# Episode 212: Josh Sharpe, the 2019 Pinburgh winner (remind me to edit later)

**Source:** Pinball Profile  
**Type:** podcast_episode  
**Published:** 2019-07-30  
**Duration:** 50m 5s  
**Beat:** Pinball

**URL:** https://www.pinballprofile.com/episode-212-josh-sharpe-the-2019-pinburgh-winner-remind-me-to-edit-later/

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## Analysis

Jeff Teolis interviews Josh Sharpe, 2019 Pinburgh champion and IFPA co-founder, covering tournament operations, tilt mechanism standardization, women's pinball rankings and championship fee structures, and IFPA's organizational model. The episode focuses on competitive pinball governance, equity in women's tournament qualification, and the Whopper rating system.

### Key Claims

- [HIGH] A tilt bob shifted during Pin Masters tournament, creating inconsistent playing conditions between groups — _Jeff Teolis describes specific incident at Pin Masters where tilt bob on Black Rose had scooted during tournament play, affecting game difficulty across groups_
- [HIGH] IFPA implemented a dollar fee for women's events starting in 2020 to fund the women's championship — _Josh Sharpe confirms fee was introduced after successful implementation of dollar fee for NACS Day_
- [HIGH] Women's World Championship qualification splits between top 16 overall players and top 8 women-only event players — _Josh Sharpe states the split is 16 from overall rankings, 8 from women-only events, with plans to consult top 50 women on whether this should be adjusted_
- [HIGH] Elizabeth Cromwell opposed the current qualification structure because women-only events subsidize pool for players who may not compete in women-only events — _Direct quote from Elizabeth Cromwell included in episode addressing the equity concern_
- [HIGH] IFPA operates as a for-profit LLC with organizational decisions made by Josh Sharpe, Zach Sharp, and four board members (Adam Becker, Brian Shepard, Brian Woodard, and Josh's father) — _Josh Sharpe explains IFPA structure and clarifies misconceptions about how decisions are made_
- [MEDIUM] IFPA Whopper system was last significantly changed in 2015-2016 (Version 5), requiring real tournament data instead of just results emails — _Josh Sharpe discusses when version 5 was implemented, though there is some uncertainty about exact year_
- [HIGH] Women's-only leagues are growing in number to provide comfortable competitive environments for female players — _Jeff Teolis references specific leagues including one in Arizona, confirms growth trend_
- [HIGH] Some women players are choosing to compete in women's events over major open tournaments (like Intergalactic) due to prestige and prize structure — _Josh Sharpe discusses example of a woman choosing to play in WHIPPED even if she qualifies for Intergalactic top 40_
- [HIGH] Tournament directors face difficulty running separate main and women's events simultaneously without creating scheduling conflicts — _Discussed in context of Pingtastic where Emily had to choose between competing in main or women's event_
- [HIGH] IFPA has 23 country directors representing communities globally, plus 50 state board members providing input on organizational decisions — _Josh Sharpe describes structure including specific count of country directors and state representatives_

### Notable Quotes

> "If they're going to charge, that would be the more equitable way to do it."
> — **Elizabeth Cromwell**, ~22:30
> _Direct advocacy for prioritizing women-only event qualification over overall ranking in championship selection_

> "The quality of play between a man and a woman, a child and an adult, there is zero difference. It doesn't matter. It's the same machine for everyone, the same skill set, no matter what age, sex, whatever you are."
> — **Jeff Teolis**, ~27:00
> _Fundamental statement on gender equity in pinball competition_

> "I like to let the women who stand to be those people that are winning this money decide what's important to them."
> — **Josh Sharpe**, ~25:45
> _Core philosophy of IFPA approach to women's championship structure decisions_

> "It's not for me to decide. It's really not for you to decide. You're just there to facilitate it."
> — **Jeff Teolis**, ~28:15
> _Articulates the role of IFPA as facilitator rather than decision-maker_

> "You can't make everyone happy in any demographic."
> — **Jeff Teolis**, ~27:45
> _Realistic acknowledgment of inherent tensions in tournament structure design_

> "This woman, if she makes the Intergalactic Top 40, the points you get in for being in the second biggest tournament in the world, she's giving up those Whopper points to play in a very prestigious women's event."
> — **Josh Sharpe**, ~30:00
> _Illustrates the Sophie's Choice dilemma for top female players_

> "The more players that play in an event, the more it's worth. The better the players that play in an event, the more that it's worth. The more games that the winner of the tournament has to play to win the tournament, the more it's worth."
> — **Josh Sharpe**, ~45:00
> _Concise explanation of Whopper system point calculation methodology_

> "We need someone else on, quote, unquote, the board, whatever that means, because it's me and Zach and my dad and Adam Becker and Brian Shepard and Brian Woodard sitting around dictating what we're going to do. That's just not how we operate."
> — **Josh Sharpe**, ~40:00
> _Direct rebuttal to criticism about IFPA governance and board composition_

