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Episode 305 - Historical Marker Looking Things

NYC PinPod·podcast_episode·49m 49s·analyzed·Sep 30, 2024
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TL;DR

NYC PinPod covers weekly competitive results, reviews At the Wallace venue, and discusses pinball pro shop inventory ideas.

Summary

NYC PinPod Episode 305 covers competitive pinball results across New York City leagues (Pinball NYC, SSPL, Sunshine tournaments), reviews At the Wallace venue in Hamilton Heights, and discusses hypothetical items for a pinball pro shop. The episode features detailed tournament results, venue infrastructure details, and practical equipment suggestions for competitive players.

Key Claims

  • As of September 28, 2024, there are 273 pinball machines in New York City at 85 public locations

    high confidence · Benjamin Furiga, citing Pinball Map data

  • Matthew Carlson is mathematically guaranteed to win SSPL 6 with 117 points out of 140 possible

    high confidence · Benjamin Furiga analyzing SSPL 6 standings after five meetings

  • At the Wallace has five pinball machines (up from three or four in previous history)

    high confidence · Benjamin Furiga and Eric Sweetland discussing venue inventory

  • At the Wallace has a wheelchair-accessible lift to reach the upper pinball section

    high confidence · Benjamin Furiga describing venue accessibility

  • The Pinister Six had a 0.69% scoring margin on World Cup Soccer doubles despite a 13-3 match victory

    high confidence · Zen Zokniak text to Benjamin Furiga reporting Pinister Six vs Harlem Globe Flippers match

Notable Quotes

  • “I describe At the Wallace as a divey sports bar with games. It's always a lively place.”

    Benjamin Furiga @ ~55:00 (approximate, during venue review section) — Sets tone for venue characterization; establishes At the Wallace as lively social space

  • “There is, because of where the beer tap is and because you can walk a full 360 degrees around that big beer tap, it's a phallic bar.”

    Benjamin Furiga @ ~56:30 (approximate) — Humorous but detailed architectural description of venue's distinctive bar layout

  • “At the Wallace was at one point, and it still feels very much like a home bar to me.”

    Eric Sweetland @ ~73:00 (approximate) — Personal connection to venue; indicates emotional investment in location as team home

  • “What would it take to make a pinball pro shop?”

    Benjamin Furiga @ ~80:00 (approximate) — Introduces third segment topic; frames professional equipment discussion

  • “You are going to encounter, I should say, the chaos of the fried chicken that your opponent just ate before they played ball too.”

    Benjamin Furiga @ ~82:30 (approximate) — Humorous but practical observation about tournament conditions; justifies towel inventory

Entities

Benjamin FurigapersonEric SweetlandpersonDante OlivapersonFrancesco LaRoccapersonEmily BaldessarapersonZen ZokniakpersonJose GarciapersonMatthew CarlsonpersonRobert WongpersonGreg FratelpersonThe WallacevenueAt the Wallacevenue

Signals

  • ?

    competitive_signal: SSPL 6 standings reveal clear separation: Matthew Carlson (117 pts, mathematically locked for first) and Robert Wong (112 pts) dominating; top eight playoff spots defined; multiple players clustered in 80s range with cutoff at ~81-88 points

    high · Detailed point totals for top 10 players provided; Benjamin Furiga commentary on mathematical guarantees

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Pinball NYC Left Flipper Division (30% through season): Lion Persons and NYC FSA both 3-0; Lesser Players and Pin Pals both 0-3. Right Flipper Division: Danger Danger, Pinister Six, Ball Drainers 3-0; Scrapple Squad and Trolls 0-3

    high · Benjamin Furiga explicit statement of standings after week 3

  • ?

    gameplay_signal: Johnny Mnemonic experiencing unusual drain behavior in multiball causing machine to credit next player; Twilight Zone multi-ball auto-plunge malfunction; Medieval Madness screen shutdown during active game; Future Spa flipper weakness and coin-stealing issues; Looney Tunes scoop drainage 90% of time

    high · Multiple venue reports from Pinball Map users cited by Benjamin Furiga; specific match reports from Jose Garcia and player communications

  • ?

    venue_signal: At the Wallace expanded from 3-4 to 5 pinball machines; removed large ring game and downsized Jenga to table-size; removed 7-foot ring swing game; added Raid to lineup. Arcade by Arcade at Rockefeller Center removed all machines (seasonal closure)

    high · Direct observation during venue review; Benjamin Furiga historical comparison to prior visits

  • ?

    venue_signal: At the Wallace: recent sidewalk vault collapse repairs in progress; added decorative scaffolding/fencing with directional art; improved patio areas between At the Wallace and Harlem Public sister restaurant; wheelchair accessible lift installed to upper pinball section

