2013 North American Spring Regionals Preview
Sunday marks the third and final set of Regionals for the 2013 North American circuit. While there haven’t been any major format changes since the last set of Regionals, the Championship Points picture is starting to clear up and this final set of Regionals may essentially clinch Worlds invites for some players while determining who will be able to get in with anything less than a top 4 finish at US Nationals for the others. 85 Championship Points are needed for a bye this time, reducing the byes at most Regionals to between six and eight. Byes have been a pretty major factor determining top cuts so far, so expect many of the players fortunate enough to have one to top cut again. With Nationals having a 16 player top cut that is so small relative to the total number of players it can be seen only with a telescope this year, players will be scrambling to go into Nationals in the top 16 CP overall or to make the finals of these last Regionals in order to achieve an elusive US Nationals bye, making this final set of Regionals even more crucial.
2013 Spring Regionals Predictions
The section for each Regional will feature some background information on the Regional, the people I would expect to cut and the most interesting story lines (The Story), and the player most likely to win (The Smart Money is on…), sometimes with added conjecture if I have a gut feeling in another direction.
It should be noted before I go any further: Regionals are the most wide open of all VGC events. While established players have had the clamps firmly locked in for Nationals and Worlds the past several years, Regionals is where players become established and break out. I can basically guarantee that in every regional (except maybe Boston) there will be at least two or three players in the Top Cut we aren’t super familiar with. That’s a good thing — it means the game is growing and more players are playing at a high level. However, I can’t write about people we don’t know yet, so don’t take there being no further mentions of anyone but established players in any of these sections as an expectation that big names are going to sweep all of the top cut slots, because they won’t.
I also apologize if I miss some people that I should have put in these sections… I will probably forget a couple people or exclude players because I don’t know what event they are attending.
Massachusetts Regional
Difficulty Rating:
/ 5
(OUR KING IS COMING out of five)
The Story: As usual, the Northeastern Regional looks completely ridiculous. Even with several great players not showing up, this field could make two top 8s stronger than any other Regional’s top 8 will wind up being. The field will contain about twice as many byes as any other Regional, with notable byes including Human, TDS, dtrain, DrFidget, Nightblade7000, Cybertron, JiveTime, EnFuego, Calm Lava, kingofkongs, wer, and Mosquito.
Massachusetts features the most players currently in Worlds position by far. Human is the top rated player at this Regional off of two third place finishes. In spite of his pending transfer to Europe, he will be trying to get all the Championship Points he can here by getting third place, which will inevitably be exactly 90, because that is how many points you get for getting third place, and he has finished in third place twice already. Top cut buddies dtrain and tds are just behind him, and both have good odds of finally taking a regional home… they keep getting so close, one of them has to get it eventually, right? DrFidget rounds out the top 12 group, and is probably the player who will be most interesting to watch this weekend to see how he does in the Northeast after racking up big points in Ft. Wayne and Florida.
This Regional is full of players nipping at the Worlds line but who are currently on the wrong side of it due to how strong the competition in the northeast has been. Nightblade7000 would be only eight points out of Worlds if the season ended today after winning APEX and Winter Regionals what seems like forever ago. I think that his Regional win was perhaps the least surprising result of anything in the history of mankind other than maybe R Inanimate’s win on the same day, but it’ll be interesting to see if he can keep the momentum going and vault into the top 12. Cybertron is desperate for Championship Points after surprising us by failing to cut last Winter, but is still in pretty good shape with 142 points as long as he has a decent showing here. JiveTime is just below him after having basically the same season but in reverse, with the 2nd place finish in the Winter instead of the Fall. EnFuego consistently lets me down when I predict him, but maybe he’ll win some Pokemon battles or something. Calm Lava and kingofkongs have picked up their points largely in other regions, so as with DrFidget it’ll be an interesting measuring stick for the northeast to see how they do.
While they’ll need go 7-1 to make the top cut without a bye thanks to the 8000 players who have one, OmegaDonut, Cypher, and Unreality stand out as strong players without byes this time. I would be surprised if any of them actually cut: they’re all good enough to do so if they started at the same point as everyone else, but this field is tough enough when you aren’t a step behind everyone from the word go.