### Entities

| Name | Type | Context |
|------|------|---------|
| Josh Sharpe | person | 2019 Pinburgh champion, co-founder of IFPA, tournament director, competitive pinball player |
| Jeff Teolis | person | Host of Pinball Profile podcast, pinball community member and commentator |
| Zach Sharp | person | Josh Sharpe's brother, co-founder of IFPA, tournament operator at Pin Masters |
| Elizabeth Cromwell | person | Advocate for women's pinball rankings, proponent of women-only event prioritization in championship qualification |
| Raymond Davidson | person | Competitive pinball player who played in Pin Masters event during tilt bob incident |
| Jason Wardrick | person | Competitive pinball player who experienced tilt issues on Black Rose at Pin Masters |
| Kerry Wing | person | Female competitive pinball player who competed in both main and women's events |
| IFPA | organization | International Flipper Pinball Association - governing body for competitive pinball rankings and championships |
| Pin Masters | event | Pinball tournament hosted in Las Vegas where tilt bob incident occurred alongside women's championship |
| Pinburgh | event | Major pinball tournament that Josh Sharpe won in 2019 |
| Whopper System | product | IFPA's ranking and points system for competitive pinball, last major update in 2015-2016 |
| Women's World Championship | event | IFPA women's pinball championship held in Vegas with 24 player field, recently began charging dollar fee |
| NACS Day | event | Tournament event with successful dollar fee implementation that served as model for women's championship fee |
| Intergalactic | event | Second biggest pinball tournament in the world by Whopper points value |
| WHIPPED | event | Prestigious women's pinball tournament with 128 players that conflicts with Intergalactic finals |
| Replay FX | event | Major pinball convention and tournament event referenced in discussion |
| Pingtastic | event | Tournament held outside Boston where women had to choose between main and women's divisions |
| Black Rose | game | Pinball machine used at Pin Masters where tilt bob shifted during tournament play |
| Adam Becker | person | IFPA board member |
| Brian Shepard | person | IFPA board member |
| Brian Woodard | person | IFPA board member |
| Emily | person | Female pinball player who finished 8th in women's event at Pingtastic and missed main event competition |
| Holly | person | Female pinball player competing at Pingtastic |
| Stern Pinball | company | Pinball manufacturer who donated prize for women's championship |

### Topics

- **Primary:** Tournament operations and standardization, Women's pinball equity and championship qualification, IFPA organizational structure and governance, Tilt mechanism calibration and tournament fairness
- **Secondary:** Whopper rating system and tournament point calculation, Women-only vs. co-ed tournament structure conflicts, Prize pool funding for women's championships, Growth of women's pinball leagues and community

### Sentiment

**Mixed** (0.55) — Generally positive and constructive tone regarding IFPA operations and women's pinball growth, but critical examination of specific policy issues (tilt bob handling, fee equity, qualification structure). Hosts express respect for Josh Sharpe while identifying legitimate concerns with tournament administration and women's championship structure.

### Signals

- **[business_signal]** Structural tension in women's championship where women-only event fees subsidize prize pool for players who may primarily compete in co-ed events (confidence: high) — Elizabeth Cromwell: 'women's only events are therefore subsidizing the pool for women that may or may not compete in women's only events at all'
- **[community_signal]** IFPA relying on 23 country directors and 50 state representatives to provide community input on organizational policy decisions (confidence: high) — Josh Sharpe explains decentralized decision-making structure where country and state directors serve as voice of their communities
- **[community_signal]** IFPA planning to consult top 50 women players on women's championship qualification structure to address equity concerns (confidence: high) — Josh Sharpe: 'I certainly plan on reaching back out to the top 50 women in both systems to see what they think about who should qualify for this event'
- **[sentiment_shift]** IFPA dollar fee for women's tournaments generated community criticism, with Josh Sharpe 'taking a beating' according to Elizabeth Cromwell (confidence: high) — Elizabeth Cromwell states: 'I noticed that there's now a dollar for women's tournaments. And I saw some of the comments, and boy, Josh is taking a beating'
- **[design_philosophy]** Tournament fairness concern regarding tilt bob calibration during open qualifying events - inconsistent playing conditions across groups due to equipment drift (confidence: high) — Black Rose at Pin Masters had tilt bob that 'scooted' during play, creating question of whether TDs should have discretion to adjust between groups
- **[event_signal]** Multiple major tournaments (WHIPPED, Intergalactic, Pingtastic) creating conflicting scheduling that forces top female players to choose between competing in women's vs. open divisions (confidence: high) — Josh Sharpe discusses woman choosing to play in WHIPPED even if she qualifies for Intergalactic top 40, giving up major Whopper points
- **[market_signal]** Growing number of women-only pinball leagues as response to comfort and inclusion concerns in co-ed competition (confidence: high) — Jeff Teolis references women-only leagues popping up in multiple locations, including specific mention of Arizona league, to provide comfortable competitive environments
- **[regulatory_signal]** Lack of standardized measurement tools for critical tournament equipment like tilt bobs creates inconsistency in tournament fairness (confidence: high) — Jeff Teolis proposes using ruler/measurement system to document tilt bob position in centimeters to detect drift between groups