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.149

0:30
info for whatever day you're listening. This is NYC Pin Pod, in which a panel talks location pinball in New York City and nearby surrounding areas. My name is Benjamin Furiga. My initials are BCF, and I've put some initials into the machines at both of the last two weeks' reviewed venues. My name is Eric Sweetland. My initials are HIP, and I'm a pinball tournament director in New York City, though as we record this, I'm sitting in Snoqualmie, Washington. Madeline is on assignment this week. On this week's pod, in ball one, as always, we'll run down pinball competition results in New York City and nearby surrounding areas. In ball two, we'll review at the Wallace as a pinball venue. And in ball three, we'll talk about what we need to open up our pinball pro shop. Let's get started. Let's talk about competitive pinball results in New York City and nearby surrounding areas for the last week. This is a little bit far, but I'd like to congratulate New York City player Dante Oliva for winning Stomp over the weekend. I think he got a belt, which is pretty cool. I like when you get the weird prizes, but congrats to Dante for grabbing the hardware. On Sunday at Sunshine Laundromat Brooklyn, the monthly tournament at Sunshine Brooklyn by FLR parentheses sucks and alley was convened. 16 players showed and after 12 rounds of match play, the top eight went to a group match play final and Francesco LaRocca took the tournament. Best thing, Alberto Santana, Dan Merrill, and Tommy Ortega, respectively. All of them, I imagine, based on the number of rounds there, got quite a few whoppers for a tournament with 16 players in it. On Monday, September 23rd, in the left flipper division of Pinball NYC, the two-for-oners went uptown to face their Manhattan Rivals, NYC FSA, New York City Flipper Sport Association. Eric, I don't think you were there, but anything to add? Yeah, no, I was out of town, unable to attend. I heard from teammates it was a real tough match. The two-for-one are sent up a tight four that played really well, and everything was close. Yeah, 10-6 home win is a nice home win, of course, but 10-6 is tight. Balls of Steel went to Skylark and they beat the Pin Pals 11 to 5.
3:26
Zen Zoknia of Balls of Steel reached out to tell me that in their match, they had to replay an entire game of Medieval Madness because the screen just shut down in the middle of a game. So nobody knew what the scores were. The Mutants went to Rolos and bested special when lit at their new home 14 to 2. Pinball Union hosted Parliament at Barcade Brooklyn and Parliament for the first week did not get eight points, but got seven points to Pinball Union's nine.
Pinball NYC
organization
NYC FSAorganization
SSPL 6organization
Sunshine Laundromatvenue
Buttermilk Barvenue
Barcade Brooklynvenue
Gebhard's Beer Culturevenue
Foo Fightersgame
Hot Wheelsgame
The Mandaloriangame
World Cup Soccergame
NBA Fastbreakgame
Raidgame

high · Detailed description of venue improvements; Eric Sweetland commentary on aesthetic choices

  • ?

    operational_signal: SSPL 6 using 7-5-3-1 IFPA scoring match play format; finals locked after 6 meetings; Sunshine tournaments running monthly with 16-player capability; No Bro Presents implementing hard start times (8pm) and 3-strike knockout format

    high · Benjamin Furiga detailed explanation of tournament formats and point structures

  • ?

    community_signal: Gebhard's Beer Culture held streaming match with explicit consent discussion upon arrival; open dialogue about streaming setup; two-camera streaming rig deployed on table with mixer and headsets for commentators

    high · Benjamin Furiga commentary on streaming at Gebhard's; noted appreciation for consent-first approach

  • ?

    product_concern: Sopranos at Filthy Diamond received mixed reliability reports: one user said 'plays totally great,' another noted it 'plays kind of fucked up'; high-profile games (Johnny Mnemonic, Medieval Madness, Twilight Zone, Future Spa) experiencing various malfunctions across venues

    medium · Pinball Map user reports from WaySoma, chamber tin, Upstate Pinball, Mirror, Entity Clay, and others

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Eric Sweetland expresses ongoing attachment to At the Wallace despite reduced visit frequency due to distance; describes it as 'home bar' for personal and team identity; values operator relationship and consistent draft beer curation

    high · Eric Sweetland commentary: 'At the Wallace was at one point, and it still feels very much like a home bar to me'

  • $

    market_signal: At the Wallace accessibility dependent on subway access (A, D, or 1 to 145th Street); Benjamin Furiga notes it's 'very far away' despite NYC context; Eric Sweetland previously lived closer, now plays only for home matches and occasional visits

    high · Transit discussion between hosts regarding best subway options to reach venue

  • ?

    industry_signal: Benjamin Furiga proposing pinball professional shop model analogous to golf and tennis pro shops, including equipment sales, form coaching, analysis tools; initial inventory concepts: branded towels, pinball-specific apparel (pin shades, fingerless gloves), medical equipment (wrist braces, elbow braces), shoe inserts

    medium · Extended discussion of pro shop concept and hypothetical inventory in segment three

