It went kind of exactly like this
As the drudgery of Real Life keeps me from ruminating on things like the music in the new Flip video, I throw this one out to the Berrics-minded masses who have stuck with this second iteration of the Game of Skate through myriad substitutions, explanation-free delays and wholesale bending/breaking of the tattered rules sheet: what, then, do we make of Cory Kennedy’s swing-for-the-fences approach to this weekend’s matchup against Peter Ramondetta? To this viewer, the game was probably some type of watershed moment for the BATB series, in spirit if not in edge-of-your-seatness or whatever. Because, you had one contestant with everything to gain, wasting no time in his bid to roll his way into the semis and messageboard lionization; then you had another dude who’s more or less a veteran pro at this point, from the purportedly less dog-eat-dog zone of Northern California, who nevertheless was able to whip out a nollie frontside heelflip with an extra body varial upon command.
Andy of the Program zine described the nollie flip backside 360 opener thusly: “It’s like playing horse in basketball and taking your first shot from full court.”
Which is sort of true. But then again, if I’m watching a couple NBA types play a game of horse at my local playground, do I need to wait for them to each sink shots from the free-throw line and various three-pointers and lay-ups before they get to the zany shit? In his own way, Cory Kennedy’s showing consideration for my time, an increasingly precious commodity even after forgetting about Twitter yet again. In another way, he’s being more up-front about his skill level (and his view of the Berrics Battle) than he would by going the now-standard route of opening with a kickflip, 360 flip, fakie bigspin flip, nollie flip, etc etc and then whipping out the Greg Lutzka finishing move over and over on the final letter.
Some have said that CK came off jock-ish and concerned only with winning, while others say that if somebody whipped out that first trick on them in a friendly skatepark game they’d instantly be over it. Both true, sort of, but also kind of beside the point, because with (at least) $10,000 on the line and a potential career-goose at stake, I think it would be more disingenuous of Cory Kennedy to try and pretend like he didn’t care.
I’ll wind down this ramble by stating I don’t know Cory Kennedy/his actual persona whatsoever, and I make it a policy of not watching any of the ad nauseum coverage of this event as far as the pre- and post-game interviews go, mostly because I have yachts to wax and so on.
Tags: BATB2, churlishness, Cory Kennedy, flatground only, Girl, Michael Rapaport again, nollie flip backside 360, Peter Ramdonetta, Real, what happens when people stop being nice and start doing nollie frontside heelflips with extra body varials
boil the ocean 
October 7, 2009 at 12:17 am |
Pete’s nollie heel thingy was better.
October 7, 2009 at 12:19 am |
Very even handed.
I agree with the “some type of watershed moment for the BATB series, in spirit” comment.
Someone should have told Ramondetta he was showing up for the Dew Tour, maybe he wouldn’t have gone out the night before with his good friends and practiced RoShamBo strategy & breaking the Brezinsky rule instead.
October 7, 2009 at 2:08 am |
Well if you would have watched the post game interview in the Cory vs Pete battle, you would have seen that Cory openly says hes tired of the warm up tricks and wanted to get the game going. I agree with that mindset if you can afford to take a chance and whip off a nollie flip BS 360. If he had missed it though, he might have looked dickish, but since he landed it and followed it up with more “harder-than-usual-tricks”, he showed that he meant it and was going FTW. If you got it like that use it
October 7, 2009 at 8:17 am |
i too do not watch the pre- and post-game interviews, but it sounds as if mr. kennedy wouldn’t have done himself any favors casting himself in a better light with saying he’s “tired of warm-up tricks.” sure, if you’ve got it like that, then you’ve got it like that, but IMHOHOHO (xmas is just around the corner!), there’s an element of understanding in such matters that kinda-sorta says “hey, we’re all friends here, so let’s have a friendly game and see what kinda shit we have to pull out at the end to win.” training to win a game of skate is even lamer than practicing your vert contest run over and over and over, simply because you’ve taken a piece of skateboarding that wasn’t really meant to be THAT competitive and turned it into the fucking Olympics. doing those tricks out of the gate takes that friendly piece of it away and CK basically came out wagging his dick in ramondetta’s face. which, you know, isn’t necessarily cool.
as an aside…i wonder what would happen if they let rodney mullen in.
