Updated topic:
Sunday, September 10th will be the start of our Fall Sunday Pinball League. The Excelsior Pub is expecting the delivery of a second pinball machine before the end of August. That means twice the thrills! Word is that it will be The Addams Family. We'll have a couple of weeks to get it up to our standards before the league starts.

Start Date: September 10, 2017
Finals Date: December 10, 2017

Entry fee is $5. League season is comprised of 14 meets with the last being a double elimination finals tournament. Players must pay coin-drop. All entry fees go towards prizes.

It will be the same rules as it was in the spring league. Dated preplays are allowed. Players will compete in 4 games (2 on each machine) each match. Free State Pinball Association rules (with noted modifications). IFPA sanctioning pending.

Register by calling Tim at 518-281-6450, PMing me here at Pinside, or register in person at the Excelsior Pub. All skill levels welcome!

Excelsior Pub
54 Philip St, Albany, NY 12207
The Addams Family
Road Show

https://www.facebook.com/events/478540172479192

Original thread post:

Calling it a league may be overstating it, but once we get people together we can see what it turns into. We have to start somewhere! I'm expecting it to evolve into a roaming league that visits both public and private locations. For our first iteration, we're doing a 5 week stretch playing Road Show at the Excelsior Pub.

Start Date: April 23, 2017
End Date: May 21, 2017

Entry fee is $5. League season is comprised of 4 meets and a double elimination finals tournament. Players must pay coin-drop. All entry fees go towards prizes.

Free State Pinball Association rules.
International Flipper Pinball Association sanctioned.

Register by calling Tim at 518-281-6450 or register in person at the Excelsior Pub. Registration is open until the start of the league. All skill levels welcome!

Excelsior Pub
54 Philip St, Albany, NY 12207

League Times, 5pm-7pm
April 23
April 30
May 7
May 14
May 21 – Finals Tournament

Pinball Machine
Road Show (Williams, 1994)

https://www.facebook.com/events/1375503419181956/

My awesome 90's style flyer for an awesome 90's game. Looks like we have 10 people signed up.

coindroppers (resized).jpg

Many people who have signed up are amateurs, so the matches should go pretty quickly. If the format takes too long, we may have to scale back the 4 games to something more timely. The idea will be that we will cycle through the groups on a night so all groups play their first game, then all play their second, etc. That will prevent anyone from waiting around too long. It's just something we have to do when we only have one machine.

We included preplay for that very reason. Just get your scores verified by another league player or the bartender. If it ends up being the second week you miss, just do your preplays right after the fist week playing is over.

Road Show is in good playing condition. At this time there is one eddy board that is not registering, but we anticipate that getting fixed.

This is all very new. We're just starting out and hoping that it evolves into something good. Hope to see you there!

I'll check that out today. Thanks for the well wishes. It looks like we have 14 signed up, 6 of which are Pinsiders.

League is now full! We'll wait-list anyone else who is interested in case someone drops out midseason.

18 people signed up. 14 confirmed. I figure when we start we'll have 16. Half are Pinsiders and the other half are regular patrons at the bar. I'm a little nervous about time it will take to play our matches, but I figure between drop-outs, no-shows and pre-plays, everything will work out fine.

I'm already working on arranging a tournament with more games.

I keep the pinside map of Albany pretty much up to date. Unfortunately, The Addams Family at McGeary's is starting to have issues. I offered to repair it for them in exchange for beer, but they turned me down. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I've never been their either.

When I started talking about a league starting at Excelsior, the game got fixed pretty fast.

I think I've convinced the owner of Lionheart (on Madison in Albany) to get in Theatre of Magic and Elvira and the Party Monsters from his distributor.

Since last week we got lots fixed.
The main flippers have been rebuilt.
The Bob's Bunker lock has been fixed.
The tilt is now more forgiving
The left outlane is low set in the middle.

I had a chat with Jay who runs Excelsior Pub and we set up a framework for going forward with the league. We're going to hold monthly tournaments over the summer given that everyone has plans and it's tough to get together. In September, we'll start back up with the weekly league. By then we will have a second machine and we'll have it fixed up to meet our playing standards.

The first tournament will be on Sunday, June 25 at 5pm. It's a double elimination tournament limited to the first 16 registrants. $5 registration. IFPA sanctioned. I anticipate only having Road Show available.
https://www.facebook.com/events/439631346406194/

I'd like to try something different for July. I was thinking of a "Herb" style qualifier in order to get more people involved. More details to follow.

I checked around for other public venues and there really isn't anywhere which is conducive to a tournament. I talked to Schmaltz Brewery where they have a Star Trek pinball and they showed initial interest, but didn't really answer my questions (like do they have the cabinet key). I'd like to get in touch with Desperate Annie, but league members seemed to think that was too far of a drive (I sort of agree). Most places the pins just don't work well enough to be fun. I offered my repair services in exchange for beer and parts to McGeary's (Addams Family) and Susies (Monopoly) and neither were really interested. If anyone has ideas, I'm all ears.

They are owned by an operator. It took a while to convince the operator to allow me the key to access the machine at Excelsior. Once he heard I wanted to start a league, he turned it over. I put about $70 in parts into it (all of which was reimbursed) and a little bit of elbow grease. With that, I have both the operator and venue on board. We're pretty fortunate to have found a venue as receptive as Excelsior. Over the years I've tried to get other places on board and he was the first to see potential in pinball to drive business.

Weird thing is the owner of the venue used to run the dart leagues at another local bar that had 11 boards that were filled 3 nights a week. He was hoping to get some of those people to join dart leagues at his new place, but it never materialized. As soon as he put in the pinball machine, a pinball following started.

Our small league easily brings in $80 in coins a month, as well as filling the bar at a time it would be otherwise empty.

I'm just excited with the promise of another machine. No where in the area has more than one.

Not sure about other locations. I think the operator is from Johnstown, NY.

Yes. He's supposed to get a list to Jay who is going to pass it to me. The operator has an Addams Family he wants to put in. Unless there is something else really interesting on the list, we're probably going to see that one.

50 cents per game. 5 for $2.

I think he was surprised that it's done so well there. I'ts set to allow up to 4 extra ball buy-ins for a quarter each. There are a lot of buy-ins from the regular bar customers.

I'm pleased to announce that our second pin arrived yesterday. Demolition Man

league (resized).jpg

Our spring league will be starting at Excelsior Pub. This season's lineup is Twilight Zone and Demolition Man . League starts Sunday, April 15 at 5pm and continues for 8 weeks. Contact me with any questions. -Tim