  • ?

    design_innovation: Discussion of padded fingerless bicycling gloves for nudging, cited as palm-protecting strategy used by player Woody; wrist brace and elbow brace needs identified from repetitive strain (tennis elbow from slide saves); shoe inserts proposed for tournament comfort

    medium · Benjamin Furiga and Eric Sweetland discussing personal injury experiences and equipment solutions

    • 4:05
    Jose Garcia reached out to say it was a really close match. pinball union and parliament traded sweeps back and forth except the third round where pinball union took one game to clinch the win there were two malfunctions that jose points out twilight zone did not auto plunge a ball during multi-ball the call on the field was to play on and jose adds there's a really weird malfunction with johnny mnemonic as matt grady was in multi-ball there seemed to have been a very unique drain that confused the machine and it started scoring for the next player because matt was only player two ball one the call was to restart the whole game yeah that makes sense for that does make sense as a call i also want to point out i'm pretty sure i had that same condition at rollo's at some weekend tournament on the johnny mnemonic there. I think I have experienced that malfunction in the past. Yeah, it also doesn't sound out of line for a Johnny mnemonic. Exactly. But thank you to Jose. Thanks, Jose. Two deluxe horses reached out to us. They went to Commonwealth and the deluxe horses take their first loss. We heard from Uchendo Nwachuku. Uchendo points out Emily B had another third round walk-off victory in their match against Intermission Dolores this week. DFW added some more detail when he emailed us at nycpinpod.gmail.com, pointed out that the games at the venue were Spider-Man, Cactus Canyon, and Attack from Mars, that they split round one, that in round two, Intermission Dolores took all the points, but for Uche on Attack from Mars. The horses took three in round three, including the same walk-off by Emily Baldessara that Uche mentions, and that is the second week in a row that we're talking about a walk-off, ball three by Emily Baldessara. And Gina tries to fight back on ball three, but Dan Fox takes the one point.
    6:25
    In round four, intermission, Dolores had a player leave, leaving them with three players left. They won Spider-Man and Dan Fox alone battled back to force the tiebreak. And then Dan and Chuck had a walk-off ball three split flipper win. I can understand why Uche didn't want to talk about it, but I'm glad that DFW gave us some further information. Wow. Yeah. Because it sounds very exciting. We Colliders went to Gebhard's Beer Culture on the Upper West Side to visit the Lion Persons. there was a streaming rig there that was a little interesting to me. It set up, it seemed like it was two cameras on a single thing that sets up on a table as opposed to a rig that you sort of has legs that stand over a thing. Gabars already has all those overhead cameras. Were they integrated to that at all? They weren't, interestingly. It was only this rig that was set up. There was a little Mackie mixer there and a couple of headsets that people could comment on. I am pleased to say that there was an open dialogue about consent for the streaming of this thing when people just came out to their Monday night thing and didn't know that was going to happen. And we all agreed that it was cool. The Lion Persons beat us 10 to 6. I had a personal best on Indy 500 when I scored 600 something million and that was not enough to win a doubles match I needed like 40 million I think that teammate Natalie got super cute game by both of us but we pulling that out was the difference between a 12 to 4 and a 10 to 6 and it was the last thing that happened and it was on the stream so it all felt pretty good from where i was sitting nice it's a really nice venue even and and it is now set up in such a way i always think it's a little corny when you go to a pinball venue and there's another event happening there when you're there for like a league night or something and they had trivia downstairs but there was totally enough space for it everybody had their space to do the things they were doing because of the layout of the venue and i really appreciate that about that space that is nice the aristocrats bested the lesser players at their home barcade chelsea nine to seven on tuesday september 24th in the right flipper division the pinister six went to at the wallace and i might add just probably showed up an hour after i left at most when i was there to review it for ball two.
    9:19
    Wink, wink, nudge, nudge, stick around. They bested the Harlem Globe Flippers 13-3. Zen Zokniak from the Pinister Six sent me a text that said there were some really close scores for the Pinister Six at the Wallace for a big 13-3 win. He points out that there's a 0.69% That seems to me like that would be seven parts in a thousand difference between this doubles score on World Cup soccer, wherein one team had $633 million plus $63 million, and another team had $212 million versus $479 million.
    10:08
    That's something. Really great win. for the pinnister six at 13 to three but it's also really interesting to note that it seems like there were a lot of scores even though the scoreboard doesn't represent that Neptune's treasure went to Sunshine Laundromat to face Scrapples squad and unfortunately for the home team the visitors conquered them 10 to 6. No Quarters for Laundry went to Jack Bar to visit the ball drainers and the home team came away with an 11 to 5 win kettles hand grenades went to buttermilk bar to face danger danger that team shares a lot of players with special when lit who played at rollo's and got their booties handed to them on monday night but they handed kettles hand grenades their booties on tuesday night 14 to 2 the butterballers went to Bar Great Harry to face the Trolls and came away with a 10-6 win. Eric, you're on this team. Did you hear anything from teammates? I know you're out of town.
