Pro Tour Amonkhet Finals: Gerry Thompson vs. (22) Yuuya Watanabe

[@blackdragonwave9415]

Huge win for Gerry, he's a great guy, definitely deserves this, and I am super happy for him. I also want to recognize: time after time, I see Yuuya being incredibly gracious and sporting, even when losing. I remember when he also lost to Cifka's eggs deck in the finals of PT RTR; while there was little he could do except for wait for the combo and hope for a fizzle, the whole time he was incredibly pleasant with not one bit of salt. Hats off to two amazing players in this Pro Tour finals, not just for being great at magic, but also for being awesome people!

[@Patronux]

BlackDragonWave Yuuya is the man

[@simoo1]

plz don't spoil the result in the comments

[@RussianBot1998]

@@simoo1 Don't read the comments before watching the video lol

[@Euclides287]

A huge win not just for Gerry, but also for the MTG community. Imagine if someone who turned out to be a *cheat* had won the Pro Tour. 😖

[@BlueXnitemare]

So deserved. Gerry Thompson is probably one of the hardest working magic players that I have ever known. Very fun guy to talk to and playtest with. Couldn't have wished for a better recipient for the trophy. Congrats bud

[@ziegfeld4131]

Played him at the star ciry game store hes actually a colassal dick with a huge ego

[@mickeypigknuckles]

@@ziegfeld4131 Lol. Gerry is one of the nicest people on the planet.

[@Euclides287]

Bro, condering Yuuya turned out to be a *cheat* and has been expelled from the Hall of Fame, I gotta say your comment has aged like a fine wine! Gerry was indeed the best recipient of the trophy. 🙏

[@lbp7693]

I'm a simple man. I see a mainstream marvel deck lose, I press like.

[@somethingorother8794]

lol?

[@stipfedart]

Jose Maria Luis Partosa same

[@kartoffelnpommesgut]

17:00 Fast Aggro Decks and Turn 4 combo decks. Sounds like modern...but without the deck diversity XD

[@jamesbayliss1617]

Yuuya forgot to mark his ulamogs...

[@danielnadeau1752]

*pro tour amon-cat coverage review* 1. the new appearance for the feature match area looks great. more open and clean. having tables play in the background is good ambience. maybe raise the lighting a little. (the darkness might have benefited the zombie player wink) 2. new draft viewer is awesome, great way to visualise the process 3. marshall has really stepped up his coverage in the last 6 months, tx @Marshall_LR 4. maria is cool, she wakes up the news desk team. she was tryharding a bit but understandable at the outset. great addition. 5. news desk 'talking points' are sometimes too obviously corporate in nature: "there is still room to design in the aetherworks shell" ie "we swear standard isnt boring", "what a flavor win!" by someone on the design team... 6. LSV is a windmill slam as always overall fun to watch, big improvement over recent coverage, thanks much yall

[@irongrin99]

I agree on many points, just adding that the editing still sucks. You miss so many plays because they cut to a camera on someones face, they don't know how to do picture in picture?:s

[@LeRobb3]

Daniel Nadeau Also pretty nice the award ceremony is in the same video as the finals, as duration of the video is not a spoiler anymore

[@amacuro]

The corporate behaviour of WOTC has always bothered me but I guess it is what it is... In fact, I'm always bothered by corporate behaviour (those damned top 0.01%! *shakes fist*) I remember Pro Tour BFZ, there was ZERO cards from that set in Standard (just Gideon, Ally of Zendikar) and the coverage team was trying their best to be as insightful as possible at all times, YET no one dared to make a comment on the OBVIOUS, which was that BFZ had zero impact on standard and that allies and eldrazi were a Limited gimmick.

[@Nanofuture87]

You do have to keep in mind that the Pro Tour is basically just a giant advertisement, especially for the newest set. That's going to affect the coverage.

[@amacuro]

That's true, all the staff and equipment is a high investment from their part to promote the new set. But as a fan who is going to play the new set anyway, I watch it for entertainment only. It's how the world works, it's like watching your favorite film on TV, you have to put up with ads.

