6-1!!!!!!!

Week 8 was a disaster (2-5!!!) and last week wasn’t great at 4-3, but I close out the regular season strong. They’ll be an upcoming post that looks at my week to week record and considers the Picks overall. Anyhow, Week 10!

Bloodsport (2-1) over Claw Viper (1-2)

Ummm, despite a win Bloodsport seems to be slowly heading in the wrong direction here. They were dominating the fight, they were landing shot after shot, and then a limbless Claw Viper drove into them very hard, which caused Bloodsport to go flying and almost left the arena! Their good work was almost all for naught, they were so close to losing the fight right then and there! Look at this!

They avoided disaster and won, but man, they’ve had hard time getting knockouts this year. I think their two wins both went to decisions? The weapon needs to be more deadly, that’s my take. They’ll be in the playoffs but I’m not expecting much of them.

Madcatter (2-1) over someone, it doesn’t matter

I said it during the picks – there’s almost no one you can trust to take care of business against a lesser robot more than you can trust Madcatter. If they are playing someone who is objectively inferior to them, they ALWAYS WIN. ALWAYS. They did it again, decisively, and here’s your HOTW for Week 10

HIT of the Week

Look at this

Absolutely Ridiculous.

Huge (2-1) over Switchback (1-2)

The Big Boy gets to 2-1!

We certainly haven’t seen enough to say that Huge has fixed or even mitigated his multiple flaws, and man I was worried when he was barley mobile during the second half of the match, it seemed like the ref was paid off to avoid counting him out. On the rewatch I understood what happened – Huge’s motors were moving fine, it was the treads of one wheel that had partly come off, and he wasn’t getting traction. Big difference between that and having only one wheel work.

Anyhow, Huge had an easy schedule (three rookies!) and this seemed like a good matchup for him, but man oh man, look at this damage. I feel like we’re looking at Prime Tombstone work here, this is crazy.

Huge’s weapon is serious! It’s legit!

So I don’t know, I continue to have a feeling there’s big potential here with this highly unorthodox robot. As for its playoff opponent…deep breath…I think it’s a toss up, but man oh man it’s going to be a stressful one. We’ll get to that. For now – congrats to Huge for turning the season around, for turning the robot’s downward trend around, and for making the playoffs AGAIN. Every year baby.

Glitch (3-0) over Kraken (0-3)

So Glitch improves to 3-0, knocks out Kraken (who rarely if ever loses in a KO) in about a minute, has looked great this season especially the last two fights…and yet I’m thoroughly unconvinced. They don’t move well at all! The weapon is slamming, sure, but I don’t much like the rest of their makeup. They haven’t fought anyone with a serious weapon that could hurt them, Kraken and Hydra were the last two fights and neither has a spinner. Last week I doubted that Blip was any good, this week Glitch is my high-seeded team I’m expressing a lack of confidence in. It’s my new FRAUD of the Week feature I’m prototyping!

Poor Kraken, what a brutal season for them. Still love them, but it’s possible they’re not any good. Darnit!

Lucky (2-1) over Mammoth (1-2)

I felt bad for Mammoth, for missing the playoffs as well as losing in front of his mom, but Lucky has been the better robot this year. Mammoth caught two tough, tough matchups in a row (the first was Tombstone and lead to an incredible HIT of the Week and match resolution). Once I saw the matchup this outcome seemed ordained. I will take a slight bow to acknowledge that I kind of predicted the events here – Mammoth got launched early and its weird frame got stuck in the arena, wedged in the screws as I guessed. Obviously losing the wheel was the key moment here, it was pretty much over after that.

I like Lucky a lot, they really could/should be 3-0, they’re tough and quick and very, very well-driven, the RC thing is real. Maybe I’m crazy, but looking at the bracket, yeah, I’m already thinking about taking them in a pretty huge upset. We’ll see, stay tuned!

Witch Doctor (2-1) over Rusty (0-2)

Honestly, I don’t know if we’ve ever seen a more non-chalant performance in our Battlebots-watching lives than Witch Doctor delivered here. It was like a warmup in the first round of warmups for a long-distance runner, something like that. They drove around for a bit, then they faced their opponent and clocked him good, and then clocked him again, and took a bow. It was already over. I don’t have anything else to say.

The Main Event

Yikes. All of you should be ashamed of yourself. What an embarrassment. Props to Icewave I guess for realizing what wasn’t working (his weapon) and adjusting quickly on the fly to face Fusion straight up and use the wedge to drive him successfully around for a bit. Except then Icewave still ended up dead on the screws for a second!

For a couple of very confusing seconds it looked like Icewave’s last gasp and push was going to lead to a Double KO, before the screws fortuitously reversed direction and let IW loose. Even in victory he was little better than the defeated here. Whatever, I was so excited to see the bracket I didn’t care that Fusion essentially pooped itself to wrap up the match, Week 10, and the 2021* Battlebots regular season.

(Dear Mr Fusion: please retire Fusion, go home and dig out SOW from the barn or wherever Jake left it after last season. Resurrect it and bring it back to Vegas in full fighting shape. If you do that, you will immediately become my personal hero, and I will rename this site to be called The Saddleblog for the Battlebots 2022 season. You’ll also be a hero to other Battlebots fans the world over. Please do it. Bring back the original GOAT, Son of Whyachi.)

Tournament breakdown coming soon!