    11:21
    Yeah, no. I'm just sad I missed it. It's always my favorite to play the Trolls. Reston Pinball bested the replays at their home of Rolos, 10-6.
    11:35
    The Schlubs went to Birdies to visit the Pin Babes and they picked up the win at home, 9-7. So far, on Monday night, I don't think it's worth talking in too much depth here, but I think it's worth noting who the 3-0 teams and who the 0-3 teams are at this point. We're 30% of the way through the season.
    12:00
    Lion persons and NYC FSA are 3-0. Congratulations. Thank you. and the lesser players and the pin pals are 0-3. And on Tuesday night, I think it's a little bit starker, but the bottom is not quite as bereft as the top is overflowing Danger Danger Pinister Six and Baldrainers are all 3
    12:32
    But only two teams, Scrapples Squad and Trolls, are 0-3. I imagine next week we might actually start talking about places that start to matter, or maybe the week after that. But I think at least noting who has no losses and who has no wins at this point in the season is interesting. Everyone else, you're within one game of each other. It's only three games in. So if you don't have three wins or three losses, you are within one game of everyone else who doesn't have three wins or three losses. That's it. One win and one loss changes it. On Wednesday night, September 25th, the weekly sunshine. tournament by FLR parentheses suck was convened. Eight players were met. Four of them were new enough that they do not yet have IFPA rankings. And Nitan Gabai took the night. On September 26th, No Bro Presents Thursday Night Strikes was held at Jack Bar in Williamsburg. 24 players showed up and after 11 rounds greg fratel finished the night with only two strikes for the win followed by ian loon and stefan calendar on thursday night at buttermilk bar in south slope 15 players showed for the fifth meeting of south slope pinball league six uh more commonly called SSPL.
    14:13
    After five rounds of 7-5-3-1 match play, I think we'd call that IFPA scoring match play, is that right?
    14:21
    Yep. Matthew Carlson and Robert Wong tied atop the standings with 29 points apiece. Francesco La Rocca came in third with 25 and Zen Zokniak and Taylor Connolly tied for fourth with 23.
    14:38
    So far, because we're far enough through this that the finals are shaping up. There's only one week left in SSPL 6 before the playoffs. Matthew Carlson and Robert Wong are untouchable at the top of the standings. Maybe someone could catch Rob to drive a bus, but Matthew Carlson is sitting with 117 points in four meetings, wherein 35 would be a perfect meeting. So sounds to me like 140 would be perfect and he has 117. He's not going to be beaten. Rob Wong has 112 points. It's going to be very hard for people to get next to him. Zen Zofniak, I think, is safely in the playoffs. at 101 points. He's probably going to be the third seed also. Francesco La Rocca at 91. Kate Martin and Billy Vazine at 87. All seem to me like they're safely in the top eight, probably.
    15:45
    Yeah, I think. In the upper 80s, it feels like it'd be hard to knock out. I try to shoot for 88 in this. I don't think that I've ever seen 88 not get in. I think there might have been a time that 87 was just below the cut line or 86 or 85 or whatever, but 82 a night feels like I'm safe. And Kate and Billy each having 87, they can each improve by a point at next week's meeting, and there aren't that many comers trying to take them on.
    16:22
    I myself have 84. I hope to be safe AJ Gould is the last above the line presently I really appreciate that Kate seems to have put in custom text that says you must be this good to make finals not you must be above this line you must be this good to make finals Thomas Milburn with a blank of an entry that if he shows up next week is going to get dropped is sitting at 80 points. So he feels like he's going to be in good shape.
    17:00
    Jess Warren needs a big week next week to get across with 72. You know, you get 35 certainly gets you in. Caitlin Reese, similar situation. Gus Gonzalez looks interesting because he's got 68 points, but he's only been to three meetings. so everything's gravy that he comes and scores if he can get himself 20 he's at 88 he's at that magic number Eric you've only been to 3 I see 16 I had to miss a couple and if I had a really good night I could conceivably qualify for A finals I'll try my best I mean the cut's 81 right now you know right now it's 80 85 you could eat 25 is not hard to envision right you've done 25 i could do it this month right oh no you did 23 but still not yeah not this season but i've yeah you've done it it's within the realm of possibility second place every round next week we'll talk about what happened and what the finals are going to look like also on thursday night at Gebhard's Beer Culture on the Upper West Side. Four players gathered. Nick Berry finished the night on top. This week, on Monday, September 30th,
    18:26
    in Pinball NYC's Left Flipper Division, we, Colliders, will host Intermission Dolores at Buttermilk Bar.
    18:36
    Special When Lit will have a virtual away match at Rolos against the longtime home team at Rolos, the Aristocrats. Pinball Union will go to Solid State to visit the Mutants. Balls of Steel will visit McKenna's and the Two for Oners.
