmo Jam Cleveland 2018 hype video (to be posted to YouTube later once i've recovered). Group Play lasted about 3 - 3.5 hours (double elim), with players in groups of 8, so we did 8 groups of 8 (64 man total, b/c of some no shows and what not, per usual - even having over-sold it). Bronze was single elimination all the way through. Silver and Gold were single elim., I believe in the first 2 rounds and then we reseeded to double elim. with both final four groups. So, at a minimum all players were guaranteed at least 3 games, whether they lost all 3 of them or not, which was a nice change from 2017. Based on Group Play players were re-seeded into Bronze, Silver and Gold Brackets: BRONZE: https://challonge.com/tecmojamclevelandbronzeTSB SILVER: https://challonge.com/tecmojamclevelandsilvertsb SILVER FINAL FOUR: https://challonge.com/eduqzjk7 GOLD: https://challonge.com/tecmojamclevelandgoldtsb GOLD FINAL FOUR: https://challonge.com/n9iyr3au Players in Silver and Gold were then re-seeded in a Final Four, also attached above with links to Challonge. I did my best to log all the scores for posterity - thanks to everyone for communicating so well and getting me results to log real-time. I believe gameplay lasted all-in until about 8 - 9pm? Keep me honest if I'm off - it was a long day and I was beyond exhausted. Jordan Willis and Louis in the finals was incredible; and quite honestly, all finals match-ups, final fours, etc. were amazing. Troy did a great job on the microphone with Eric Kuhlman doing broadcasting on some of the top games, and I appreciated him making the trip out to be a part of this years' experience. NBA Jam TE was great the second day as well. We had exactly 24 competitors show-up so that made for great brackets. We did 6, four-man groups that were all double elim. Again, based on performance in group play, players were seeded in Gold, Silver and Bronze brackets respectively. So 8 Gold, 8 Silver, 8 Bronze. They can be found here as well: We just ran these through the entire-way as double elimination to get everyone more games. BRONZE: https://challonge.com/tecmojamclevelandbronzenbajam SILVER: https://challonge.com/tecmojamclevelandsilvernbajam GOLD: https://challonge.com/tecmojamclevelandgoldnbajamte Green Majic walked away victorious with some great games and hard-fought competition. This was great to see and an awesome addition from 2017 + it was just fun. NBA Jam play ended around 5pm(ish)? Again, keep me honest guys. Then the fun part began... I think I got home around 9pm Sunday night by the time cars were unloaded, I dropped off arcade cabinets at John's arcade, hit up a storage locker and more. I was utterly and completely pooped, and my back was just killing me too. Anyways, I think Tecmo Jam Cleveland 2018 was a great success and I owe a huge debt of thanks to a lot of the guys who have been Cleveland-faithful in helping me promote, setup, tear-down, etc. in the last 3 - 4 months and also on gameday. You guys are great - thanks. What I learned in 2018? Kudos to Chris Vogt, because he already read my mind and sent me an email re: 2019. I've felt like an ass for the last two years being really so close to Midwest Tecmo, knowing that they are both great tournaments - and truthfully I want to make the trip down as well, as I'm sure they want to come up. I've talked to so many ppl about this in regards and Chris and I are going to talk to figure this out for 2019. I 110% respect Chris' seniority and entitlement to the late July timeframe and I do want to move Tecmo Jam Cleveland 2019 out of mad respect for what they do as well and I am looking at options. In the spirit of full-transparency to the community, the timing has always been an issue for me as well for the following reason - my wedding anniversary is August 28, I had Hamilton tickets this year on August 25, I have a huge conference with work I am planning for multiple months which is the 2nd week in September every year at our software company, my wife, son and mother-in-law (yes 3 generations all have the exact same birthday - which is October 6), my dad's birthday is late October, plus planning for Halloween costumes, etc. with the boys around Halloween is a disaster, plus my other son's birthday is November 20 - so that is a mess too. So basically from August 20th+ through the end of the year (any year) my calendar is hosed because as soon as November 20 hits it's holiday season. Factor in the Cleveland weather which can kick-up any time with snow storms really early October - it could spell disaster - oh plus football season and MLB playoffs (if not world series again [hopeful]). So, long-story short. I'm trying to find something that works and I want the community to know I seriously am (as you can tell) looking into it and trying to come up with an alternative for 2019 because I do not want our two tourneys to be back-to-back weekends next year as it does nobody any good. At the end of the day that really leave me either pushing back a few more weeks in August, but not too close to our wedding anniversary date b/c I'm also dangerously close to the 10 year mark and I do not need a divorce and/or we usually take a wedding anniversary vacation around that time. I also want to work with Kevin Cabarello re: Tupa Bowl too, b/c again - mad respect to him and I don't want to conflict at all and give him the space/time he needs around scheduling (which is generally May). So really it comes down to either moving up in the June timeframe, but not close to Madison or anything else - maybe pushing to the 1st week of November in between Halloween and my second boy's birthday - i.e. 11/1 - 11/15 (but also knowing everyone will be in full NFL and college football mode, so I'm competing with that then too). Or moving entirely to the winter, but not competing with Tundra Bowl who I madly respect as well. I'd be open to suggest, comments, recommendations or more because I really want everyone to understand I know I am a relative newcomer to this community and I fully respect the boundaries and work that these Tecmo-lifers have been doing and they are owed mad street cred. So kudos to them and we'll figure it out in 2019 best we can. I just didn't want anyone also think I'm not trying, because I am beyond this and even more. Anyways, in summary - thanks for the support in 2018. I'm excited about 2019 - growing this thing even more. Growing Tecmo, growing Jam and maybe even adding more into the mix. Thanks for making the trip out. I hope you guys had a great time and I appreciate the support, knowledge transfer, collaboration, partnership, recommendations, suggestions and more. Tecmo Jam Tom *edited adding in handle/tags so ppl are aware of this post and not buried in the forums @vogtcd11 @trojan1979 @kmolnar3298 @red98sethuthut @Woodshed @The Ultimate Weapon @mort1237 @kevincabarello

