| 05 January 2011
Since my football season is now over, myself along with other football fans will see their beer pong workouts die down for the offseason. But it seems most of us were a little late on notice as the official World Series of Beer Pong championship occurred this week in Las Vegas.
A field of about 500 teams (two people per team) participated in the event that required registrants to enter by December 10th and each pay a $500 entry fee that included a 4 night stay in Vegas and the WSOBP entry ticket.
The WSOBP offered up almost $65k in prizes with the Championship check totaling $50k and also expected around 6,000 spectators. Not bad for a "college tailgating" game.
And guess who was on hand to announce the final table? MMA announcer Bruce Buffer makes his return for the third year in a row to judge the ever growing championship.
The final matchup occurred Tuesday night with a cross border face off of Team USA ( Standing Ovation) and Team Canada (Unstoppable Since Inception). In which I am happy to say that unlike the Winter Olympics of 2010, the good ol' US of A pulled out a win against those red glove wearing fools. (Canada, I mean that in the nicest way possible)
Hit the title/read more to read more about the WSOBP....
Besides your back yard rules, the WSOBP actually has a very extensive list of the rules of beer pong. During the tournament, teams played 6 games a day during the 2 day Prelims and opponents chosen at random. One team is allowed to pick the side while the other team chooses the possession.
Some rules that stuck out to me was the starting a game off with 10 cups per side with the first six cups to be filled with beer or water while the back 4 cups are reused every game as water cups. This probably sways those idiots who say "game over" if a single cup is knocked over. Ridiculous.
Also ridiculous? Elbow violations are very VERY rampant. Does this kind of leaning fly for the WSOBP? For God Sakes, I guess we now have to take wing span into account when choosing a pong partner.
Another rule that was a red flag is that swatting away a bounced ball is NOT allowed to be touched until it hits the rim of a cup. Also, should the bounce make it, it does not count for two cups.
Based off of that , please join me in saying "then why the F would I want to bounce it? Ever?!".
But I guess it helps to have it in writing to dispel any disputes. Which, if you have played beer pong before, you have probably seen that this game and all its rules will directly lead to World War III.
On a side note, the 25 pages or so of WSOBP names makes for a gold mine of future fantasy football names to rip off. My personal favorites include "Our Couch Pulls Out But We Don't", "Not at the Table Carlos" and "Touched by God.....and a Priest".
Besides the eventual up-rise in the popularity of this game, the people over at Bpong.com have created some pretty awesome promo videos for the event from last fall. The promo video coupled with the $50,000 grand prize is good enough to make you start saving for that $500 entry fee for the 2012 WSOBP
[apologies for the auotplay--there is no way of disabling it--lucky for you though, it is rather awesome]
Final Highlights of the World Series of Beer Pong
[image source @FlamingoVegas and Pulse of Las Vegas ]