    19:02
    3-0 Lion Persons will go to at the Wallace to visit 3-0 New York City Flipper Sport Association. gonna be a battle someone's not gonna be and oh the lesser players go from barcade chelsea to barcade brooklyn to visit the deluxe horses the pin pals go to owl farm it's the second shortest commute for them they could possibly have a shorter commute if they went to commonwealth I like that the Owl Farm team is named Parliament. I think it's one of the more clever pinball team names in the league, even if it's not a pinball pun. In the right flipper division on Tuesday night, trolls will take their Instagram account and hopefully some kick-ass theme to Barcade Brooklyn when they visit Rest in Pinball. parenthetically I should say every time I say their name Reston Pinball parenthetically RIP ball trainers will visit schlubs at Jack Bar in another virtual away match much as at Rolos on Monday night Danger Danger will go all the way from Buttermilk to Solid State in Queens to visit No Quarters for Laundry Neptune's Treasure will interestingly have I presume that there's a rivalry between them and Pinister Six as they are Neptune's treasure and Pinister Six calls Boat Bar home. I imagine that the fury of the seas and whether or not they can be tamed is what's at stake here. A nautical night. Quite so.
    20:52
    The replays will visit the Harlem Globe Flippers at At the Wallace. Pin Babes will come down to South Brooklyn and visit the Butterballers at Buttermilk. Scrapple Squad will go to Kettle of Fish to visit Kettle's Hand Grenades. On Tuesday, October 1st, Craig Cash will host the Tuesday Night Pinball at the Vault, October Week 1 at the Morristown Game Vault in Morristown, New Jersey. On Wednesday, October 2nd, Arcade Brooklyn Pinball League will begin its fifth season at 8 p.m. in Williamsburg. Also Wednesday, October 2nd, the Sunshine Fall League 2024 No. 1 will have its first meeting. It will be five rounds of group match play with IFPA scoring. sign up starts at 7 it claims that it starts promptly at 7.30 it says it's $10 for the whole season and $5 optional weekly for the side pop on Thursday October 3rd at Jack Bar in North Brooklyn No Bro Presents Thursday Night Strikes will be met that's a three strike knockout tournament and it has a note on the IFBA page that says hard start at 8pm exclamation point Also on Thursday night, the sixth meeting of the South Slope Pinball League, aka SSPL6, will be met at Buttermilk Bar in South Slope, Brooklyn.
    22:39
    Also on Thursday night, at Gebhard's Beer Culture on the Upper West Side. Thursday night at Gebhard's Beer Culture will be met. on Sunday Silver Ball Sunday at Single Cut 19 I do really need to get up there in particular now that I understand it's Peter's Machines and they've got a big collection I don't know if it's going to happen this week or not but I'm excited about that tournament having a monthly footprint in the calendar also on Sunday the October Monthly at Gebhard's will be met It is a match play qualifying tournament this month. They flip formats month over month. You can go to Gebhard's Beer Culture on the Upper West Side if you would like to contest that tournament. A quick correction. Last week, I misreported the results of the Barkay Brooklyn Pinball League B-Finals tie rake for first place. The correct winner was Svika Geft. My apologies.
    23:44
    As of September 28, 2024, there are 273 pinball machines in New York City at 85 public locations. Thanks to the creators and users of Pinball Map for this data, here are machine updates from the past week. On Tuesday, user WaySoma went to Pioneer's bar and said of their Star Wars, the $2 for 3 credit steal doesn't work. Impossible to play at this angle from the bar. pinball lizard visited barcade and chelsea on tuesday and noted on future spa the left flipper is too weak to send the ball to the top the ball frequently gets stuck at the joint between the right flipper and in lane comes loose with a flip or two but definitely compromises play and also the black knight 2000 is stealing lots of coins a couple of days later user chamber tin said their Looney Tunes left scoop will eject into a drain 90 of the time Also on Tuesday a Sopranos was added to two existing machines at Filthy Diamond in Bushwick User Upstate Pinball said, you're going to love this one. And the next day, user Mirror stopped by and also played the Sopranos and said, the game plays totally great. Where great is defined as an idealized version of your memory of any Sopranos you've ever played before. which is to say still kind of fucked up right mir goes on to say a lot more with some philosophical thoughts about sopranos as a pinball title and it's worth a read if you want to dig up this on pinball map on thursday user sas 33 said the avengers at al farm upper left flipper gets stuck every time. A quick note that on Saturday, all of the machines at Arcade by Arcade at Rockefeller Center were removed from the pinball map. So that was the shutdown of the arcade for this season. Hopefully that went well for them and we'll see it again maybe next summer. And then over the last few days at Sunshine Laundromat, user Entity Clay played the Big Lebowski and said it only accepts dollars but plays fantastically otherwise. And then a Pulp Fiction and a Jersey Jack Avatar have been added to the lineup, and Attack from Mars was removed. Let's talk about At the Wallace. Located at 3612 Broadway, near the corner of 149th Street in Hamilton Heights, or what a lot of people might call upstate Manhattan. At the Wallace is currently home to two teams in Pinball NYC on Monday nights, NYC FSA, and on Tuesday nights, the Harlem Globe Flippers. I describe At the Wallace as a divey sports bar with games.