The Smart Money is on…: Human. Human is a strong player who puts more time into Pokemon than probably anyone else. I’ll predict that pays off for him.
Attending this event? Join your fellow competitors in discussion on our forum.
Georgia Regional
Difficulty Rating: 
/ 5
(Four Downloadable For a Limited Time Only (TM) Ludicolos holding Sitrus Berries out of Five)
(Sitrus Berries not pictured)
Last Year’s Winner: Crow
The Story: Traditionally one of the weaker Regionals, Athens is inexplicably pretty competitive looking and may actually wind up being the 4th strongest Regional of the year after the three events in the northeast.
A big part of this improvement comes from about half of the Team Magma players trekking through what I can only assume is several states of desolate wasteland. They add three byes to the field from 2nd place benjitheGREAT, Shiloh, and Smith. Benji is an obvious contender given the Texas Regional win and St. Louis top 4 finish, but Smith and Shiloh will be dangerous too, with the former looking to improve upon a disappointing run in Missouri after playing Benji in the finals of Texas and Shiloh also coming off a rare top cut miss. Perhaps the most notable probable attendee without a bye is Dim, who will probably be too busy being swarmed by fangirls to play due to the Dim Ludicolo giveaway.
Speaking of people who don’t have the advantage of the bye coming in, this time for sure Crow is going to show up. So far I’ve predicted him to win two Regionals this year and he’s successfully walked through the door zero times, but I sometimes have to walk farther to find the restroom than Crow does to find this Regional so he can’t possibly screw it up this time, can he? His top 16 2012 US Nationals opponent, cakesofspan, will similarly be a big threat to win this tournament in spite of having to play the first round. Speaking of former Crow opponents, his buddy Captain Falcon will be around as well, who defeated both Crow and that Synre guy on his way to winning the 2011 Atlanta Regional.
Most of the remaining big name players are perhaps better known for their administrative antics than their Pokemon. Skarmbliss PO host ryuzaki will be taking the SERVER DOWN!!! to head over to Athens. She’s sort of had a quiet season in spite of staying nicely in striking distance of the Worlds cut at 20th overall right now, and I’d expect her to top cut fairly easily after being a little short in a loaded field last Regional. plaid (@NBplaid) and Scott (@NBNostrom) will troll each other on Twitter between matches or something, and we’ll even get a cameo from Smogon admin mingot!
The Smart Money is on…: ryuzaki. She has managed to show up to Regionals two (2) times, which gives her a leg up over another player I might have considered predicting, but I have faith in my team USA teammate for this one. She’s always been a hugely underrated player by the community at large for some reason, but she’s definitely one of the 12 best players in North America and I think this Regional will wind up being what makes the final standings reflect that. I’d expect Crow, Span, and two of the Magmas to wind up in the top cut with her.
Attending this event? Join your fellow competitors in discussion on our forum.
Wisconsin Regional
Difficulty Rating: 
/ 5
(one Garchomp with Brightpowder and one Confuse Ray Jellicent out of five)
Last Year’s Winner: Zach
The Story: Madison: The Midwest once again stacks up to be one of the middle of the road Regionals, with a roster that isn’t as intimidating as the Northeast while still being noticeably stronger than those of the less attended events. Zach is the obvious headliner of the event, with two Regional wins and a Wi-Fi tournament win already this year, making his Worlds invite secure if he gets any Championship Points at all here. The only other byes I’m aware of that are likely to show up are those of St. Louis winner FonicFrog, GreySong, and apparently Stephen. I think all four of the players with byes have pretty good shots at winning it all, with Zach and FonicFrog already having proven they can do it this year and Stephen having made it to the finals once already.
Two players who, like Zach, made it to the round of eight in last year’s US Nationals will be attending, MangoSol and theamericandream38. MangoSol is one of those players that always gets brought up in discussions about flukey years, so it’ll be telling to see how he does here in spite of how consistent he was last year in a season that ended with him finishing 11th in the world. tad38 won a Regional last year, and while he hasn’t gotten much done this year with a disappointing return to Ft. Wayne and not playing in the previous set of Regionals, he did get 3rd at APEX and should be a contender in this one. Some other lesser known types like Darkeness, Carl, and honchkro13 have a decent shot at slipping into the top cut in a field that is a little lacking on depth.