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## Transcript

 It's time for another pinball profile i'm your host jeff teals you can find our group on facebook we're also on twitter at pinball profile please email us at pinball profile at gmail.com and please subscribe on your favorite podcatcher oh why am i doing this you know what it is it's pinball festivus it's time for the airing of grievances and who do i have a grievance with or several i introduced you to our next guest Josh Sharpe hello joshua how are you greetings jeff Jeffrey, Mr. Teolis. Dr. Teolis. I like it better when I let you go your whole intro without interrupting you. I usually prefer to interrupt you, get you off your game before we start our banter. I have to wonder about this time of year. You're a father of three, a young child now in the household, and I think of all the late-night terrors, the waking up, the pissing and crapping, and the diapers being changed. I'm not even talking about your kid. I'm just talking about how you're feeling right before Pinburgh. Yeah, what you were saying, all true. Yep. Oh, this is going to be a great episode. And you, Meathead, I picked you, you of all freaking people, and there's a thousand to choose from, I picked you to come on the episode before Pinberg. And I have this thing called Pinball Profile Karma. Oh, you know where I had Johanna Sostemeier, the champ, and Daniele on right before the IFPA 16. They both made it to the finals. And now I'm putting you on. So what is going to be greater, the pinball profile karma, which is a proven winner, or your inability to win a bloody major? Which will be stronger? If Daniele finished second, because he was, who aired first, Daniele or Johannes? Who was the last one you aired? Was it Johannes? Daniele aired, and then right before it started, I aired Johannes. Oh, so really, if you think I'm going to finish like sixth, you can air five more episodes after this one, right before Pinberg starts. Just like launch them all on like day two of Pinberg. If I'm not looking so hot, just start throwing episodes out. Maybe I'll finish like 70th. We're recording this on July 25th, the little behind-the-curtain scenes here. So I've got some time. I'm usually the one to destroy that for you. That's fine. That's fine. I just want people to know how long it takes me to edit out your ums and ahs and all that other crap. Right. Right. Yes. Go on. Because I never make a mistake. I never have to redo anything. It's all one-take teal, as they call me. Yep. Like, yep, this is the first time that we're recording this thing. You can take that out. Go on. Yeah, we might have recorded earlier in the week. And why did I? And I chose. You know why? Do you know why? You went there. Well, let's. All right. You knob. The reason we are re-recording this. So somewhere in my audio files, I have a 45-minute conversation with Josh that will never air. Because we talked about a lot of topics. Some in jest, as we like to do. Some were serious topics, but we thought, you know what? Probably shouldn't have a jokey episode where some serious topics were brought up. So... You know what? I also think that it probably led on that we like each other a little bit too much. I think we were having a little bit too much fun. We have to dial the fun back and really stick to the animosity, I think. I agree. I think it is best. I mean, look, do you want Superman and Lex Luthor to be walking down Metropolis? Hey, buddy, what's going on? Boring. Some of those grievances. Where do we start? I mean, there are a lot. You know some of them. Which one do you want to start first with? I don't know, dude. Just random number generator, man. Pick one. Pick one. Let's knock it out before my boss comes in and asks me more questions about the meeting that's going on outside my office right now. I don't care. All the best to you in Raw Thrills. And I know you guys are excited about the Big Buck Championship going to be on the Ocho coming up. Yeah, man. So I know you're excited about that. Congrats. Totally pumped. That was filmed, what, in October? That was October in Las Vegas. Yeah, I remember. I remember when that happened. That's right. All right. Speaking of Vegas, first grievance. I'm sorry, Josh. I have to say. Oh, we're going there? Okay, yeah, go ahead. Maybe not the worst tournament, but the least fun I've had at a tournament maybe ever was at Pin Masters. And not because of the venue. Wonderful venue. Great people. But you and your brother, Zach, decided to set up these machines as you always do. And they are difficult. and God bless you that you let everyone practice for 30 seconds on each game beforehand. But you know specifically what I'm talking about. The game was Black Rose. Jason Wardrick, if he was here, he would back me up 1,000%. What happened in the Pin Masters event? There's a morning tee-off time and an afternoon tee-off time. And what happened at some point when my group was playing with Raymond Davidson, who might know a thing or two about pinball, and even Black Rose, he knows, you would plunge and perhaps tilt. Jason Wardrick did that. So somebody said, well, why don't you get them to check the tilt bob? Great idea. Yeah. You opened it up and saw that it was. It had scooted. So the tilt bob obviously shifted. It wasn't set that way for the morning match or maybe even. Well, you don't know, right? You don't know. What's that? You're off mic. Get on the microphone there. You got a blowing cell phone? What's going on here? No, it was my hands like covering my mic because I was leaning. Picking your nose? Better. Better? Thank you. Better now? Thank you. So let's fast forward to the ruling to be made at hand, which is interesting. It's been sort of like TD Canaan that you don't change a plumb bob during the course of an open qualifying tournament that isn't match play. What if it fell off? Besides if it fell off. Oh, so falling down to almost the ring is different than falling off. It has been. So the question that you posed, which is a great question, is should tournament directors reserve the right when something is reported about the tilt of the game? And it's obvious that, you know, between the staff, we could all look at the plumb bob and, you know, Zach can say, I obviously, when I closed the machine up after I had the play field up and looked to make sure the plumb bob was centered before we started, you know, it's definitely not in that position now. is there TD discretion after a ruling is requested to change it? And should that answer be yes? And that's a great question that you should post to Tilt Forums so we can discuss it. Well, I just went to the source in the TD and asked that question, who has also been one of those people that creates the rules. So I could go to Tilt Forums, but I actually care more about what you have to say than maybe somebody else. It's tough. It's so, it's tough because we still, I mean, outside of that group, it's tough to know. Like when you guys, you guys were the first group to ask us to even look, right? To see if something was messed up. Like if a man, I've opened up Coindors and you see the manual that's leaning up against the bob or whatever. And at that time, there were however many groups that were already done in the morning. And then however many groups had already finished playing it, that it's tough to make that call of changing it. And the history of that decision has always been not to change it, like just let the game continue to be its bad self. But we'll talk about it. We'll talk about it before. Am I running something soon? No, I'm not running anything soon. Power 100 at my house. We'll talk about it before then. Let's pick up the next thing I run. The easy solution, and not for me and maybe not for you, but maybe for somebody to create, is have some sort of tool, maybe a measurement. It could be as simple as a ruler as here's where the till bob was set. It is X, I use centimeters, I'll even grant you inches. What's smaller than an inch? Just quarter inches? Half an inch. All right, we have millimeters, all right? And it's a little more precise than inches, but anyway. We use centimeters here if we start getting into smaller, smaller measurements. I'll give you a Canadian ruler, all right? 