    26:54
    It's always a lively place. Lots of people Correct me if I'm wrong. They're Cleveland fans. Yeah, it is a Cleveland bar. Kevin Love's face is on the wall yeah there's also in terms of the sports bar thing there's a like very bright painting that is surely an adaptation of a photo of rashid wallace wearing a nix uniform it's a very interesting wallace wallace in their decor there's four big screen tvs i think is the count at least for. So he's going to be showing some sort of Cleveland sports if it's on. Or any sports whatsoever. Yeah, some other sports if not. It'll be SportsCenter. If you walk in at 5 o'clock, SportsCenter's on those TVs. There's a landmark-y thing that describes the architect and the name of the ball. Yeah, there's a couple of historical marker-looking things talking about Robert Wallace for whom the entire building on the corner of 149th and Broadway is named. One small subsection of which is now at the Wallace the Bar, directly next to Harlem Public, their sister restaurant, with some nice upscale dining. Right now, there's some fencing out in the patio areas right outside of both of them, and there's great art that has arrows pointing you toward, like, this is where you go for at the Wallace and this is where you go for Harlem Public. Yeah. There was a collapse of the vaulted sidewalk into their basements. So it's going to be for a while that scaffolding stuff will be there. Sure. While they get that fixed. But also they made it beautiful. They took something ugly and made it beautiful. There's a long bar, maybe about 40 feet long. I'm going to go ahead and say a long phallic bar. There's a set of balls, right when you walk in. It juts out and then it goes long and curves at the end. I'm sorry. I don't think that we can avoid that part of this conversation. There is, because of where the beer tap is and because you can walk a full 360 degrees around that big beer tap, it's a phallic bar. That stretches along the right as you enter. And if you're interested in pinball, you continue past it up a few steps that does have uh an accessible wheelchair lift does indeed yeah if you need to get up to the upper section which is where the pinball lives alongside a big buck hunter and a few other bar games used to take over a lot of that space but it's been downsized in recent years. There's still a big Jenga that would be super annoying if people were trying to play while you're playing pinball, at least on three of the machines. It's more like a medium Jenga these days. The big Jenga, all those bricks got stuck up to the wall up in the game section now. It used to be much larger and more annoying. Now it's sort of more table-sized and people tend to take it to tables and not play it where it falls directly on a pinball player's ankles. I also want to note that there used to be a game that had a seven-foot run, and I talked about it when I reviewed At The Wallace when NYC Pin Pod was just Benjamin Furiga, and that you pull this ring and you drop it, it's on a string and it goes on its fulcrum and you try to get it onto a little hook. And I saw a very miniature version of that that was designed to take to your table, as Eric points out, much as the Jenga is now maybe designed to take to your table instead of designed to stand behind the big buck hunters and the pinball players. Yeah. The giant ring swing game is taken out and now we have space for another pinball table up there. Yeah. It's crazy to say I was surprised that there were five pinball machines there because pinball map is on my phone, but I was still surprised that there were five pinball machines there.
    31:13
    I remember it having three at a point in history. And I certainly remember there being four recently.
    31:27
    But the fifth is Raid. Let's talk about the machines. I wrote them down, I think in order. You get up those stairs and immediately on your right is Foo Fighters.
    31:41
    Just past it is Hot Wheels. Incidentally, in exactly that same order from back to front, the last venue we reviewed, in this instance, it's front to back. In that instance, it was back to front, but standing farthest right in the bank, you were at Foo Fighters, take two steps to your left, and you were standing at Hot Wheels. If you took two more steps to your left, you'd be standing at The Mandalorian. That's a premium? No, it's a pro. Okay. Another couple of steps to your left and you'd be at NBA Fastbreak. And then if you turned around and dodged a tiny piece of furniture that I think used to be a shuffleboard table at the back and walked a few steps forward, you would find yourself at World Cup Soccer, into which I put my initials when I was there on Tuesday. partially because I won the thing where you always put in your initials what is it, World Cup champ?
    32:46
    after you get all the cities but it was also high score number 3 or something so it was pretty good too I really enjoyed my visit even though I was there for a short time I went on Tuesday night because it was the night I was free knowing that there was a match coming so I went right after work and tried to just like sneak into a window that I could get there and play every game I didn't actually I didn't play Mandalorian but I played the others partially because just the Mandalorian is the Brian Eddy table and I just I know it I know what the play field is I know what to do it is what it is that said the last time that we colliders went to visit your association there I got my ass handed to me twice on it, handily.
    33:37