Had this banner waiting on me when I got home. I have a true lady of Tecmo. I had so much fun this weekend and to win one of these was incredible. I was a little salty that they didn’t have a police escort for me as I rolled into my hometown with the trophy, but I think I might get a sign underneath the 2009 boys basketball state champions, so I’ve got that going for me. Big thanks to everyone involved, and the love from the Tecmo community after this was phenomenal. Something I’ll never forget. You guys are the best. Can’t wait to spend another day drinking and playing this game with you guys. It’ll never get old.

Because the 1990 49ers were a great team. They had come off winning two consecutive Super Bowls and compiled a 14-2 regular season record well on their way to the first 3peat in NFL history. The loss to the Giants in the NFC championship game is considered an upset and it involved knocking Montana out late and Roger Craig fumbling with 2:38 left to give the Giants the chance to kick the game winning FG. They are the best team in the game but to say they're practically unbeatable is a bit of an overstatement.

As for every Midwest tournament, I'm so happy this weekend is over. But also, I'm saddened that it passes by so quickly. To date, after hosting 11 of these things, MWTecmoXI was by far the most fun and smoothest run tourney. There are so many people to thank: David Fulcher for being who he is and providing representation for not only MWTecmo but for the Tecmo community in general. We were able to raise $544 for his foundation on only 28 total participants. Do the math. I think that's amazing. So thank you all. To @AJFullam AJ Fullam, who is the glue to this tournament when it comes to the group play excel document that calculates where everyone is placed in the elimination part of the tourney in real time. Derek Ruble, who provided an outstanding setup for our live stream. @allamerican1569Tom Stahnke, who not only provided his livestream for the RBI tourney, but offered up his wifi hotspot after some technical difficulties regarding hooking up to Rick's Tavern's router with a hardwire. Rick's Tavern's two waitresses Caitlin and Kaylin for wanting to continually take care of us rioters. They are always great and supportive and eager to be a part of this every year. My wife and kids for understanding that this is something that means a lot to me. My brothers for always being supportive in my directive mentality during the day. Aaron Hake for running the registration table and manning the raffle gift table. My mother Diane who ran the raffle ticket sales for the first 4 hours of the tournament and Jimmy's girlfriend Destinee who finished up the last hour of the raffle sales. Mort for offering up his stockpile of systems, carts and other equipment. Our supporters Yuengling, Ohio Valley Beer and Wine, FC Cincinnati, Cincinnati Reds, Cincinnati Bengals, Pure Romance, The Sports Gallery, The David Fulcher Foudnation, Rick's Tavern, McKinley's Pub and The Retro Sports Gamer. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. You can check out the results from everything at these links: https://challonge.com/MidwestRBIBracket2018 https://challonge.com/MWTecmo2018Pool https://challonge.com/MWTecmo2018Bracket MWTecmoXI in its entirety: Friday I woke up and finished the final touches for prep at my house. Then took a trip to pick up the tourney TShirts and some Yuengling donation raffle items around 1 p.m. ... I left for Rick's Tavern around 4 p.m. once my wife got home from work. Began setting up equipment immediately upon my arrival. The first two dudes that arrived for the RBI Tourney/Nintendo Night were Marc Z and Brian M. Nice fellas who came from the northern parts of Ohio. We had about 14 of the 28 guys show up for the Friday night festivities, which told me that it was worth having. The predominant reason why the Friday night event was a success was because we literally had everything set up the night before and could focus on operational aspects of the tourney the day of. Saw some Master Blaster, Tetris Attack, Dr. Mario, Tecmo Bowl, and others being played. It was cool. The final four of the RBI tourney was Me, Joseph M., Matt and Mort. @bigmv54Matt beat @mort1237Mort 11-1 and Joseph beat me 2-1. Matt took down Joe for the first ever Midwest RBI Baseball title. The event lasted until about midnight and we all felt it was the right time to pack up and get some rest, which surprised me. I had a hunch we were going to be staying until last call. But that wasn't the case. Ruble crashed on my couch for the weekend. Before we hit the sack, we made sure his stream setup on his laptop was good to go. The only thing we had to do was just set his stuff up, hook up to Tom's hotspot and we are livestreaming. Went to bed. Saturday Loaded up the remaining items that I had in my garage, which included the rest of the Yuengling donation raffle items. My head is usually in about 15 different places the morning of the tournament but seeing the systems already up and running when I get there made for a little less tense of the time. Mort grabbed what he could from his bag o' stuff and hooked up the 3 tvs that were not ready. Registration went without a hitch. One person no-showed but informed me the night before that he would pay at the table. Would have been 29 participants. So it didn't bother me one bit. 28 players it is. 7 groups of 4. Boom. I was happy. Setting up pool play groups the week of the tourney really helps me out in terms of small adjustments the day of. Not one single adjustment had to be made except for plugging my last entry into the dude's spot who didn't show up. It didn't ruin the quality base of each group as I feel they were as evenly spread out as I could make them. I said "ef it" let's roll in Gats' group because I've never played him live in a tournament and I was an easy No. 2 seed after dissecting the No. 1 seeds in this specific tourney. There really was no separation in the No. 2 and No. 3 seeds. It was crazy. Derek and I put together a 15 minute pregame show on the livestream to give everyone a heads up on how the day would be operating and we also did some player profiles. It was fun. Fullam was ready to roll regarding the excel document and pool play groups