[@Ben-pp1ws]

Watching with captions is always entertaining Anula muggle, Lulu MOG, Ghulam Auggie, blue mug Shondra Spin the marble

[@tennis1090ca]

"you once an RB"

[@amacuro]

Is that Yuuya's name? lol

[@tennis1090ca]

Gondwana XD yep

[@somethingorother8794]

Ulama, geese of hunger

[@guilhermecastilhos3885]

almond cat

[@brokenwingbird2552]

This set has been really refreshing for the standard format. Its fun to draft on its own and its bringing back a lot of the fun from Shadows/Eldritch Moon. I think there are some powerful decks no one has played yet with the new set out and I see the format evolving a lot before the next set is released

[@haganbrown9414]

What type of card covers does Gerry have, where might I get some???

[@Cindoof]

I'm fairly certain those are Legion Double Matte sleeves, hopefully you've found them in the 4 years since you left this comment. Cheers

[@supaaznjigga]

ya.. I really feel like not casting harness lightning on that crypt breaker that last game did it

[@alanyuan8565]

Not casting censor I think was also pretty bad

[@MrJund-gp3jh]

Great job Gerry and both of you!

[@13borechannel79]

Anyone know where can buy/ find Gerry Thompson protection sleeves ??

[@AndresGonzalez-xr9eq]

at 43:57 how does Yuuya block the dire graf with 4 creatures? I'm sort of new, i always assumed you can only block with 1 creature

[@masterchaosforge]

Andres Gonzalez you can block with as many creatures as you want on any numbers of creatures you want, even more than one on one attacker. But the thing to remember is that your opponent decides where they want the damage to go on your blocking creatures.

[@9288Savior]

You gotta pause it at *56:29* to catch the face *{::^_^::}*

[@jakeg3032]

Does anybody have the link to buy the sleeves Gerry Thompson is using? They look great.

[@ArrmanK]

They're Legion sleeves if I'm correct. Go to their site and look under either matte or gloss sleeves. They should be there.

[@jakeg3032]

Awesome, thanks a ton.

[@jamesdoble7580]

Please make better entertainment for the pauses , Thank you :)

[@johnnymartir8283]

shielded ather thief and no follow up harness lighting. this to me was the tipping point. had yuuya played out the harness lighting we probably are going to game 5, not sure what he was thinking.

[@vilarcarbu]

Can someone explain me what happened at min 26:30 ? Yes i'm noob

[@lukas_kudlacek]

50:18 Who else wants an aether hug?

[@eriktruchinskas3747]

i just started playing more but its still at home and im sure theres many things im flat out doing wrong. the way they keep their mana on the table confuses me. is it sorted by color? i would just keep my mana side by side

[@Osborne4Life]

I see that they returned to the regular finals format. I guess the stepladder format for the finals of the last PT didn't sit well with fans.

[@thomas3816]

Any idea what sleeves Gerry uses for his Zombie tokens? thanks!

[@guilhermefj1]

Where did Gerry Thompson get that awesome shield?

[@GToul13]

This zombie deck is so powerful! It feels like it would beat even modern decks

[@alanyuan8565]

Standard decks don’t perform that badly against fair modern decks

[@lamgor89]

wow! they shuffle their decks and hands so smooth, teach me how to do that anyone have youtube link?

[@greytoeimp]

I thought mardu vehicles was a strong deck for standard. is that no longer the case?

[@andrewsmith4827]

I've seen a lot of people attribute the dominance of Mardu vehicles solely to its strong matchup against Saheeli-cat combo decks. There's certainly some truth to this assessment, as Heart of Kiran is pretty much a stone-cold answer to Saheeli and is difficult to deal with to boot. If you look at the tournament statistics, Mardu was the most represented deck on day one - I'm sure a lot of people brought winning lists from the last pro tour and jammed Glorybringer. Pros assumed this sort of thing would happen and built their sideboards accordingly. That being said, I still think that Mardu can be a really strong deck - it just needs a bit of tuning for the current meta. RBW has some great answers for Ulamog/Marvel (Statis Snare, Cast Out, Quarantine Field, even Angel of Sanctions) as well as a very powerful creature removal suite. Radiant Flames and Sweltering Suns are good against zombies as well as low to the ground GB decks. Gideon will always be good. Heart of Kiran will always be good. They're certainly not as well positioned as they were a few months ago (thanks turn four Ulamog) but if you invested in Mardu I still think you're in good shape.

[@Kestral287]

A lot of the problem that Mardu has is that it's weak to Marvel. Last format that was fine; Marvel's problem was that it auto-lost to CopyCat. But now Cat's gone, that means Marvel can come back, that means Mardu has it much rougher than it did before. It can certainly adapt to this, but a lot of the Aether Revolt meta was the way it was because Cat protected Mardu from some of its worst matchups.