    But I really enjoyed those games, and I have often enjoyed visiting this place. The only reason that I don't go to it often is that it's very far away for me, personally, insofar as anything in New York City is very far away. I find it a great place to hang out. I used to live a lot closer, and so it would be my local pinball hangout at one time. Now, I live a lot further away, but I still go up all the time for my home games. They've got PBR on tap, which I like. I get the large. You could get a large or a small pour. Oh, right, the draft. Yeah, the very big mugs or the kind of big mugs. Yeah. um it's uh it's got good bar food uh the burgers are pretty good on monday nights when nyc fsa is playing coincidentally they have a hot dog menu with lots of creative options on it when you say creative options is that like foreign cuisine or just like unique combinations of things you wouldn't have expected how does it work out they've got a condiment they call steez is i'm not sure is that a philadelphia sort of spray cheese or something oh interesting you get like that plus bacon plus uh onion ring bits and scallions i spend a lot less time there than i did you know a few years ago and in a way that buttermilk is sort of my home base nowadays at the Wallace was at one point, and it still feels very much like a home bar to me. And, you know, that extends beyond a team home bar to the idea of a home bar for me personally, but they both apply and I really like it. It's a very friendly place.
    35:36
    And so in the few years since NYC FSA moved up there, it's been a really great place to have a team. We've got a lot of upper Manhattan players to this day, and we've added the operator to our ranks, which is very nice to have. Always nice to have someone on site who's got keys to the game. Yes. I really enjoyed my short time there this time. I have really enjoyed my time there a lot when I've been there over the years, not just this time. I like the way that they curate their drafts and cans. I can always get an Abita, Amber, or Purple Haze on tap or in a can. They often have interesting things that still live in the boring kind of beer that I like. And I appreciate that about the place. I like the collection. It has two of the three things that we said were a wacky collection last week and then one other wacky game in NBA Fast Break. World Cup Soccer, I love. It's not exactly wacky, but it's not everywhere anymore. It's a real classic. Yeah. Mando.
    36:58
    It feels like the one that could go. It's also kind of the normie modern Stern that is sitting there. Yeah, it's the competent modern Stern. Yeah. it's you gotta go to 145th street on the 1 is there any other stop that you want to go to 145 on the A probably I take the D to 145 because that express for me from 36th Street and Sunset Park Right So A or D to 145 1 to 145 Those are the best subway public transit options There's a lot of buses uptown that will get you kind of fast between uptown and midtown, particularly around Broadway up there. It's pretty wide. outside of whatever barrier to entry getting there is.
    37:47
    Boy, this is a great place. It's one of my favorites. I have a hypothetical that I've been bouncing around with some friends lately at late nights at pinball tournaments. What would it take to make a pinball pro shop? Other sports like golf or tennis have pro shops where you can go in, pick up some equipment, maybe talk to a trainer about your regime, your practice regime. Yeah, your form, your equipment. What do you need to be better at this? They have like a golf pro shop might have like a swing analyzer machine that takes video of you and gives pointers. What sort of stuff should we stock at our pinball pro shop for players, tournament players, to come in and get? I mean, I feel like the towel is the first obvious thing. I feel like having a towel because you are going to encourage you are going to encounter, I should say, the chaos of the fried chicken that your opponent just ate before they played ball too. Right? Yeah. No, this is great too because this is branded merch. We can brand those towels. See? See, that's what I'm talking about. I've got a, you know, I've been batting it around. I've got a list of sort of things you're going to find on the shelves. You're going to want your pin shades, low light glasses, maybe some fingerless bicycling gloves for padded nudging.
    39:38
    Yeah. Can we explore that for a second? Sure. Is it about nudging? Is it about grip? I know specifically Woody uses gloves for the padded nudging.
    39:51
    So it saves his palms is the idea. Yeah. I've tried it in the past and it has been nicer on my palms. I've gotten, I've had some aggressive nights where the next morning I'm like, I shoved a little too hard there, which is another thing I want on the shelf. Some elbow braces. I have definitely given myself tennis elbow from slide saves. Interesting. And needed a brace for a while to recover from that. This is particularly interesting because I have been asking myself why my left wrist has been hurting recently. And I haven't come up with any specific reason. Right. You got some wrist braces for you yeah some uh maybe some comfortable shoe inserts i don't know if anyone has actually designed pinball ergonomic shoes but i mean this that's a whole nother business idea that we can i'm gonna i'm gonna go ahead and jump right in here and say that if you need insoles in your shoes and it isn't like a prescription thing. It isn't like because there is actually some difference in the height of your heels or something that you need the thing for.
    41:06
    Cork insoles in your shoes are relatively easy to cut to the size of your shoe and they are the greatest memory foam. As someone who wears dress shoes a lot, cork insoles. We'll carry those.
