Most of you know that I follow the professional tennis circuit pretty religiously, and one thing I've noticed is the stark bias against one of the best players ever. Roger Federer, someone who has not only won 13 out of the last 23 grand slam tournaments and has reached the finals in 18 tournaments, is rarely often selected as a tournament favorite of late. In contrast, you see someone like Andy Murray, who has no grand slams to his name and only has reached one grand slam final (US Open 08, where he was dismantled by Federer), often overhyped as the "future of men's tennis." Case in point is Australian Open 09. After Murray had posted a few wins over a few top players in smaller tournaments, he was all of a sudden the favorite to win one of the biggest tournaments in the world. How did he do? Out in the fourth round. And the defending champion, Novak Djokovic? Out in the quarterfinals. However, to everyone's apparent surprise, World Nos. 1 and 2, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer, respectively, battled it out in the finals. The same scenario is occurring right now at Roland Garros (aka French Open), where Andy Murray is once again being hyped as the winner with Nadal and Djokovic gone. People, I believe, are looking at too many short-term statistics, when it is long-term ones (like the fact that Federer has been in three consective Roland Garros finals) that should matter. So what is my prediction? Murray loses to Nikolay Davydenko in the semis, and Federer defeats Davydenko in the finals in four sets.

Okay, I'm pretty frustrated right now. As I'm sure you can tell from the below post, my first experience on the Smogon forums was not a pleasant one. I read the rules, and one tiny section embedded in the enormous (and to me, mostly frivolous) list of rules, there is one that says "No questioning the tiering of any pokemon." Now, that's kinda funny to me. Wouldn't most people think that since the vast majority of people follow Smogon's tiers, they would at least allow for more input on what goes on? Or is it that they don't think we have the right to question their supreme authority? Sounds alot like our government right now. Way to go, Smogon. You just killed any and all chance of an intelligent post on your forums. Of course, they do allow the posting of so-called "warstories," where people just post these giant battle logs and give maybe a sentence or two of their opinion on the battle. How boring! It's as if they wanted to keep anybody from really thinking for themselves. Anyway, I'm going to stop now because I'm starting to get ahead of myself. I just want to let you know that because of this little foray, I will no longer be using the Smogon forums, and I encourage you all to do the same.

-Oh, and just an update. The reason for my infraction was because I haven't posted enough. As if that correlates at all to my knowledge

So, I posted the below rant on Smogon in hopes of getting some discussion going, and for some reason it got me an infraction. Now, not only was it my firstpost, but it also seemed to comply with the rules. So my question is, does anybody use Smogon for actual discussion, or is it just that Smogon thinks the average user has knowledge equivalent to that of stale milk?

I wrote this today for a Smogon topic stating why I believed Scizor should be moved into the uber tier.

Generation IV has been very kind to Scizor. With the addition of new priority moves like Bullet Punch, many slower Steel and/or Fighting types now find themselves with a potent new weapon. Scizor is no different. After fighting in 70+ wifi battles, I feel that there is just cause to consider Scizor to be placed in the uber tier. Let's look at a few main reasons:

1) Access to a powerful priority move. Bullet Punch is a staple on Scizor. With the ability to use Technician, Bullet Punch becomes a 60 BP+STAB attack. Considering that Scizor's attack stat can reach nearly 400 (close to that of Metagross), Bullet Punch is sure to cause severe damage to nearly everything that switches in against it.

2) Extremely easy setup. Because Scizor often forces switches, it is almost guaranteed a turn to setup Swords Dance. As I'm sure you know, SD, in effect, doubles Scizor's already phenomenal attack stat. Combined with Bullet Punch, Scizor is guaranteed a powerful attack.

3) It is very difficult to counter. The closest counter Scizor has against it is Infernape, but considering the lack of a fire-type priority move, Infernape will be severely damaged before being able to attack. Worst-case scenario, Scizor could just switch out to an Infernape counter due to its extremely easy SD setup. But the main point is that Scizor is only weak to one type (fire), but resists ten! Furthermore, Scizor has a fairly significant defense stat, enabling it to easily shrug the majority of hits or...

4) It has virtually unrestricted access to Roost. Roost was mainly intended as a healing option for flying-types, but the designers purposefully put in a hitch: the removal of flying types. Because of this, flying-types became vulnerable to EQ and fighting type moves on their Roost turn. This hitch does not, however, apply to Scizor because of it's lack of a flying-type. This gives it free range to recover it's HP without having to consider the possibility of a counterattack during the Roost turn.

The overall result of this is an extraordinarily powerful sweeper in OU. SD Bullet Punch combined with LO can decimate entire teams, but the presence of Roost prevents a typical LO stall strategy. Because I believe Scizor is such a monstrous threat in OU, compounded by the four reasons above, it would be in the best interests of the metagame to move it into ubers.

It's been awhile since I've been on here. For those who are interested, I've got a Marriland account now, so you can find me there under the same screen name. Other than that, school's about over which is VERY exciting! I'm also losing my voice right now, though, just in time for the National Catholic Forensic League tournament this coming weekend... fun. And before I forget, I would highly recommend everyone go see Angels & Demons. The book does go into more detail (which is always an issue with these types of movies), but the movie still retains a very cohesive plot and is sure to be worth your money!