Even though I’m not a hockey fan, there are two things I love about the NHL: mullets, and the Stanley Cup.
The first doesn’t need much explanation. Best of both worlds, party, business, you know the drill. What you might not know is I modeled this blog after the mullet. The writing is all business. But man, if you could see the wild coding parties we have in the back-end, you’d be amazed. We do lines of PHP.
(How many nerd points was that worth?)
But enough with the mullet. The real prize of the NHL is Lord Stanley’s Cup, and not the sweaty one that goes in Lord Stanley’s Jock Strap. It’s the big one that the players drink champagne out of after winning the playoffs.
The concept is fantastic. It’s probably the most tangible reward in sports, and people like tangible rewards. You can train a dog with nothing but encouragement, but if you do it with food it’s much faster, and you get a whole psychological effect named after you. Do you think the World Series of Poker would be more or less exciting if they used a giant check or didn’t bring the money out when it gets down to the last two players? Or, for that matter, if they didn’t hand out bracelets (rings, in other sports) for titles?
Those are all good things, but they don’t hold a candle to the Stanley Cup because the Cup has a life of its own. Nobody cares what happens to the trophies in baseball, basketball, or football, but how many containers do you know that have held champagne, baptismal water, and dog food? It’s one of the running stories that never lets me down. I love seeing where it goes, pictures of people drinking out of it, and just thinking about how cool it would be to have a day with the Stanley Cup. It’s one of a kind.
So, I’m here to make a modest proposal: the CGS needs a Stanley Cup.
It’s not too late; we’re still months away from the first World Finals, or whatever they’re going to call the championship. I’m on the case, so hop on board if you want a fun ride.
First, we’ll need a catchy name that doubles as an homage to somebody in eSports. And of course, it has to be named after a real object so it’s a tangible reward. My first instinct was to name it after the first commissioner of the CGS, Andy Reif, and something near and dear to most gamers’ hearts. Hence, version 1.0 of this idea was named “The Reifer’s Bong”. There could even be a whole subplot where the gamers try to take pictures with it, but also not leave any evidence that could get them imprisoned for illegal drug use. They’d need to leave enough hints so we could verify who was actually in the picture, but still have enough plausible deniability to not get sent to the pokey.
Unfortunately, I had to scrap this idea due to concerns about the gaming community’s collective intelligence. Somebody would take an incriminating photo, post it on Myspace, Facebook, the CAL forums, GotFrag, FARK, Digg, or Imageshack, and then we’d have one less gaming fan. I thought that, more often than not, The Reifer’s Bong would end up as Exhibit A instead of a big reward.
Out with The Reifer’s Bong. In with version 2.0 of the CGS trophy: the Angel Ball.
This would be named after Angel Munoz, the founder of the CPL, and it would be a bowling ball. You could still put alcohol in it, a la the Simpsons, and it would be much more inconspicuous. Plus, it’s practical. You could take it to various bowling alleys, have famous bowlers take pictures with it, and do, uh … other bowling-related activities.
Problem: not many people like Angel Munoz anymore, he has nothing to do with the CGS, and a fifteen pound bowling ball would be pretty annoying to haul around. Plus, you know somebody would end up using it as a weapon in some pointless LAN fight*. Now our prize is Exhibit A in an assault and battery case. Not an upgrade.
(*- I use the term “fight” very loosely here, as they’re usually nothing more than a shoving match that happens every time you have more than ten immature, materialistic, ego-centric gamers all trying to prove they’re “hard” and impress the one really hot booth-girl that’s already got a boyfriend.)
Out with the Angel Ball. So to went the Ksharp Krown, The Torbull Torch, The Midway Shotglass, SirScoot’s Scooter, and the LANDodger Golden Boxers.
Most of these ideas were scratched because, well, they’re ridiculous. Except the LANDodger Golden Boxers -- that was scrapped because I don’t want to give up my favorite pair of underwear. But there are realistic options.
I think you need something that separates you from the rest of the games; it’d be weird to have bracelets (WSOP) or rings (NFL, MLB) simply because they’ve been done before. Necklaces could work, especially because they’re unisex, and that’s more important in eSports than it is in the NFL. It’s different than the Stanley Cup because each player would get one to keep, but it’s something.
As for the trophy, it could be anything as long as there’s only one. The reason the Cup is so interesting is that teams have to give it back instead of every team getting a new one. It makes the physical item more special, and the CGS would be wise to take the best aspects of all the different professional leagues. They’re all sitting out there for us to take and adapt, we just have to recognize what makes each of them special so we can preserve it and not end up with a bastardized version that looks a lot like the real thing but doesn’t mean anything because it’s a transparent knockoff.
Here’s a fun idea that I think could work: Championship Controllers. Make a special set of usable, ornate keyboards and controllers (for PGR, DoA, etc). There would be one for each game, and the winners could take it with them to various LANs, take pictures with it in their home setups, and, hopefully, be comfortable enough with them to use it during the actual CGS competitions. Personally, I think seeing a PGR team use them during the CGS Finals match, or seeing Rambo sitting behind the CS:S keyboard during the Finals match would be awesome. There would even be room for engraving names on the back.
I’d love to hear any community suggestions on this, so send them in. What kind of reward would you guys like to see, or have, if you won the CGS championship? Something to show off to your friends, that would also end up with stories attached to it. All submissions are welcome, and if I get any really good ones, I’d be more than happy to post them.
Just make sure they’re less ridiculous than the LANDodger Golden Boxers.