[@kero1640]

Joseph Sedita the big problem mardu has was everyone was expecting it and ready for it. zombies did really well because it was new. graveyard hate will definitely be a sideboard inclusion going forward. but zombies could easily switch to a plague belcher style to counter.

[@nocturnalanimal6815]

where could one get Gerry Thompson's sleeves

[@Armazillo]

Is the Aether plot point an analogy for medical marijuana? I read the flavor text on Rogue Refiner and I was like, "Hmmm. I see."

[@silase.quester3519]

Why are they wearing headphones with mics?

[@NoActuallyGo-KCUF-Yourself]

So glad to see Zombies on top!

[@Jogitoe13579]

I built a zombie deck before it got expensive and after this week the deck went from $50 to $200. glad i bought relentless dead when they were $4 and not $20.

[@joecooper8527]

Joseph Ginnett Geeez, when were they $4 ?

[@Aelia12]

They were 5-6$ late eldritch moon, early kaladesh.

[@Varnell]

After winning game two did Gerry shuffle his entire sideboard into his deck?

[@luliby2309]

Some people will shuffle their sideboards into their decks then take out 15 cards to conceal how much they are siding in.

[@IznoLTB]

Format ?

[@colinbrown74]

I like it more when the Control decks rely on Planeswalkers. I feel like they are the most fair and satisfying win condition while also usually making fans of said character happy when it's played. I really hope Nicol Bolas is the new win condition (or at least one of them) for Control decks in Hour of Devastation.

[@kevinflagler2999]

the day energy counters rotate out of standard, i'm cracking a Pappy 23 year.

[@MrAndMrsGrover]

I haven't followed/watched Magic for more than a year or so. Could someone explain me why they're wearing headphones, like they're playing a videogame?! Looks like it takes away the social aspect of a duel. Thanks!

[@han_yolo6742]

Hate to see mana screw in a finals. Matched up with LSV on the last MOCS, luckily for me he was a no-show!

[@FranzNagy]

Not looking forward to another few months of Wheel of Fortune...Zombies are awesome, bust Marvel is a busted card with ridiculous variance. Bring back Emrakul and get rid of Marvel, I'd be fine with that.

[@ryan6881]

Franz Nagy agreed!

[@jakebaker2486]

Franz Nagy its also banned

[@nickfanzo]

Franz Nagy it is now banned.

[@buggus0034]

Did anyone hear of any Esper control style stuff? One would think Esper control zombies with a few Sorin's would be pretty damn solid. Plus brain pick with delirium eliminating the aetherwork marvel train. Thoughts?

[@nathantruett3136]

I opened 3 amonkhet boosters and have gotten 2 Gideon of the trails and 1 incantation

[@BarginsGalore]

*invocation

[@Snazzeo]

Yuuya before he got caught

[@lukekamella2603]

Why the head sets

[@jackiesingleton2351]

luke kamella ,,,, Not 100% but I thought it was translation. Not sure if they both speak English. P

[@garyritchie6649]

The announcers are talking about both players and their hands, and it can be heard by everyone, so the players wear the headsets, so they can't hear the announcers, but can still communicate with each other.

[@settralives]

After watching most of the weekend live I'm still having nightmares where all I can hear is 'mahwehhhhhhh..............mehyewwwwwwww..................'

[@HenryDarr]

Well done Gerry !

[@brokenwingbird2552]

1:07:30 wait for the high-5's feelsgreatman

[@Mystsicity]

I just wish Wizards would create a system for mandating deck diversity and a system that would allow the common player to stand a chance of even getting to pro tours. It always comes down to a team of people and demonstrates that only teams with endorsements will ever get the chance to play in high-end tournaments. Wizards wants to know how to revitalize standard magic, its quite simple and can be answered in one sentence. Make the game accessible to the common player again. The common players are the ones who made magic what it is and turning in to a battle of celebrities took that element from the game. Special Note: I do not use the term "common player" as reference to those who play mediocre magic, but rather, the people who cannot afford $ 500+ every three months to stay current in the format and require endorsement deals, on a celebrity team, to gain entry into high-end tournament play. Final Note: its not like anyone from Wizards will actually read this comment, let alone take anything from it , if they did.