30 centimeters, 12 inches, same thing. It's easier to divide. Anyway, the point is, if you had a tool to measure, Okay, the tilt bulb was set at whatever centimeters from the top. From the bottom of the ring. From the bottom of the ring. Got it. So when you open it, why not? When you open it up, holy cow, it has changed. And I understand and respect that you can't change the game significantly from what the other groups have played. I totally get that. But in the case of the Women's Championship, also played there at the Pin Masters event in Vegas, there was a problem on the very last game. I can't remember what the problem was. It was an EM something time something. Yeah, there was some relay that was not causing the tunnel to go. That's right. It was always auto-stopping. It was fixed. It's no different than if a flipper dies. You would have to fix it, even though that's changing the flipper, possibly changing the flipper's strength of what the previous rounds in a pin goal. It's true. Right, if a rubber snaps off and you need to replace the rubber. It's naive to think that any correction to a game because of a malfunction that requires you to do something physical doesn't change the actual game being played. I guess that's the difficulty with pin golf tournaments, right? Because you want an even playing field, and I respect that. You want an even playing field from group one to the final group. In a perfect world, they're all playing the same machine, same power, same strength. That par four that's 480 yards, it shouldn't be 290 yards for the last group. Okay, well, you know what? It's an interesting... This is not a grievance now because I appreciate your answer and that you're looking into it because it was unpleasant. But listen, as I've said to you before, if you think I went to Vegas for a pinball tournament and only a pinball tournament, that was so... During March Madness, that was so low on the things I cared about. It was my seventh priority there, and I was running the tournament. I am curious what the other six were. I know there was a lot of betting I saw. There was a lot of betting. Basketball betting. I don't think pinball betting existed yet. Did it? Yeah, it did. Yes, it did, yeah. It was after the circuit? All right, yeah, no, okay. Yeah, no, you're right. And let me clarify, it was basketball betting only. It was basketball. Oh, for sure. You had the laptop open. We were watching games. Remember I had that parlay, and I had to have a team go into – the only way I could win was the team had to go – they had to tie and go into overtime. It was unbelievable. And you got it. And you got it. It was joyous. That actually paid for my trip. So again, I don't really care about pin masters. All right, here we go. Next. Speaking of gambling and money and all those things, what a segue. Yeah. I've noticed on IFPA that there is now going to be a dollar fee for women's events to help fund the women's championship in Vegas or wherever it's going to be. That's not a segue to gambling. No, no. I didn't say... No, it's a segue to money. We're talking money. Okay. All right. All right. I know how this all came about, but if you want to explain to those who don't know how this came about, why did you decide to do that and where did you get the advice to do that? We had asked. So after seeing the effects of the regular dollar fee and that the world didn't end and the excitement of NACS Day and being able to pay out a bunch of people, we liked where things went. and after the women's championship was over this year, where the women come out to compete for a new in box game, gracious Stern Pinball for donating that to the cause Very nice And I think it a entry fee for the 24 ladies so there a prize pool It was pretty much just sticking to the same formula that we found success with for the NACS and that's really just deciding to use the leverage of the women's Whopper system as a service that we provide for free. We provided the regular services of the Whopper system for free for players for a decade plus. and is there space for us to charge for that service so we have some additional funds in-house to work with to do stuff. And when I had emailed the top 50 women of both ranking systems, the overall main system and the women's system, like I had done the previous year after the Women's Championship, what year are we in? We're in 19? So when I emailed them after 18, it was pretty unanimous of like, No, I don't think we're ready. It was pretty much like I didn't even hesitate then. All right, well, we're not doing that this year. We're moving on. And the responses that I got from the 2019 survey was I was surprised at how supportive the people that stood to gain under this process were interested. Even the people that stood to gain under this process were not believers in it a year ago. So I don't know if them having competed in the NACS this year and sort of seeing the process play out changed their mind, or the women that did show up that were like, well, this sucks. I paid $50 to win, you know, $200 and paid, you know, $1,000 to come to Vegas, and I'm not that into March Madness, so I couldn't fall back on other stuff. I don't know what went into the women's minds for their opinions to be shared, but we saw those responses and decided, you know what, let's do it. See what happens. That was long-winded. That was really long-winded. I was recently in Pittsburgh, and I was talking to Elizabeth Cromwell, who was a big proponent of getting the women's rankings on IFPA and, of course, with women's events and WIP, which we're going to be seeing this weekend. I asked her her thoughts on the dollar fee. And here's what she had to say. You know, I've been watching a lot on IFPA, and I noticed that there's now a dollar for women's tournaments. And I saw some of the comments, and boy, Josh is taking a beating, which I'm not surprised. He deserves it. I think so, too. But what do you think about that? So I'm not opposed in general to the fee. I am opposed to the fact that the fee goes to the Women's World Championship, but it's invite-only. And the top 16 players they choose from co-ed events and not women's-only events. So women's only events are therefore subsidizing the pool for women that may or may not compete in women's only events at all. So the women's finals, if I recall, 24 women, the top 16 women based on overall standings and then the eight in women's events. The balance maybe should be the other way around. Maybe eight of the overall players and then 16 from women's events, especially if the women's events are doing the dollars. I'm just asking because I don't know. No, I agree with you. If they're going to charge, that would be the more equitable way to do it. Well, I'm sure I'm going to be talking to Josh sometime soon, so maybe I'll bring it up. But I don't even know. Maybe I won't even talk to him. We'll see. It's good seeing you. Good seeing you. Are you all excited for ReplayFX? I'm exhausted, man. I'm going home to go to bed. All right. Well, let's do that. The discussions for the fee, there's two facets to the discussion, right? And Elizabeth pointed that out nicely. One is the collection process, and two is the decision of what we're choosing to do with the distribution of the funds that we're taking in. And it sounds like Elizabeth is okay with paying for the services of being ranked in the women's system and whatnot, and her opinion on the funds potentially going to women who don't play in any women's-only events is a valid point to be discussed. And we can skip through the debate that we had about it, And the ultimate response that I had was, I like to let the women who stand to be those people that are winning this money decide what's important to them. So, you know, for