were announced. The tourney began on time. My goal was to have the pool play groups wrapped up and the announcement for who is playing Fulcher in the charity game by 2 p.m. and at this point of the day, I looked at my phone and it was 1:57 p.m. Boom. Greg H. won the Fulcher Foundation game. We also allow Fulcher to play using the Bengals of course and the raffle winning player can use SEA, IND or NE. But Greg is a GB fan so we allowed him to use GB. Fulcher beat Greg 28-2. I will have to watch the game on the recorded stream to see how this all panned out. I think Fulcher is no slouch and could be labeled as a middle to low tier player in most tourneys. The Fulcher game raised over $100 itself. @JimSocks13won the Bucket O Liquor raffle 2 years in a row. He stated that all he wanted to do at Midwest was win that. He went home a happy camper. The raffle prizes were being announced while the Fulcher Foundation game against Greg was going down on the livestream. Fullam was finishing up the pool play results as well. It was a good transition so people weren't waiting to hear their first round game. I felt good all tourney. I went 3-0 in pool play which was only good for the 6th seed. I felt as though Gats wasn't with it during my game. But oh well. I take the win. Gats was ready for tournament play though. I could tell. The ultimate scenario played on the livestream with our last game between @RetroNathan and @diazhole. If Matt doesn’t win by more than 6, then Flo would get the 4th seed bye -- the last bye being the fact that we had 28 participants. Diaz won by 3 and missed out on the 4th seed and pushed him to 5th – no bye. We announced all of the raffle ticket winners. A lot of great matchups throughout the day with, what, 4 overtime games on the live stream? I think. Matched up with Brian S in the first round. Super nice local guy, teaching inner city kids from Cincinnati. Had a great chat with him during game about how hard it is to be a teacher. He explained that he’s more of a parent to them than a teacher, and I believe it. Talked about the ins and outs of Tecmo knowledge and he was open-eared about taking it in. He said he was going to go back home and tell his buddies that the community is worth the trek to these tourneys. I won 31-3. Next up was Jordan (Woodshed). Such a great and close game. Wish this was on the live stream. Couldn’t believe I (DEN) pulled it out. Jordan (WAS) had me up against the ropes. Won 14-10. Elite 8 was Mort. Snatched a first-drive INT which sort of set up my momentum. If I didn’t try to do anything fancy and play straight forward, I was only hoping to keep the momentum and not let Mort’s expertise strip it away from me. And I was able to do that 17-10. On to the double elimination Final Four against Gats. I picked DET-WAS matchup as a slight bait call. He didn’t want to give me WAS, which I felt OK with. 0-0 heading into halftime. Gats get ball and kicks field goal in third. I couldn’t muster up a decent drive at all and was hoping for a couple opportunities with a deep ball and some luck. Gats was on. I wasn’t. He wins 10-0. I have Diaz in losers fourth place game. I pick CIN-WAS matchup against Diaz and he takes CIN. Really don’t remember much of this game other than I lost 21-20. I was able to call the finals with Joseph M, which turned out to be a great game as well. Gats pulls it out to take the MWTecmoXI title against Diaz. I will point out that Gats accidentally hit field goal on an early punt attempt. Diaz professionally punted it back to him. Gats got the originally planned punt off to Diaz. At this level, those two players are far more than qualified to make their own decisions regarding a situation like that for what was at stake, without having to get commishes involved. Gats was extremely humbled for Diaz’s kind gesture. And no hard feelings were expressed, assuming any other Tecmoer at this level would have done the same thing. Unfortunately, you’ve lost roughly 40 seconds of the first half because the ball was in the air when it shouldn’t have been. Clean up ensued following the tourney. I was worried I didn’t bring any of my equipment home it was such a blur. The only thing I was worried about was our 5 Tecmo carts and 4 RBI carts. Matt has them all. I think. LOL. The debate was where to go after the tournament. As we are cleaning up, my wife texted me and said just come home and we can sit by a fire outside and swim. I happily, and drunkingly, invited everyone over to my house. Literally everyone. Our house turned into a frat house. JoeyGats was chilling at a table eating Arbys. My bathroom downstairs smelled like piss toward the end of the night. Hendershot handed me his credit card and forced me to buy 5 pizzas from Papa Johns. They were devoured within minutes. We set up shop with a station and played team Tecmo in my living room. @Super DuperKrebs and I were a team. I forget how we did. RetroNate and Matty V were a team, and I think they won a couple straight games. I enjoyed a conversation about music with RetroNate. We jammed on some tunes in my downstairs living area. It was awesome. Pretty sure RetroNathan, Ruble, my wife and some others sat outside around the fire the entire time. Krebs and I took a dip in my pool and talked about how my brother Joey ditched up for the Manchester United-Liverpool soccer match at the Big House in Ann Arbor. We were both pissed at him. LOL. @joeygatsGats and my two year old son were chilling on the couch next to each other, Gats playing on his phone, my son on my phone in his diaper. It might be one of the most epic photos I’ve ever seen. @tecmoninjaHendershot took the photo and said, “Look at this pic.” It melted my heart that Gavin and Gats bonded. Gavin and Gats are two of the best GOATS ever. I really didn’t feel like I had to rush everyone out the door because it was already 2 a.m. and many people had to wake up early enough to get home Sunday. I think I offered people to crash at my house if they weren’t able to drive. But there were enough people in each caravan who were able to drive safely. Ruble was the only one who snagged a couch overnight Saturday. I didn’t really know what to expect when I woke up the next morning. Woke up with my swim trunks on still. GG. Long. Live. Tecmo. #.url