    41:24
    Noise-canceling headphones. We should have a range of those, from affordable to outstanding. Apropos, earplugs.
    41:37
    Yeah. Maybe I should start bringing earplugs. I'll pick some up at the shop. Now, I want to touch on something important here. it's called a pro shop at the uh and i'm gonna um enter bowling alley to the to the pandeon of places where we we have a pro shop in a place which is a place where you can go get the equipment and the advice and everything in all of these realms there is someone who has been certified as a professional by somebody by in this instance the usga which puts on the u.s open that that is the only thing they do i think other than i and i believe i'm correct when i say the usga is the is the governing body in the united states at least who like if you were at the golf course that's the pro shop they're a usga pro they were certified by the usga same thing USTA for tennis.
    42:47
    Do we need IFPA-certified pros to run a pro shop? Well, you know, that's the dream. Make enough money to go pro.
    43:00
    Well, I was thinking, though, like a golf shop might have the golf swing analyzer of a range of training machines.
    43:12
    Doesn't have to be a full-size pinball machine but something of the approximate dimensions maybe not as deep one of which or has various scoops that feed you a repeatable drop catch practice a scoop that feeds you a repeatable live catch practice feeds that you can use this trainer machine i'm gonna go i'm gonna do 15 minutes of drop catches right it's just going to go bing bing bing like you could do for yourself at a free play place but you've got to set up the situation consistently and repeatedly this is a thing where you can do it again and again my favorite thing about this is the idea of the shats subway shot that brings it right back up on the other side think about that you hit into a scoop it comes out of a scoop that feeds directly into the right in lane off your right flipper you shat it goes up the left in lane and into a scoop where it shoots back out on the right in lane once you Halloween has those in lane up scoop feeds that would be great for practice there we go Yeah, that is the machine that makes me giddy when you talk about this idea.
    44:42
    Because, you know, the repeatable drop catch is awesome. But the third body problem of the repeatable drop catch is that you have to be able to drop catch from many angles. there are certain angles that drop catching is a fool's errand but it can't just be from that one single shot and I understand where you're coming from with the theory, getting the theory of the drop catch is what you get there but I think you can't over practice on it either I like this whole idea now of the trainer machine I think there's a lot to explore. There is, yeah. It's interesting.
    45:32
    And so, is that what suffices for the pro? Is the ability for you, in your own body, to do the repeatable thing, does that suffice for the fact that, I'm sorry to say, I don't imagine in my lifetime that it is reasonable to expect that there will be someone who is certified as a professional pinball player by the ifpa and therefore is respected in the advice that they give to people because they come to the place where the pro has set themselves up i guess it depends on our sales volume whether we can you know hire jason zahler right right i mean that's the thing that's the thing i i don't i think that you know equally interest the guy who owns the bowling alley in the town where i grew up is technically a professional bowler he's he is a pba pro and he occasionally goes to an event where he is putting up his own money for entry fees and trying to compete. I believe at one point he actually rolled a 300 in one of them. He's never been on the TV show on Saturday afternoon or anything. But he's a professional bowler. And how he makes his living is owning this bowling alley. if i own that pinball joint right on pinball mile in park slope i don't know i i don't know if i can make enough but it's it's an interesting idea pro at that point right it's an interesting idea whether the two things can supplement because that's one you know i imagine that there are usga pros who are cooperators in golf course investments and usta pros who are cooperators in tennis club investments, for instance, just like the bowling thing. And I don't know, is that out there? I don't imagine it is. I don't think the business of pinball is that big of business that we can get there. But it is interesting to think about the pro shop from that standpoint, from the pro who, you know, some organizations said that they're that on weekends, they go to tournaments and that's what makes them a pro. Is there a comic book store model where collectibles are a part of the business model?
    48:28
    I mean, yeah, I think the world of pinball merch in general is much larger than things that apply to a tournament player. But, you know, we pick the best of the best and feature that. I'd like to hear from any of our listeners additional things we should stock in our pro shop other features we could offer and I'm entertaining investment offers that's all for this week's pod reach out to us on Facebook with your ideas for pinball pro shop stock or email us at nycpinpod at gmail.com Thanks to everyone who reached out to us this week. DFW, Uchendo Nwachuku, Zen Zokniak, Jose Garcia. Thank you. I appreciate you. Join us next week when I'm not 100% positive what will happen in this space, but we will present something in this space. Between now and then, pinfolk, whether you play in pinball or not, go get them.
    49:41
    Bye.