us, whether the split is, and you know what, I don't mind after letting everything sort of clear out that we are in fact doing the dollar fee. You know, I certainly plan on reaching back out to the top 50 women in both systems to see what they think about who should qualify for this event. And I can't think of a better way for us to move forward than letting those women decide. Can you think of a better way for us to decide how to move forward, Jeffrey? I can't, but I do realize that there are concerns on both sides, just as there were when you did the dollar fee last April 1st in 2018 for, I guess it was 2017 for the state and provincial championships. Yeah, it does seem like a while ago. Well, and that's all the women. We're talking about the women's championship in 2021, right? So we have plenty of time for us to, hey, we're changing the qualifying system, and it's now going to be 12 and 12, or it's going to be 16 and 8, but it's flipped. I'm not going to pretend to make that decision for the people that are going to be participating. I'll be able to ask. I'll be able to ask. Between the top 50 of both systems, I will be able to get in touch with any woman that has the possibility of being one of these finalists to have their opinion validated. I think what we're seeing is, thank goodness, we're seeing more and more women play pinball. We're seeing leagues pop up, women-only leagues. That one in Arizona that you posted on IFPA, very, very cool. The growth is there, and I've said this for years. The quality of play between a man and a woman, a child and an adult, there is zero difference. It doesn't matter. It's the same machine for everyone, the same skill set, no matter what age, sex, whatever you are. It doesn't matter. But there is that comfort zone, certainly, that we're seeing horrible, horrible examples where women are not feeling comfortable because of some individual men who do horrible things. And these leagues have popped up to make more women feel comfortable. Because of these leagues, they're going to be paying the dollar fee starting in 2020. I think you looking at which is the right ratio, whether it's the top 16 overall or maybe it's the top 8 overall players and the top 16 women, I think that's a balance you need to find. I think as more and more women's leagues and events happen, I think it really should be devoted more to that. That's just my personal thought. Listen, it's not for me to decide. It's really not for you to decide. You're just there to facilitate it. It's just a matter of what's going to make everyone happy, which is difficult to do. You can't make everyone happy in any demographic. I think the important question that has to be answered by these women is, is it more important to be the top-ranked woman in the world among women-only events, or is it more prestigious or whatever to be the top-ranked woman in all open events in the world? What's better? Well, until the solution of being able to separate tournaments so that women don't have to decide, am I going to go in the main or am I going to go in the women's event, which tournaments are having such a difficulty doing. I mean, Indisc did it very, very well. They did separate it. Actually, let me go back to your pin masters because that was also the same weekend of the national championship and the women's finals. You did a great job too there because Kerry Wing was in both, and Kerry didn't have to decide. She's one of my favorite players in the world easily. You know, she didn't have to make that decision. She just had to play a lot more pinball, but I'm sure she was thrilled to do so. But it's really that difficulty of not having to make a decision that even whipped as wonderful and as awesome as whipped as 128 players, there are going to be some people I've already heard from that are disappointed, oh, darn, I can't play in the Intergalactic because I'm in whipped. That's too bad. I actually did not realize that until I listened to your Bowen episode. Do you know, have you talked to any women about if they do have to make that decision of playing in that top 40 intergalactic final versus playing in whipped, what they would choose? Yes, and I will let them speak. And if they were on this program, I would let them do that. But I don't know if they want that out there. But that has been a concern that women have directly told me. Do you know that just in general what the most likely choice would be from people? Not naming names, just in general. What have you heard? I'll give you an example. One woman that I talked to is going to play in Intergalactic and also play in Whipped. Now, if she should make the top 40 for Intergalactic... Yeah, but that's the only time that there's a problem. Everyone can qualify in Intergalactic, no problem. It's the choice between if you make the cut. That's when the Whipped choice comes into play, right? She's going to play in Whipped, even if she makes the top 40. And that's, I guess, back to the dilemma. And this is a serious topic, so I'm not joking about it at all. This woman, if she makes the Intergalactic Top 40, the points you get in for being in the second biggest tournament in the world, she's giving up those Whopper points to play in a very prestigious women's event, the biggest women's event in the world, with a wonderful prize system and just great recognition. And they are both great tournaments. And this person would have to make that choice. That sucks. And I don't think she's alone. I agree. No, it's tough, and I think... By the way, this is not a knock. Please, please, please, this is not a knock at replay effects. I mean, my God, the fact they're doing this is great. This situation is better than... It happens everywhere. Well, this situation, though, is better than a tournament deciding not to even give the option, right? Yeah. It's a better version of, well, we're just not going to run a women's tournament. And it's like, well, that sucks for all the people that have a chance to play in it without this conflict. And then it's nice to see the tournaments that have found a way for all the women to have their cake and eat it too. We'll quickly wrap up this topic, but I do want to say that you've got the top 16 women in overall rankings currently going to the women's finals. Correct. But when women have to give up great whopper points to play in women's events, that is the problem. And I think of Emily and Holly who were kicking butt at Pingtastic. It was a tournament just recently outside of Boston in June. Did they have to choose between opening or... Emily, when she started playing the women's event, which was then, I say, Saturday morning, I think she was eighth in a ticket format. There was 160 people in that tournament. She was eighth. And she didn't have a chance to play at all that Saturday or whatever. She bled out. She never got to play Saturday because she was... So here you're asking her to be in the top 16 in the overall, and she had to give up a ton of whopper points to play in the women's event. That's the difficulty that every single tournament is having right now. I anticipate if most, because really my question that I'll be posing in terms of how they think the split should be is really putting these women in the same position as these tournaments do, right? Like if you're picking, I'm asking them to give priority to one or the other, right? So I would expect if most women are picking the women's only event over the main event that they can play in with their time, when it's a Sophie's Choice situation, that maybe we will see a majority say, hey, all 24 spots should be women only. It'll be interesting. It'll be interesting to hear the responses, see how it all adds up. Yeah, that's certainly a discussion for brighter minds than you and I. Yeah, I mean, that's sort of been my go-to with all of this, the women's stuff, is I've never pretended to know the answer. Any decision we made along the way I relied on letting the women choose the direction for this stuff IFPA is the