Nice photos, Lainey.

I especially like the one of the Canadian and US flags.

 

Reminds me of this place in Cromwell, CT which we stopped at in 2004.

 

Gillette Castle!!We have been there !

 

Part of my trip out to Long Island last week was to coordinate a stop at a friend's game/card shop. A 3x world darts champion was going to be there Thursday afternoon. The PDC (professional darts) players were coming over for the US Dart Masters event at MSG this past weekend.

Friday night was the first round against 8 top North Americans.
Saturday afternoon was just the 8 NA players in a separate NA Championship.
Saturday night was the remaining QF/SF and Finals.

Since I was on the island Thursday, stayed at a cousin's house, played golf Friday then went into the city. I had tickets courtesy of MSG and the Garden of Dreams given to Make-A-Wish to use. My friend texted and said - empty table seats with us, come on down. So I did.

You can see in the middle pic.... About 4000 people in the Hulu theater at MSG for the Friday event. On the bottom is my sign. Many players after their matches sign things or toss flights to the crowd (think band throwing drumsticks and guitar picks) Gerwyn Price saw the sign and tossed his flight/shaft right to me. My friends were in the first seats and got the sign autographed by MVG as well as Luke Humphries. LH and GP are also world champions and LH is the current world #1 player. I suspect that I use them as a prize for Darts for Dreams next year.

MVG signed the shirt I am holding in the picture, along with about 6 others on Thursday. Whenever I got to a meet/greet I get it signed. It's mine to keep. He asked what I do for MAW and I told him. He said he's a MAW ambassador for MAW Holland. I passed along a few business cards to the event handler that was there. Fingers crossed something happens.

You can get a sense of the atmosphere here: This is the Friday highlight reel. Over the players right shoulder, above the table is my friend Tom in the green shirt- I'm across from him and do get on cam a few times. The guys in the ref uniforms are just to my right. I'm clearly visible at the 35:00 mark.


Me with Michael Van Gerwen - 3x World Champ

Friends from our local league.

Everyone gets a sign. The other side says 180 (A Max score) that they put up and scream when it happens and you make your own billboard on the other.

 

I would never have guess in a million years that darts could draw crowds like that.

 

It does. I think they select and size the arena's well. Within a 2 hour train ride of NYC you have all of the NYC area, Philly and parts of New England - 3 very large US dart communities. So they get a very large local contingent. If they went to a 10,000 seat place, it would be partially empty. Even Ally Pally where they have the World Championships, the dart hall holds only 3200. At the Hulu theater, they don't use the 300 sections in the back.

The atmosphere is truly electric at times. The chants in the crowds are endless and unlike many sports, they are real guys. They were mailmen, bricklayers, clerks, etc.. before becoming dart pros.

There's costumes, parties, etc... in the crowd. People just having fun for the night.

 

I think we did too on the way home from a NorEaster one year.

 

Darts and Disc Golf. Two 21st century sports that are still played without computers. During my years in pool league I saw the growth of darts here in south Mississippi, as league pool venues (mostly bars) added league darts.

 

Darts is mostly computerized now if you can believe that.

The soft tip side (plastic darts, large stand alone dartboards/screens/etc...) is all Internet connected - so players on each brand of machine can play against others all over the world. They are "competing" companies - think XBox vs PS5. It would be great if they'd consolidate platforms or find an aggregator to allow play across the major manufacturers. Currently tournaments are only open to players who play on their machines and often ban others from playing on competitor machines.

On the steel tip side (traditional English style) has moved to a set of electronic scoring tools. DartConnect is most prominent in the US and has partnered with many international organizations. Leagues/Events manage schedules/rosters/players and scoring for leagues and events. It also connects with cameras to allow remote play globally. During Covid, it exploded. You can actually go to tv.dartconnect.com and click any leagues that use it to see standings/stats, etc... You also see any events going on that have active matches and can watch the scoreboard. The World Police and Fire Tournament is currently ongoing.

Screenshot is what a live match looks like: Names/Current score on top. Each turn going down. Match info on bottom. To the right is their information/stats for this event.

After you play a match, you get a report like this (https://recap.dartconnect.com/matche...468b8baff7abc1) that recaps the match and players can review to analyze their games.

It's progressed quite about since DC started in 2015 as just a replacement for chalk/marker. Local bars often have a chalk/white board for scoring, but its not uncommon for a player to use their phone/tablet at this point.

 

I miss tossing darts. Back when we were still dating my wife got me a nodor board for Christmas one year.
It's been so long I can't hardly remember any of the rules/games anymore.