Suited connectors

I just read Brian-David Marshall's article on the mothership, and read the last part about Raphael Levy's request to players in the upcoming Pro Tour: Berlin to wear a suit on Day 1.

I'll admit, the first card game I got competitive in was Pokemon, and constantly on forums people would make parallels to the competitive scene in Magic. I remember clicking over to Sideboard Online and reading the tournament coverage of the 2000 World Championships, the one that Jon Finkel won. And I'm looking at the photos of Bob Maher and Jon Finkel duking it out, and while Bob wasn't dressed badly, Jon looked like he was supposed to win the game. He looked confident. He looked like a professional.

It legitimized playing with these little cards as something that you could take seriously. In my eyes, it made it cool. The smelly kids in the lunchroom you see playing with trading cards: not cool. Professionals in their 20's outwitting each other for $40,000: cool.

And I always get excited when on the Pro Tour broadcast someone in the top 8 decides to do what Jon did and try to look like a professional instead of any other backpack-toting dude you would see at a PTQ, because clearly you are not a PTQ top 8 kid-with-a-dream who maybe ran hot with a good sealed pool and went X-0-2, but you beat the best players in the world and you're playing for thousands of dollars. Time to look the part.

If I ever qualify for the Pro Tour, I'm definitely bringing at least one suit to the event. I'd might even go one, well, two further and bring three suits: one for each day of the Pro Tour, ala Marcel Luske from the 2004 World Series of Poker main event (the one Dave Williams did well at), plus that it would do no good to wear the same clothes every like some Magic players do anyway, no matter how nice they are.

I think it'd be great if Wizards instituted a dress code. I've never seen Garry Kasparov play chess on TV without a suit. Hell, he wears a suit when he plays against computers; would you dress up to play MODO? I think it'd be a great for player acquisition. If this Suit Up for Berlin deal is successful, couldn't you imagine a guy stumbling on a Top 8 match from Berlin on YouTube, seeing professionals play some kind of card game, then going to a local card store and asking about Magic for the first time? That wouldn't happen if the people playing are wearing cargo pants and t-shirts. (As a parallel, do you think poker would have exploded in popularity in 2003 if everyman Chris Moneymaker had gone toe-to-toe with a guy who looks like he hasn't shaved or bathed in a week instead of Sam Farha, who absolutely looks the part of a professional gambler?)

Anyway, I absolutely love the idea and I hope it continues so that when I finally go to a Pro Tour, I won't look silly being the one guy that dresses up for Day 1 and 0-3 drops.

Unrelated to all that, I'll leave with a snippet from Masashi Oiso from the same article that sums up what I feel like I've been trying to do since I've arrived here and the attitude I hope I have:

"Even now, I always think to myself, 'Kai Budde could have won' after each loss."