facilitator I get that And IFPA as you mentioned earlier is free for members And you know you get requests to do different rankings and different categories You can have subcategories. You can email, and they'll do that for you. I mean, I'm sure there are a lot of creative ones out there. There's a nice custom ranking list out there with all sorts of random choices that certain tournament directors have wanted. And we're happy to oblige and let them use that as a tool for their community. IFPA is a free site. Red Head Player Ranking. Right? Yeah, but do I have to, what's the qualification for red? Like, is there a gray to red ratio that I have to be on the good side of? Right. Oh, wow. I'm losing that battle. Sick burn on yourself. Sick burn. No, no. Anyway, the reason I brought up that it's a free website is there is some confusion, perhaps would be a word to use where people think that, you know, when it comes time for state directors or board of directors that people should be voted in or it should be, you know, why are these people in? Well, that's not really how IFPA runs. It is a business. Do you want to comment on that? Go ahead. Yes. So, you know, we're set up as a for-profit LLC. my tax accountant handles filing our tax return. And, you know, the nuts and bolts of how we operate is something that I know I've seen mentioned, like, it'd be nice for someone else besides myself to take control of the organization and see if there's a different direction to take things and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And, you know, similar to Kevin and Elizabeth and the current Papa team, you know, with the Replay Foundation, you know, they have serious, you know, real-life paperwork to deal with, that it's not just a for-fun thing for them, that they can just bring anyone on board and do anything they want based on, you know, other people's visions, and our organization falls under the same sort of category. You know, we certainly take guidance, you know, the way we're structured. It's all volunteers, and we rely on, we have country directors, 23 of them around the world. Yeah, they all made it to IFPA 16, so I couldn't get in. I know, right? Even Herbert. Romania. But they're the voice of their communities to me because I may pose a question, or other country directors have posed questions on our forum about like, hey, wouldn't this be great? And everyone's sort of in their own little bubble, and someone from Romania can pose some question, and everyone else can be like, dude, that makes no sense for anywhere else in the world. And I can pose questions that I think would work well in the U.S. because I understand the U.S. community better than I do, you know, Germany or Sweden or wherever. And a lot of the times the European country directors put me in my place about things that will never work outside of here. So, you know, that's important for us to be able to make organizational decisions of changes to the Whopper system, different campaigns we decide to run, blah, blah, blah. And within the U.S., we rely on our state reps to be representing the player communities fairly and really being the voice of those communities to make sure that if we're making changes that people like or don't like, that, hey, we'd love to hear. And contact your state rep. You can see on our website who your state rep is and email us, and we'll put you in touch. So I feel like the request to, you know, we need someone else on, quote, unquote, the board, whatever that means, because it's me and Zach and my dad and Adam Becker and Brian Shepard and Brian Woodard sitting around dictating what we're going to do. That's just not how we operate. So I think there's the thought that that's how we operate. But we don't need one additional board member because we have 50 state board members and 23 country board members that are all sort of feeding the beast of information to me to help make the best decisions we can. How was that? Was that better? I feel like that was even better than the last time I answered that. It was a good answer. That's why they pay me the big bucks, Jeffrey. Are you happy with the current Whopper system? I'm happy to not have to go through another change. Oh, my God. Yeah, I feel pretty good about it. I think, when was version five? 2015? 2016? I don't know the answer to that. Well, I think that's the one where every event was 25 points, right? It didn't matter if it was 10 people. No, that was the biggest change we ever had. Sure. Like now, tournament directors, instead of just emailing results to me, then that was all we needed. Now we suddenly needed real information, right, about what they did. Just quickly, yeah. That was the biggest change. we've ever had. I think it was 15. Just quickly, there are some people that are listening to this that are collectors and probably have never played in a tournament, so how does the Whopper system work very, very quickly? How rankings and all that work? Very quickly. The more players that play in an event, the more it's worth. The better the players that play in an event, the more that it's worth. The more games that the winner of the tournament has to play to win the tournament, the more it's worth. The end. Good answer. You also decided years ago that you were going to take a player's top 20 events. Yeah. I don't remember what it was before. It was 25. It was 15. No, it was 15. It had to be smaller because we combined. That's why we did the combo events. So if you played in the old days, your one entry would be Pinberg plus Intergalactic combined into one entry. How about that? That would be like a 250 Whopper. Wow. day nightmare so we went from 15 events to 20 because now we were splitting all of these combo events and i think what did i put oh maybe it was on tilt clones people were talking about the evolution of the system or whatever and we kind of accidentally fell into a nice place where the person that was ranked first had like a thousand whoppers it was like it was always like 989 a thousand so it was kind of bubbling right around that thousand which was nice it was very easy to use that as like a metric. So when we ran, we ran simulations of like 30 events, you know, 25 events, 20 events, you know, different decays. We added a fourth year of decay. You know, right now, after three years, it goes, whatever, 175, 50, zero. We added another year. So it went from 50 to 25 to zero, try all sorts of stuff. So we would build it and then Brian Shepard would run it and then he'd email me when it was ready. And then we'd look at the standings and see if it looked all messed up or if it looked decent and the 20 event total looked the most like it belonged like it represented what we thought were proper rankings and the first place guy was right around a thousand so it was like all right i feel like we can we can start with this and not disrupt things because kind of like the uh the outrage when wizard of oz came out and everyone was freaking out about like the low scores and that begging Keith P. Johnson to just add a comma and three zeros to his game because that would make it better somehow. Like, we went through that same thing of, like, we'd make a change to the system, and it's like, oh, my God, I went from 230 Whoppers to 370 Whoppers. What's going on? And it's like, well, everyone changes. It's like everyone changes, so it's all relative. But that seems to be a real thing. So sticking to keeping it, because it was such a big change to the system. I mean, we were totally overhauling how everything was graded. It was nice to be able to sort of keep that point total thing as close to constant as we could. I think it eased the pain of the transition. The big change that we've seen over the last couple of years is what's happened to Stern Pro Circuit. No, it's kind of almost gone back to the way it was with the ladder match. You've gone to the top 20. The last 40 have been true. I dare say it's exactly the way it was when it was originally created. The reason for the changes, especially