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@ over |3eer

We begin tonight's writeup with an offering and a prayer, for this might be our only chance to do so.

"We thank the STA Powers for our promotion to Bronze. We did not ask for such an honor, nor do we think we legitimately deserve it. If it was up to us, we would have happily continued toiling in Copper until TFC Armageddon. However, we are not ones to question the mysterious ways and wisdom of the Powers. We understand we are merely pawns in a scheme much greater than ourselves. We have faith that the Powers understand the scheme and how their actions can best assist the community we all try to maintain.

"Although we successfully escaped from Copper, it should be noted that we did so by navigating around Copper's power teams instead of through them. The scheduling gods blessed us with forced byes and opponent forfeits to propel us to Bronze. Now that we're here, we fully expect to be banished back to Copper in a few weeks' time. That is where our suspect offense and shoddy defense belongs. We know it. We assume the Powers know it but see fit to test our resolve and commitment to supporting the community. It is only a matter of time before the truth of our Keystone Copness becomes evident to everyone else and we return to our roots.

"We hereby honor all those we must temporarily abandon. Every time our offense fumbles or our defense crumbles, we will think of those we left behind and reflect on all the special moments we had together.

"However, tonight we must again praise the scheduling gods for their benevolence. They shepherded us into Bronze and intertwined our path with that of the Beer Boys. For a single evening, we looked as if we belonged in Bronze. Although we did not feel as if we did, we did our best to imitate the Bronze persona, and as long as we are allowed to grace the division with our presence, we shall try to live up to the lofty expectations that have been set before us. Amen."


Now, on to the match depiction.

Of all the nights and all the matches Missy could have returned to, it had to be tonight. The Reds made their debut in Bronze, and Missy made an encore appearance. It could have been a coincidence. Perhaps it really was the first night Missy had off in months, but we think otherwise. In fact, D Leader had this to say about Missy coming back, "Didn't I cut her?"

Truth be told, he did cut her more than a year ago. Little did he know that his second in command put her back on the roster a few weeks later. If you thought STA Bronze didn't have enough drama before, the Reds bring enough to compete with the Law and Order empire all on their own.

During the first round, the Beer Boys had everything under control. Their offense shredded the Reds' defense like any mic'd up monolingual team does. It got so bad that the Reds had to reshuffle their positions because the BBs' offensive demo kept annihilating the flag room on each of his runs.

"Someone stop that demoman!" the Reds' own demoman shouted at the rest of the team. "Where the hell is he coming from? Someone call him. Let me know where he's at. For the love of God, why do we keep escorting him to the flag room?" Not that any of this was unusual. The Reds' demoman always takes it upon himself to rail against his team whenever he and his pipe traps go down. If it were up to him, the only good, clean match would be one where he goes 150 kills and 0 deaths. No, even then he'd find something to criticize. So although he may detonate his pipes early, let the opposing demoman own his position, and kill one teammate for every two opponents, he brings the drama every night, and that's something.

The Beer Boys' defense blocked their own entrances well enough that if it hadn't been for the Reds' own offensive demoman getting an insane amount of computer detonations, the game would have been out of reach by halftime. Yes, the Reds were still in the match after 30 minutes because the Beer Boy's ENIAC kept exploding. One would have figured that heavily armed computer aficionados would happily sacrifice themselves to save their beloved computer more readily than their little colored flag, but that person would be mistaken.

The second round was where the drama really picked up. On a day when many a man thought somberly about where the women that used to haunt their lives had disappeared to, Missy returned in a truly Missy-like fashion. Down 30 at the half, the Reds knew they needed to make some adjustments. That's when Missy decided to join the channel and demand playing time.

Question: how many other teams let someone who was previously cut 18 months ago come back and dictate the match roster? Seriously, how many teams have leaders that are that whipped? Why didn't Mr. "I thought I cut her" rise up and say, "Missy, I should have muted you years ago. Shut up and let us play our game"? We would have understood such an action. Many of us might have applauded it. But instead, the Reds started the second round with Missy in the lineup. We blame D Leader's bad back. Once in the server, it took all of thirty seconds for the Beer Boys to start hitting on Missy in their subtle ways. "Hey, Missy! You remember me?" one of them asks.

