by Andy Longo
Last Spring, I was lucky enough to be invited to join Matt Jones and Hugh Kramer’s Team Draft League for its second season. The rules are relatively simple: you put together a three-person team and battle once a week against another team in the league. After eight weeks, there is a cut to top 4 and your standard single elimination playoff.
Jamie P, Team Draft League ringer turned absentee!
Determined to win my first TDL season, I assembled a monster crew consisting of Jamie Parke (who you might remember from such Top 8’s as: ProTour Journey into Nyx, 2008 World Championships, 1999 World Championships, and more!) and Colette LeRoux (who was a Grand Prix Trial Champion). We named ourselves “Protect Ya Deck” and were primed to take down Season Two. The format was Theros Block (JOU/BNG/THS)—fitting for titans such as ourselves.
Colette LeRoux won a GP Trial once.
Our first week we played eventual champions Hail Slaton. They came into the Dojo (what we call our little slice of the Magic-verse) all business-like and quickly dispatched us (bunch of lucky chumps if you ask me). Unfortunately, we failed to do much better the second week. And the third week. Apparently Jamie was too busy Top 8’ing Pro Tours and Grand Prix to play with his team so had to use substitutes for most of the matches. Our hopes of a TDL title disappeared along with our ringer and we finished the season with a grand total of zero wins.
Manning (center), the best player who isn’t a household name.
I told myself that the next season would be different. I only needed one win to top Season Two so my goals weren’t very lofty, to be honest. Knowing Jamie would be unable to commit, I reached out to Chris Manning (who William Jensen has said is “the best player who isn’t a household name” and who also recently Top 4’d GP Providence) and my original teammate Colette LeRoux (who won a GP Trial). With our powers combined we became the “Stabber Crew.” We won our first match that Season Three (achievement unlocked) but afterwards Colette disappeared from NYC. A sense of deja vu was beginning to form as I searched for another long-term sub. Luckily, Dan O’Mahoney-Schwartz (who Top 4’d PT DC with Team Antarctica and is just a good man in general) was able to be our substitute for most of the season. We played like warrior poets (only losing one week) and managed to make the playoffs, breezed through the semis, and lost in the finals to the Brendaxian Mobliterators (bunch of lucky chumps if you ask me).
Dan OMS, the destroyer.
This season, because of a loophole in the TDL charter, I was able to run back the Manning and O’Mahoney-Schwartz terror squad for Season Four, this time in the form of “The Longo Khan.” We’ve had two losses this season so far (to a bunch of lucky chumps, obviously) but managed to make the playoffs on tie-breakers. We won our semifinals match against Team PBJ and are waiting to take on the winner of the Khans of Kadarkir/Hooting Tandrils match in the finals.
I don’t know what the prizes for winning this season are and I don’t care. Getting to play with this group of magicians is a prize in and of itself. Just kidding—I think the prize is cash and I’d rather have that.
Andrew Longo has been playing Magic the Gathering at a mediocre level since 1994. He managed to get lucky on the backs of his teammates to win Grand Prix Providence Rhode Island. When not playing magic he runs a D&D campaign, plays video games and reads comics (a real triple threat for the ladies).