In brief, while I have a spare moment on this hungover Monday. This was by far the funnest Midwest tourney to date. And I’ve questioned how that’s even possible by measuring past tourneys. I think the best part was being able to have lengthy conversations with TheRetroSportsGamer, RetroNathan, JoeyGats, Hendershot, and others. The smoothest tourney to date as well. And that’s thanks to people like AJ Fullam, the mastermind of pool play excel spreadies. Derek Ruble, the dedicated live streamer. Tom Stahnke who provided the RBI stream Friday and a hotspot to better our internet connection for our main stream on Saturday. Hake for being the setup/registration dude. Caitlin and Kaylin, the waitress girls who served our entire weekend at a Rick’s Tavern. The owners of Ricks Tavern himself. Yuengling. Mort for his plethora of Nintendo equipment. Our sponsors. My brothers. The David Fulcher Foundation and David Fulcher, things would never be where they are at regarding MWTecmo if it weren’t for him. First day of family staycation away from work, so I’ll have an in-depth recap from my point of view to post later tonight. Thank you to TecmoBowl.org for allowing us to showcase and advertise our Tecmo endeavors to the world to experience. Stay tuned for my recap and photos. Anyone who has photos and stories to share from this weekend, please post them. I love recollecting and hearing about them. ✌️

I was able to catch the majority of the stream throughout the day. I thought Ruble's stream was excellent. Props to @allamerican1569 aka Retro Sports Gamer Tom for hooking everyone up with the mobile bandwidth. The competition on stream was entertaining. I wanted to say I saw at least 3 overtime games. Nice selection of who to put on stream and when by @vogtcd11.

This is the matchup sheet proposed for the tournament to easily keep track of your own and your opponent's matchups.

Need 5 more to make it official. TecmoPsycho thanks for the early sign up bro.