Why do you people do this to yourselves? Has nobody learned from the past? Was the soap opera not coherent enough? Getting attached to Missy is just a recipe for heartache and pain. Just ask D Leader, if he ever returns from his Lance Armstrong workout routine, he can tell you all about it.

Missy is a fickle creature by nature. Anyone who disappears while a team is struggling and then suddenly rematerializes when it starts improving should immediately be classified as either an opportunist or a bandwagon groupie. Knowing Missy the way we do, we can confidently confirm it's the latter. If the Reds had been playing the Old Folks and been up by a dozen flags at the half, Missy would still have been on hiatus. Anyway, Missy was on the second round roster, and we wish that is all we had to say about that. However...

The Reds defense still let out a bunch of flags (8), and they'll have to replace that Apple IIe they keep in the attic unless they either know that Iraqi from Lost or have a bunch of Crazy Glue on hand. Something interesting happened midway through the round for the Reds' defense though. It figured out how to stop someone. We don't know how it happened, but the Reds stopped giving away flags like they were free money. Check the <a href=http://s92739903.onlinehome.us/rml/beer-bases2k3/rd2/>stats</a> for yourself. Actually, don't check the stats because the stats don't support our previous claim.

Here is what the stats show. At 14 minutes into the round, the Beer Boys had four flag captures. At that rate they should have had eight or nine captures by the end of the round. They ended up with eight flags and one computer detonation, so no, the Reds' defense didn't figure anything out, but at least it was consistent from start to finish.

There's nothing worse than letting out a trickle of flags for half the round only to have the levies burst wide open and let out a flood of flags at the end of the round. Just ask the Beer Boys. They can tell you how it feels. Okay, there are worse things, but when you factor in letting someone like Missy walk all over you during the process, there aren't that many.

14 minutes into the second round, the round was tied and Beer was still ahead by two flags overall. Then Missy starts wailing on them. It was unbelievable in one of those <a href=http://journals.aol.com/deskblog/aolsports/entries/924>Tyrone Prothro</a> kind of ways. It's horrible. You wish it didn't happen. But you know exactly what it means. The Reds' offense started looking at the death info and it was all Missy. It was like watching that CNN news crawler and only seeing Missy events. Missy gasses an engineer. Missy grenades a demoman. Missy wrecks a sentry gun. The only thing Missy didn't do was move the flag, but nobody's perfect; although Missy would probably contend otherwise. The Reds' offense hated it. Missy came in, made demands, and then Beer let the Reds win.

That's not how the script was supposed to go. The Reds were supposed to move to Bronze and promptly start tanking their Konspiracy Stock Exchange value. At this rate, they'll be back to 100 by New Year's. Then when Missy shows up, the Beer Boys were supposed to rally together and give the Reds a loss to remember. Then everyone could go home happy. Beer would have had the well fought win, and the Reds could go take Missy down a peg or two. It would have been great, but that's not how it turned out.

Instead the Reds had to go and thank Missy for playing. Do you know how painful that is? It's worse than when you have to put on that shirt your grandmother got you for your birthday, give her a kiss on the cheek, and tell her how much you love it. You know which shirt we're referring to. It's the one buried deep in your closet that smells like your basement and hasn't seen daylight since "the kiss."

It wasn't right. It shouldn't have gone down like that. Now, the Reds have Missy promising to play next week. That gives them seven days to figure out how to prevent almost certain pain from happening. There have been rumors floated that if Congress passes that anti-torture bill, the vice president is looking into hiring Missy and D Leader as lead interrogators. This may be the perfect solution for all involved if it could happen in the next week. The U.S. can say it doesn't knowingly engage in torture and yet would still have a crack team of intelligence officers, and the Reds wouldn't have to spend the next week quaking in their boots while dreading the Second Coming of Missy.

Can someone please initiate a letter writing campaign to make this happen? It's truly for the good of everyone in the community. We hope the Powers agree.



-The fearfully humble Redeye Writing Team

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