with the mid-season change, Josh, why did you do it? So ESPN offered me a check for $10,000 to change it to this format. And I can't say no to that. If that was true, I would agree with you. Right. No, I think there's something as people, as someone that played in both, I've played every version of the circuit, right? Like I played in the early days where it was the top 20. Bragger. I think there's a big difference for high-level players between the 20-player straight to ladder and the 40-player two rounds of madness and then the ladder. I think where you qualify in the top 40, sort of the importance of the regular season, was extremely minimal. I didn't care if I was the third seed or the 17th seed. Yeah, you're right. And with the number of games available, it's like, well, I don't care what seed I am. I just don't want to have the ninth guy as my driver. I'd rather have the third guy as my driver, so I'd rather be the 23rd seed or whatever. I feel like it discounted the regular season, which we fought all year across all these great events to earn this spot. And I think it sort of just poo-pooed that. And it's like, all right, here, we're going to put you in a blender, shake it up a couple times and see if you survive. And, you know, I remember the original days, like, even if you were in 11th, like, you were motivated. man, if I go to Expo or City, whatever it used to be in that November, December time frame, Free Play Florida, you could make a jump from 11th to 5th. And it's like, oh my God, I just saved myself six matches. There's an intensity to Free Play Florida feeling like a playoff event for you. You would go then from a 1-11 chance to a 1-5 chance of winning that new Stern pinball machine. I get that. Yeah. but how many people really are going to be motivated, how many people are going to be in that window, I think you're really looking at only the top players, whereas when you looked at the numbers in the top 40, there was a lot of, it wasn't a great separation between, I don't know, some of the people that just got in, let's say. Like really, just a few points. So I think with the 40, you might have had more motivation for people to show up to those later events. You might have seen better attendance. I get that. More motivation. By the way, hold on a second. You've been talking a lot here. Let me speak for one second. All right, take the big mic. If you wouldn't mind, all right, give your yap a second here. I agree with you. When you made the top 40, it did discount and really make the league worth nothing. You could be the first qualifier, and you could be out after four games. That doesn't seem fair after a year of hard work. So why couldn't you still have 40 and a buy system, as some tournaments do? It's just the length of time. You're there for two days anyway, and you do the Stern Pro Circuit in one day. I'm just asking, I'm not asking should you do this, I'm just asking was this thought of. You're there anyway two days, you've got the Stern Pro Circuit, you've got the Heads Up Challenge, you wrap up the Stern Pro Circuit in one day. You could kind of make it over two days if you wanted, but again, I'm just asking. Nobody on the team, the scope of the final has always been a one-day thing. I think the importance of people at Stern to be inviting people in for the festivities and whatnot and attending themselves, like encompassing one day of something. And it's similar to what we do for Buck Hunter. It's, you know, we have the ladies championship is the night before. But the big buck championship with the top 64 people around the world you know it their it their IFPA is is one day not even a one day It like 10 a to 5 p It like seven hours And that just like what works for you know setting up and then paying for all the production to happen And as the SPC continues to evolve, I think the need for outside production is going to continue to increase. That if you're doubling people's time to be there, you know, recording and doing whatever, it just doubles the scope of what you're trying to pull off. When I think it's not, It's unnecessary. You're sitting here trying to give reason for the lower-tiered players down the ladder to just keep them playing. And my argument is, why don't you have those players face off at Free Play Florida to make that spot? Go play each other there. So the idea of trying to get 20 additional players to Chicago to do some sort of pre-qualifying event to make the top 20 that would be done over an evening or a day or whatever, why not use the circuit itself to have these people go to Florida in November to battle it out for those spots at Freeplay Florida or the Sanctum or whatever? why not use the actual tour to have that playoff for you? Well, the Sanctum is not a good example because those tickets went on sale well before you have to make that decision, and it's capped at 100. The Old City Champ was capped at 80-something. So those were difficult to get in even if you wanted to. I think of Andy Rosa and Alex Harmon, the two people who were in the Stern Pro Circuit Finals. Those two people were not in the top 20, and they put on a great performance. Both were champs in my mind, and they would not have made the Stern Pro Circuit Finals, and they won't if they're in that. But wait, so he wouldn't. But would Andy be motivated to attend Expo in October, Free Play in November, OBX in November, any of these third quarter, fourth quarter events, to make sure he makes the cut? Motivation, I'm sure, is there. And is that a fair ask? motivation is certainly there, but I'm sure I can speak for a lot of people when they say, yeah, I'm motivated. That costs a lot of money. So, again, I hate to think that we're becoming almost elitist. A professional sport without the money? Well, if there were sponsorships. Well, okay, you think about that. That's so funny that you say it that way, is that the money we spend to go to different events far outweighs whatever possible money you could win And if you were to win the event, you do it for the enjoyment. Some do it for the competition. Some do it for the chasing of whopper points. But I'm hoping it's for a good experience overall. It's for a bigger competition than maybe you're used to in your local leagues or whatever the case may be. But it's just not, unfortunately, affordable for a lot of people. And you know what? That, to me, number one, I circle it, number one, biggest reason pinball won't be like eSports is because of the accessibility of it. unfortunately. These machines cost a lot of money. Here's Fortnite. It's free. Everybody can have it. I'm not saying pinball needs to be free. I'm just saying we've got a pretty big uphill. No, it's a hurdle. It's a big hurdle. Yeah. So, anyway. Okay. Let's talk about this Stern Pro Circuit Finals as we wrap things up. It's Pinberg, and you're going to be playing I don't know. When was the last time you played? Vegas? Oh, my God. Why am I putting you on? I know. It's such a waste. I would like to say right now, pinball profile. And then I go from Pinburg to like Expo in October and then Freeplay Florida and then I'm done. Why am I putting this on the line? Doesn't count. Semi-retired. Semi-retired. If only I was good as Elwin. Semi-retired. Yeah, no kidding. What do you think of his new game? I'm hoping it'll be at IFPA headquarters in time for the Power 100. You bought it already? Whitewood. He had me at Whitewood. I already wrote my check. Just waiting to head over there. A lot of us haven't played it. It looks pretty darn good from what I've seen. It's pretty darn good. I think, you know what, when Zach hears this, marketing tagline for that game, it's pretty darn good. TM, trade market. Well, it does look pretty awesome. It's a good theme, too. It checks all the boxes so far, and you've got Keith making it. I'll tell you what, man. Here at Rothfels, we did not understand on the power of the Jurassic Park brand, because when we secured our deal, the Jurassic World, the first Jurassic World