Posted by: Susan Haynes on July 22, 2003 at 10:53:36

We go every year and every year moan about the prices and what you get in return. I will give Debra credit as a businesswoman though. Everything is sponsored or paid for, if it isn't, you don't see it,i.e, remember when you used to be able to keep the flags that were hung and the teams would hang them all over their staging area as a badge of honor? That was one of the coolest things. When you step into that place everything for the players from the armbands to the prizes are donated and sponsored. You used to get a few cases of paint when you made finals donated by Debra and Ryan Kriske and they don't even do that anymore. Anyhow it seemed to me that there were far fewer teams and the trade show was missing a lot of people I am used to seeing there, like PMI and Extreme Rage. I think that you can only hose the vendors for so long and many of them have gotten wise and don't come. The gift certificates by Dicks are pretty much a joke, they are in $10 and $20 increments and state one per person per visit and expire in September. We don't have a Dicks sporting goods within an hour of us. Basically they are donating gift certificates which have a small chance of ever being used. Props to the vendors and companies that are still thinking of the players when it comes to prizes like National and Custom Products, we can at least use those certificates. I also remember the old days of the players party when you were actually fed a meal. When they started giving out chicken in a brown bag a few years ago we stopped going and haven't been back. I think the IAO needs to realize that the players can and will turn on them once they feel that they are taken advantage of. The three man arena was a disappointment for the three man teams. The games lasted maybe 30 seconds. The kids came away from the end of the tourney feeling like they didn't even get much playing time in. The more experienced teams must be getting more cynical because there were only 10 teams in the seven man amateur division. Barely enough to have a tourney. Well I could go on and on but we still in spite of everything had a great time and it was fun to see the people we only get to see once a year. I will try not to think of all the money I spent and just enjoy the memory.

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