[@rosedoesntknow1853]

I'm late to the party, but I'm always happy to see a deck that tries to free cast it's way to victory bite the dust.

[@cyberrittengrem4993]

Play kozilek's return, then play ulamog the ceaseless hunger triggering kozilek's return from the graveyard killing everything plus exiling two swamps.

[@boogiestreet594]

do people notice how weird it is how people who play this game simply keep shuffling over and over and over and looking and shuffling and shuffling even when they aren't doing anything? it's kinda odd. when i play i lay my cards on the table when im not doing anything.

[@BASEDinMaine]

It usually tweaks out casual observers which is one of the reasons they do it: a legal way to fuck w the opponent. It adds a layer of deception, masking if u are paying attention to a particular card or the order of your cards. The other half is just nervous anxious energy and keeping the brain engaged.

[@EvonyBasics]

If Radient Flames was Sweltering Suns Yuuya coulda hit it off Marvel as an out.

[@paulm2163]

I really don't understand why it's Flames instead of Sweltering Suns. I guess the RR is scary versus having RX1 as a pyroclasm, but yeah with Marvel and just added upside of having Cycling as an out you'd think it'd be stronger.

[@bladeflesh]

there was plenty on times he would only have 1 red source for most of the game. Chandra Flamecaller would have been much better.

[@paulm2163]

The issue is that Radiant Flames is not a relevant hit off Marvel whereas Suns is. Sure, when you're on one red and you need to hardcast it it is problematic, but it seems somewhat likely you can hard cast it in this deck and you get added flexibility of it being live off Marvel and being a cycler.

[@EvonyBasics]

Yeah there are definitely corner cases for both. I guess it just comes down to what he thought was more relevant

[@jacksonj69]

I think guys watanabe should have played rogue refiner instead on virtuoso.

[@HComfy]

Game three was my favorite part. I was glad to see the marvel finally hit an ulamog

[@MrRaidereric2]

Even the annotations say almond cat 55:03.

[@naturalsuper6032]

Wow even in finals people make mana screw by chance. The mulligan rule needs to change

[@nickfanzo]

Natural Super he should've mulliganed. his own fault.

[@Haannibal777]

Liliana vs Eldrazi. Liliana won again.

[@DiabloTommaso]

Ty for the spoiler xD

[@notorioezz]

I expected more from Yuuya Watanabe. First of all not the stupid Marvel deck, second of all, not keeping a one lander in game 1.

[@JadenPrada]

I agree. He made egregious misplays. I hope he learned his lesson, ALWAYS kill Cryptbreaker at the earliest opportunity. That said, congrats to Gerry Thompson for his ProTour win.

[@ОлегКостенко-з9б]

Totally. I mean, card draw PLUS aditional zombies and potentially getting something like Scrounger in the graveyard? Busted. And only 1 energy and two mana to kill. I think that was a huge misplay

[@alanyuan8565]

Well he already made it into the hall of fame. I think magic is a lot less important to him now as he can easily get a stream of cash for simply showing up

[@amacuro]

I'll defend Yuuya a little bit, or at least give my version of why he didn't kill the Crypt Breaker and killed the Lord of the Acursed instead: I think Yuuya was pretty traumatized from game 2 when Lord of the Acursed made Gerry's 2/2s huge and unmanageable. So Yuuya made a judgment call: do I let him have some card advantage or do I let him go tall with his zombies and out of range of my harnessed lightning? Yuuya decided that he was able to get better card advantage than Gerry based on his Shielded Aether Thief and Glimmer of Genius. At the end it proved to be the wrong decision, specially because Gerry was drawing so many swamps that he would have had a hard time developing his board anyway, but i don't think you are expected to reach this conclusion with the limited info Yuuya had at the time.

[@JadenPrada]

+Gondwana. Valid argument you have here. Though, through my 17 years of playing magic, the two best things you can do in Magic to secure a win is generate mana and card advantage. While Aetherworks Marvel generates mana advantage my cheating mana costs, I feel that Cryptbreaker is a tad better in the case that it generates board advantage and card advantage for little investment cost in the bigger scheme of things. Yuuya was in a damn is he does damned if he doesn't moment as you pointed out. But I feel that even with Lord of the Accused, a T1 Cryptbreaker is far more threatening in the bigger scheme of things than a possible t3 Lord. I also didn't really care for Yuuya's Marvel list. I liked the Chandra and Sweltering Suns in other lists far better, as those decks had more outs to zombies. Though, I will give Yuuya the benefit that he did fight and claw his way to 2nd place, and that is a hell of an achievement in an of itself since I am sure that both of them were suffering from players fatigue.

