SD PokéMom said:
So this is all about YOU...how other players' alleged "desire" to "win" affects the attitude you have towards the matches YOU play?
If someone's not playing up to the 'standards' you've set for YOURSELF, if they don't want the same things you do, if they're not willing to do ANYTHING just within the rules to "win"...they don't 'deserve' to enjoy and participate in all levels of OP they can qualify for entrance to? A player whose priority is to ENJOY the experience of playing in an event is 'less worthy' to participate in OP than a player who will ONLY enjoy playing in that event if they WIN it?
How awful for you: you might actually have to play someone who's not what you consider to be a 'worthy' opponent...and you might even LOSE to them because of the luck of the draw.
But that's LIFE, and going to happen in ANY game with a wide variety of players; you can't legislate "desire to win" at the door. And asking people to self-select and exclude THEMSELVES from OP because they supposedly don't "want to win" as much as YOU do is selfish, IMO.
Would you rather be the player who ends up doing better than they expected to going into the tourney or the player who goes in with the attitude they're going to win and doesn't? Who do you think enjoyed the event more?
JMHO,
'mom
All right that is enough! I am sick and tired of my statements and sentiments being misrepresented because someone is not understanding them properly! This is not about me any more than this just happens to be my article in my column and is obviously there fore MY OPINION! Anything anybody writes is there opinion and they have the right to express it. You can disagree with me, but do not vilify me for expressing my opinion! When I chose to use the words “Nothing is more deflating to
me as a player than to here this type of thing at the end of a game when
I have just tried
my best to win.
I want to know that every one of
my games was and is as challenging as possible. This will not be if
my opponents are just playing for fun.” , I meant them in the general “you” sense. Replace all of the “I” and “me” with “some players” and the sentiments will be exactly the same. Any intelligent person should be able to figure that out!
I would rather be, the player who did not sell himself short prior to the beginning of a tournament and came out knowing that I did my best no matter what the outcome of the event was, than the person in either of your examples. Entering into a tournament with only the desire to have fun is exactly the same as entering a tournament saying to yourself “I know I can’t win so I’ll just try to have fun.” This person is setting him/herself up for failure every time. All I’m saying is that players should try their best and that if you are entering into a tournament with the desire to only have fun, you are resigning yourself to not trying your best, and that is a shame!
Having the desire to win and being arrogant about it are two different things.
You are assigning an attitude to me that I do not have. Any further attempts to do so shall be considered an unwarranted attack on my personal character and I will take even further offence to them.
F/S- Pre-releases don’t count with this because they are a different beast altogether. This also only applies to those players who are mature enough to understand the concept. Which will leave out most of those in the younger age divisions.
And for the last time (hopefully):
I never said don’t have fun!
I never said winning is the only way to have fun!
I have said several times now “Fun should just be a side effect of playing, an automatic if you will, win or lose, and NOT a goal!”
In other words fun should always happen!
