Avaricious Arcanines (4) vs. Humilau City Hitmonlees (4)
ORAS: blunder vs. FlamingVictini - fv has been expressing more investment in the oras rarelyused metagame than most 'mains', and idt blunder has won a pokemon game since spl finals. nothin set in stone clearly, but i would say that this ways heavily in fv's favour.
ORAS: Star. vs. teal6 - a bit of an odd one; i do not believe either is intimately familiar w/the meta being played, and i cannot speak confidently who will be providing them teams (unless either / both are feeling particularly ambitious). i'm leaning towards teal here given he's on a tear nowadays.
ORAS: NaCl vs. Imanalt - in recent months i've come to feel like nacl has really stabilized as a player, and while he's not the most innovative player i would be giving him the edge in this game. however, sweep tends to have a bit of a left-wing approach to lower tier building, and assuming that's where alt's teams will be coming from, there might be enough of net surprise value to cause an upset.
XY: Omfuga vs. galbia - my gut says omfuga, my heart says galbia. i think its well within galb's power to set up a good mu out of the gate, since fuga's the most predictable builder this side of tewmew, but honestly i think it'll come down to more efficient play on fuga's part. should be a highlight unless someone goofs hard.
XY: KratosMana vs. MrAldo - ok, ok, one of my least certain calls here. i saw what anti brought to xy slam series, and even as a player that was not touching the game during that stretch of time, i knew it was the worst thing ever. that said, i feel tour exp will outweigh here, and being able to turn to fuga for something at least passable will give him enough leeway to grab a w. that in mind, i'm lowkey routing for aldo b.c he's a cool guy and i think he can pull it out if he doesn't let the trophies get to him.
BW: Finchinator vs. Oglemi - i think of all the bw tiers finchinatorpo sides, ru is probs his weakest, but generally i feel tour exp and less interest in making a 'cool team' is gonna drive a w from him. oglemi has a little more depth in this tier, but i don't feel it's enough here.
BW: Void vs. Peli - another player that's been on a bit of tear recently, been impressive. that said, i'm not sure his team suppliers are as solid as they were in, say, nupl, and void is definitely a strong player who also has some good team support to work off, but if momentum was ever a real thing in this context, then peli has it.
Manager: -Tsunami- vs. Sweep - a lil tough to call, but of the two, i think sweep is far less likely to bring something really stupid, and more likely to account for shake's usual approach to these kinds of games.
Flexin Flygons (2) vs. Weaboo Wormadams (6)
ORAS 1: ChillShadow vs. Tricking - i think chillshadow's a bit of sleeper here. he's had some suspect builds, but generally i've been pretty impressed from what little i've seen, and his play has been solid as well. i do think tricking is rather solid, and it's well within his power to pull it out, but whoever helps him build for ru just really has not sat well w/me x_x maybe pearl can iron out some of the sub-optimal stuff that gets thrown in there, but i'm giving the edge to chillshadow.
ORAS 2: Lord Death Man vs. dice - yeah. dice will bring some billboard top 40 shit and win w/starbucks in hand, but he'll win. there isn't really enough linearity to his builds for ldm to brew something to effectively counterstyle, and i figure dice is just a better player currently. maybe i'm just out of touch, since i know ldm more as a poster than a player, but it feels pretty clean-cut unless he manages a terrific mu sheerly on coincidence ~_~
ORAS 3: Zamrock vs. HANTSUKI - honestly, i'm just shy of having no idea. i view hantsuki as the perpetual 'super sub' of smog as is, and from offhand comments from bigs i have been led to believe he's invested a mild focus, which is what bases my decision here. zam's insane in a great way, big ups, and might very well pull some insane sequence out to catch a w, but idt his oras support is strong enough on this team to set him up for sucess.
XY 1: Arifeen vs. thecrystalonix - like nacl, i feel arifeen has really come into his own in recent months, and his high level of activity in contrast to tco's should come to favour him hard here. tco's gotta really play up what i'm to understand to be a greater familiarity w/xy to stretch his advantages here, but i do not feel it'll be enough.
XY 2: Evan. vs. rozes - most overrated guy of the year(?), but i think the edge of better team support will push for rozes here. evan-senpai has a better feel for the end-game and a stronger trigger finger tho, so if he could bum a team off kiyo then maybe somethin could happen ?_?
BW2 1: FLCL vs. Kushalos - just like me to get crit right away haha. u both lost in spirit when u played as early as u did
BW2 2: EonX vs. SilentVerse - mind you, there is a distinct possibility of an act win here, but w/league pals in tow I figure this is less likely than usual. i hate to sound cynical or w/e, but there's a really substantial gap in playing ability and meta knowledge here, rust or not x_x im not even sure if sv bringing standard balance + a really awful bug would even the field here, and if ur reading this dude then know that i bear absolutely no ill will when i say this q-q
Manager: DTC vs. Pearl - I have seen dtc play one tour game, in which he brought a monferno, lost, and then made a meme pun.