movie, was not even greenlit yet. So we were simply just like, hey, kids seem to like dinosaurs, and this is the best dinosaur license we could grab. And it obviously blew our socks off. And by the time we came to market, Jurassic World came to market. Yeah, all bets are off. Our extension licensing fee was not fun. The brand was worth a lot more by the time we went to sign our contract extension than it was the original deal. That's for sure. I've got to tell you, when I was at IAPA, not last year, the year before, I think when I went to the Raw Thrills section, that's all I was playing. That thing was awesome. It's awesome, man. My kids, it's still their favorite. They come here, they'll just park their butts downstairs in our testing room and just play that game, which right now I think is the Chinese version. We're testing some Chinese stuff. They don't care. They're just going to sit in it and yell that in Chinese and not be able to read the screen. Jurassic Park, it's pretty awesome, and I assume Stern realized the power of the Toronto Raptors winning the NBA championship. And, you know, how can we cash in on this? We're sitting on another few games. Wait a minute. Raptor Mania, we saw the Jurassic Parks all across Canada for the World Championship. Forget the Kauai's left. Did you hear the rumor Kauai's doing custom speech for Keith's game? Yeah, right. Oh, don't air that. Don't air that. You've got to cut that out. Kauai hardly speaks at all, so I'm pretty sure. I know. it'll be like 24, but his version of Chloe's jackpot. Oh, no. Just get his ha, ha, ha, ha. Only people in Toronto will get that joke. We're basketball fans. No, I got it. That's good. Okay, so you're going to be playing a bunch of games you have not played in a while. Willy Wonka I saw is going to be, I think it's on the big stage there, based on the number of games. Yeah, I haven't played that yet at all either. Have you looked at the games? Jack guys won't put the game out on test out here. It's killing me. Have you looked at the games? No. Doesn't matter to you? Have I looked at the games? No. Okay, Josh. What percentage of that list are you going to play? 10 out of 83? Yeah. Is that another 83 banks? 87 banks, so 10 out of 87, if you're lucky. 89, whatever, 88.6% of the banks you're not going to play. I get it. Then my question to you is, what do you, Josh Sharpe, do when you come up to a game you've never played before? Which is going to be the case for a lot of us at Pinberg. Oh, I'll go find Keith Ellin and ask him what to do in three words or less. Doesn't everyone just do that? You just go find Keith and then you get the deli counter line and you just stand and wait to talk to Keith for 30 seconds? What else would you do? Of course I ask the people I know. For Wonka, it could be like, hey, man, just to be safe, just combo ramps all day. Okay, sounds good. See you later. Thanks. Is that because it's match play and not a pump and dump? A pump and dump, you're trying to get a GC. You're trying to get a grand champ score. Yeah, and in pump and dumps, especially when it's not limited, you can learn as you go. You know what I mean? Yeah, as long as the lineups aren't too long. The importance in match play of finishing third instead of fourth is just as valuable as finishing first instead of second. It's just a constant state of, hey, don't suck today. So what can I do in this game to not suck? Can I have enough friends who know enough stuff? I'll go ask Joe Katz. you know he's in my league in chicago he'll he'll lend me some tips i'll go ask actually Keith P. Johnson's probably the dude that most people in our league will ask before uh if you get assigned some random obscure game and then he'll start talking to you about 800 different things you could do and then you have to like slow him down and be like dude like one thing what should like just one thing it is funny that in competitions you're trying to beat everyone and yet you ask your peers who may be in the competition and most people most are willing to say do this do this you still have to execute but it's not like people have secrets anymore whether they're using pin tips.net or they're watching some videos maybe they've got the bob matthews spreadsheet who knows most there's some groups out there that have their own private things that they don't share but that that's okay that's okay but i do find that most people are are very worthy of sharing and they always that's been the way since i started competing in 93 like it's always been a community that seems to want to help and nurture you know anyone they can because of like the love of the sport like outweighs you know even the most competitive people the love that they have of just like being able to do this thing that we enjoy so much like like that trumps all josh i know people are probably placing bets on you you're on a few prop bets i've noticed they do right a couple yeah the zach one and the second they're gonna listen to this podcast they're gonna listen to this podcast and go, oh, I don't know. This guy doesn't know. He hasn't played since Pinmasters. Right. Money off. He doesn't know how to play Wonka. He doesn't know how to play this. He doesn't know. Oh, my God. He doesn't seem to care. Hmm. It's when I play my best, man. You start caring. You start caring too much. I come from the golf world, man. My best rounds of the year are usually like the first time I take the clubs out of the garage. And then it's always the second round where it's like, oh, man, my first round was so great that it just all falls apart. actually trying too hard and it all gets destroyed. That's so funny that you say that. The more intense I am, the worse I play. Right. The more relaxed I play, and it's not that I don't care, but I try to have that mindset, I don't care. I seem to play better. And that's where my line like, and it's why I yell at myself when I play, like, I have to straddle the line between indifference and I need to care, but not care but i can't be indifferent so i have to i have to be in the moment but i always tend to fall in that realm of the spectrum i'm not i don't have to deal with like the nerves and trying too hard anymore i'm really good at controlling you know where i need to be emotionally or whatever in the situation and sometimes i can drift to not caring enough in the moment and staying focused you know your style of play is a little distracting to some people that are playing in earshot of you. And that is, I would honestly say there are five people that I know and that you know, I wear headphones whenever I'm around them because I don't want to be distracted by some jackass yelling, not like this! Or whatever the hell it is. Josh, are you aware that you might be distracting other people? Do you care about that? Yes and no. Those are two questions, right? Yeah. Do I know? Yes. Do I care? No. Are you ever distracted by someone else? No. I grew up with Zach as a younger brother. Are you kidding me? Oh, he's quiet. What are you talking about? I've never seen him blow up. Well, I mean, when we were kids, the only rule we had when we'd play each other, you know, in best of 11 matches every night, and the only rule we had was no physical contact. That was the only rule we had as far as annoying each other. So blowing in someone's ear, as long as you're not touching. I am so desensitized to caring what's going on around me simply because of Zach being such a jackass for my entire childhood. Wow. Throwing the director of marketing for Stern under the bus. He's trying to make a name for himself, and here you are. But look, it's a good way of making sure stuff doesn't bother you. When we do loony throwdowns, it is just a gong show as far as lights go on and off, Music will blare. People, not the blowing of the air, but people will start hitting flippers behind their backs.

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*Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-04-13 | Item ID: a4a9c382-c409-4f1b-a748-d1cb4d08a9e2*