The Smart Money is on…: Stephen. At the risk of Crowing my own prediction since I’m relying on second hand info that this is the Regional Stephen is going to, I think he has the best shot. He has the advantage of the bye and the extra motivation of having not won a Regional already. There are a lot of players here with relatively even shots at winning, but I think Stephen’s reliable play is probably going to be what holds out this time.
Though it’d be pretty hilarious if Zach managed to get four in a row…
Attending this event? Join your fellow competitors in discussion on our forum.
Utah Regional
Difficulty Rating: 
/ 5
(The only team Cybertron knows how to use an event later out of five)
(Except unevolved because this is NOT the Northeast)
The Story: Having absorbed most of the Californians, Utah gets to avoid the shame of being the weakest this year, though it’s still a tournament where I think results could be a little volatile. The skill level of many of the players here is very high, but the lack of recent results from most of them indicate that motivation probably isn’t and sometimes that’s a lot more important.
The only player currently in Worlds position who will be attending is Duy, as Kamz apparently can’t make it, which is annoying because like all players who can’t actually make Regionals, I wanted to predict him to win. Duy has had a pretty fantastic year in spite of taking the Allen Iverson stance on practice and is progressing toward avenging finishing a game away from Worlds in 2012 and twice in 2011. Duy has been using some pretty unorthodox Pokemon, such as Empoleon and Machamp, so the Pokemon he picks should surprise us almost as much as his own items surprise him. Just below them is Evan Falco at 15th, who apparently is going to this Regional and will definitely be the next most likely player to top cut if he shows up.
Alaka has had a quiet year so far in spite of it seeming like an inevitability that he’d at least make it to the finals of a Regional every year until now, but he has one last shot at it this year and this is a field that he could do well in after rebounding enough to top cut in the Winter. Huy has fallen a little short at Regionals so far after an excellent Worlds performance, but as we learned in Hawaii he can put up an elite performance at any time. Fishy has had a hard time matching the success she had last year, but with as many darts as she throws at the crazy team idea dartboard you have to figure she’ll get another bulls-eye eventually. Fish and makiri are two once-feared players that I’m never quite sure what to expect from any more. While they haven’t shown much to us lately, they’re both very intelligent guys and experienced players, so I wouldn’t be too surprised if one of the managed to put a great performance up here… or if they both didn’t really care and didn’t wind up with a positive record between them.
Tyler is rocking a bye thanks to his top 4 performance in the Fall and would be the most overlooked player with a good shot of winning if it wasn’t for Kaphotics, who can do more with Pokemon than just research.
The Smart Money is on…: Duy. This one is a super toss-up because it is a mystery to everyone who will actually be trying, but Duy has been the best of these players all year and will probably keep it up.
Attending this event? Join your fellow competitors in discussion on our forum.
British Columbia Regional
Difficulty Rating: 
/ 5.
(One condescending Braviary out of Five)
Last Year’s Winner: R Inanimate
The Story: Like all things related to Canada in Pokemon, the British Columbian Regional looks puny and weak, but it is not without it’s handful of solid players. R Inanimate has been one of the few bright spots for Canada and is coming off both a Regional win in the Winter cycle and as the defending champion of this Regional, but he’ll have to contend with Chinese Dood, who beat him on his way to winning Canadian Nationals last year. The biggest name beside them will probably be that of hakemo, who is 3rd in Championship Points right now. feathers will be there and she top cut a Regional, so that’s promising, I guess.
The Smart Money is on…: R Inanimate. I hate to predict a back-to-back Regional winner since that is pretty unprecedented outside of Zach doing it earlier this season, but this one is a toss up between so few people that I think it is wisest to pick the player I know will bring his A game. I will, of course, be rooting for feathers.
Attending this event? Join your fellow competitors in discussion on our forum.
About the Author
Scott started playing VGC in 2011. He finished 17th at US Nationals, then lost in the final round of 2011 Worlds LCQ. He finished 10th in the 2012 World Championships and qualified for Worlds again in 2013 after going into US Nationals second in CP. Instead of playing, he commentated at US Nationals and the World Championships in 2013 and 2014. Follow him on Twitter @NBNostrom!
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