[@david1913]

this video did not hold up well...

[@MenniePlay]

He win because he know how to win. Playing Meta not always win. If you said Zombie will be Meta, another Non Meta Decks will win soon. This is MTG, not Yugioh.

[@Kestral287]

Zombies were definitely meta here. Three in top eight, remember?

[@MenniePlay]

i mean before this. no meta comes meta. not like yugioh, meta always win.

[@Kestral287]

That doesn't make sense. We knew about the Zombies deck already, in both its variations. We knew it was good. It was already part of the meta.

[@John-mz5jy]

i really don't understand how Ulamog hasn't been banned.

[@daltondee5666]

you know it's funny watching this now with Marvel being banned. that takes away that entire deck

[@rodolfosanchez1508]

its like listening to limited resources

[@kero1640]

glad I built my zombie deck before the price home. picked up liliana's mastery for 39 cents each. just wished I wouldn't have overlooked dark salvation like an idiot.

[@kero1640]

buy you're shamble back's now for the zombie mirror match before they quadruple in price.

[@mmurphy373]

Shamble back is bad and also a common.

[@kero1640]

You're right getting to exile a relentless dead or cryptbreaker and making a zombie token against the mirror is horrible

[@mmurphy373]

Let's see. Pro tour Amonkhet top 8. No shambleback. I'll bet it isn't in any deck in top 8 of PT Hour either. It's a bad card. Relentless dead is rarely in the graveyard. Requires too much set up for too little payoff. Not worth a slot in the 75.

[@wowblizzmythighs]

whoever made black card is ridiculous, they are designed to be OP and extremely mana conservative.

[@midnightblood1780]

Watanabe? Unbroken anyone?

[@EvonyBasics]

Go Gerry!!

[@EvonyBasics]

He's even got those classy sleves

[@luckyskin09]

imagine if the cheater had won

[@wadedennis864]

zombies for the win i guess...

[@Arghore]

Guess Exile and Graveyard hate just became a lot more standard viable...

[@Vindsvelle]

Does any one else find it abrasive when one's opponent fidgets incessantly like Watanabe?

[@DiabloTommaso]

1 lander? Balsy

[@jacksonj69]

I think guys watanabe should have play rogue refiner instead on virtuoso!

[@lostingreenbay]

Glad the cheater lost.

[@ChubbPirates]

I hate watching people shuffle their hands

[@sirepic5763]

Let's go over the decks: Green-Red-Blue Aetherworks (NOT Temur because there are no temur cards in the deck and most people understand just the colors): Oh? You wanna cast a 10+ CMC card on turn four? GO RIGHT AHEAD! Sideboard can be much improved Zombies: Remember when they reversed the standard cycle? The deck wouldn't be as powerful if they reversed this decision. If you don't like the way standard is, you may want to check out Des. Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if this comment was banned.

[@Senziko]

gotta admit ulamog kinda makes the game boring

[@colinderue8095]

game 1 WOOF.

[@nickfanzo]

not mulliganing game one was very foolish. mtg 101.

[@victorleese9491]

Lol reasons why i stick to esper control planeswalkers as my control deck. Would have languished the dog shit ouuta him

[@WhisperingWinds0]

wait a minute, now the PT is team based? what is this focus of teams ? what does it f* matters? this is a solitary game,it's not worlds. im very pissed off

[@autodidactusplaysjrpgs7614]

Watanabe has 24 chromosomes

[@Dtrollmancan]

wow so the guy gets the ulamog and the game is over..........................WIIIIIIIII FUNNNNNNNNNN im wating for 1 CARD AND I WIN WIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII I LOVE IT

[@littledyu-gi-oh3580]

In my opinion Marvel is broken and it should be banned

[@Yuglyoshi]

>marvel deck loses 1-3 >BAN IT

[@littledyu-gi-oh3580]

The zombie guy was quit lucky as you can see.This is magic after all,but if they played another 9 matches after that one, Watanabe would've won the 7 easily...

[@brandoncasiano1856]

I'll I could do was look at yuuya's lips. He's got the Donald Trump lips going on

[@Bladerxdxi]

2nd

[@krem6023]

FIRST