June Player’s Championship Qualifier Recap

Player’s Championship Qualifier Recap

This past weekend we held another Qualifier for our end of year Player’s Championship! 17 people sleeved up their choice of Modern deck. The local metagame is as unpredictable as ever! Our last Qualifier was a room full of Eldrazi and combo decks, and this room looked quite a bit different (outside of a certain blue Tron deck almost taking back-to-back tournaments!). Our top 8 is still quite diverse however there are far more copies of Psychic Frog hanging around than our last couple of Modern Top 8s with 4 decks playing 4 copies. Could this have been a calculated shift in the local metagame to adjust to the speed of the combo decks that had been dominating the previous field? I asked our most recent and now 2-time Player’s Championship Qualifier winner Tijler de Jong what he thinks of this metagame change, how he tackled the event, and approaching Modern in general. First, let’s look at Tijler’s winning list, as well as the rest of our Top 8.

Tijler de Jong – Esper Goryo’s Vengeance (1^st)

Mike Giles – Mono-Blue Tron (2^nd)

Connor Cheney – Izzet Prowess (3^rd-4^th)

Chris Dubé – Grixis Control (3^rd-4^th)

Matt Bailey – Esper Goryo’s Vengeance (5^th-8^th)

Michael Cameron – Zoo (5^th-8^th)

Christopher Brackley – Dimir Frog (5^th-8^th)

Cody Leblanc – Orzhov Blink (5^th-8^th)

With a Top 8 full of Psychic Frogs pushing out the aggressive strategies, it was Tijler de Jong’s version of Esper Goryo’s Vengeance that reigned supreme. Tijler was kind enough to lend me his time for a classic Player’s Championship Qualifier winner’s interview and answer some questions!

TB: Tijler, I would love to know what made you pick Esper Goryo’s Vengeance for this event!

TDJ: So, when I started playing modern there was this guy with a Goryo’s deck. This was back when Griselbrand and Emrakul were the best targets, and ever since then I wanted a Goryo’s deck. So, I put one together almost a year ago and it’s never seen the light of a competition, only a few practice games with friends. This weekend I thought that I would try something new and would also play into how much Steel Cutter I thought would be in the room by throwing around 7/7’s with lifelink.

TB: A stone wall of life gain is a solid strategy vs the creature deck with burn! Tijler, you’re definitely known in the community for playing either a solid combo/big mana style deck, or some absolute jank (looking at you, Battle of Wits)! Do you think playing the off-the-wall decks holds you back, or offers you some other perspectives into the format like wearing training weights?

TDJ: Oh, I could definitely be the Rock Lee of decks, I do think it’s holding me back a little bit whenever I play some absolute jank like Battle of Wits or Goats, or some other tier 3 or 4 deck. But in general I think it helps me because if I can come out of left field and play something that’s inherently underpowered in whatever meta we’re in, I think it does help in learning how to deal in tough situations, improves deck building a little bit because you have to look outside the box and if I can do well with bad cards, I feel like I can do so much better with good cards.

TB: I like the approach of aiming to have fun and doing well as a result of that. It’s not always about playing the best deck, reading every point of data, or going by just the numbers. Sometimes you have to play to your strengths, what you’re comfortable with and what you enjoy! So, with the next big Modern event being the FacetoFace Tour Stop in Truro, do you have any predictions for what the metagame may look like?

TDJ: Honestly, I have no idea what the meta is going to look like. If Final Fantasy picks up a little bit, it could look entirely different. But I did promise a good friend of mine that I would actually play a good deck for the event, so I’ll be on something competitive depending on how the meta turns out.

TB: Last couple for you, were there any memorable moments in the tournament for you? Or any cards in your list that crazy overperformed for you?

TDJ: As far as memorable moments from the event go, I had a great moment with Evan Mercer right at the beginning of the tournament where my opponent had to leave and Evan got the bye, so we were sitting and hanging out and because we both essentially got the bye. We got paired against each other round 2 and when the pairings went up we both looked at each other and just started laughing because after sitting with each other hanging out and not playing magic for the first hour, it was just funny to know that he’s going to kick my butt this round. And as far as cards that overperformed, as much as I hate to say it, because it’s a very good card and everybody knows it’s a good card, Psychic Frog. It did everything that my deck wanted to do, it drew me into pieces, it let me discard what I wanted to for Goryo’s, it just did everything.

Congratulations to Tijler on his 2^nd Qualifier win this year! And congratulations to the rest of our Top 8 on their performance! Do you want to qualify for the most prestigious Tournament in the Maritimes? Join us for our next Player’s Championship Qualifier on July 5^th which will also be our Final Fantasy Standard Store Championships! Store Champs promos, an invitation and Leaderboard Points for our At Large Invites all up for grabs. We’ll see you there!

Written By: Travis Benedict Pro Tour Competitor, Cat Lover