October 7, 2009 at 9:30 am |
I think some of the pre/post game interviews have been great. You don’t know what you are missing
October 7, 2009 at 10:14 am |
that’s what Berra & co. get for throwing money in the mix. they have forever corrupted the spirit of the first BATB, as pilot light once pointed out months ago. plus the so called warm up tricks can get you too (PJ got a letter on a front shovs) so that “tired of warm up tricks” rant is crap. all in all, cory acted like a little kid and should’ve showed Ramondetta more respect. shit, I hope chris cole 360 ollie double flips on his face as a first trick. respect the architects!
October 7, 2009 at 10:36 am |
is waxing your yacht a euphemism for using internet porn?
October 7, 2009 at 12:10 pm |
Now, to preface, i’m old. However, years and years back, i would see kids playing skate and it would seem foreign. It seems that back in the day, we would all session a ledge, curb, bump, or gap. These new kids would rather tre flip 100 times in a row than just roll down the street or bomb a hill. Their basic skill level has really surpassed us old dogs and SKATE is their “competitive” outlet. Ramondetta has NOTHING to be ashamed of, he is soooooo much gnarlier than Cory anyways, he just got beat in the “new school” arena. Trust me, I respect these kids coming up, but yes, they do have a different approach and I think Cory wanted to take out a big pro, which he did. Now let’s see his ass Smith grind a rail to hill bomb, then he’ll be able to talk.
October 7, 2009 at 12:21 pm |
Personally, I thought it was lame that Apples was substituted by Chris Roberts and a bunch of little kids. Chris Roberts is cool, but Mark Appleyard would have made it a completely different game.
That being said, if Appleyard would’ve showed and won, the CK game could have been totally different. Kennedy came out swinging for sure and was fucking good regardless of whether or not he did any “warmup” tricks. I thought Ramondetta was going to come back when he hit the nollie front heel body varial, but I guess that wasn’t in the cards. At least there was something to watch this weekend….
October 7, 2009 at 12:47 pm |
The kid looks like he’s got a serious deficiency in the brain department, with his vacant stare and perpetually open mouth. Can it be a dick move when the thought process that initiated the onslaught was probably as complex and calculated as that of The Hulk (“HULK SMASH”) or Frankenstein (“FIRE BAD”)?
The basketball “horse” analogies aren’t really apt. No one at a high level in the basketball world would ever take a game of “horse” seriously, or view it as a true measure of ability (to do so would be considered laughable and pathetic). I would suggest a better analogy is the following – it’s like trying to play video games against a 14 year old who has them as the focus of his life.
If you’ve ever experienced this (in person or via Xbox Live), then you know the mentality of domination is so ingrained by that point that you’re essentially facing an automaton juggernaut. He knows what you’re going to do before you’ve even decided, and is immediately bored with you. His only motivation to continue participation is the promise of a brief sensation confirming his superiority received upon victory. He may take some joy in dispatching you via unorthodox tactics. Yet, in the end, the whole exercise is little more than a vivid portrait of absurdly overdeveloped ability in a nearly pointless field, and an accompanying sketch of what was surely a sad and all-consuming development process.
October 7, 2009 at 4:36 pm |
Did you go to college?
October 7, 2009 at 8:29 pm |
Obviously he did not attend college or he would know that Frankenstein is a sensitive, extremely intelligent being, and not some lumbering mono-syllabic oaf with pyrophobia.
(Kidding about the not going to college thing.)
October 9, 2009 at 4:50 pm |
“Yet, in the end, the whole exercise is little more than a vivid portrait of absurdly overdeveloped ability in a nearly pointless field, and an accompanying sketch of what was surely a sad and all-consuming development process.”
That sentence out of context could be concerning intelligently and exhaustively analyzing, and expounding upon, a blog post about a game of SKATE. Perhaps you were being self-refrencial. I don’t know.
It’s just funny and ironic. No disrespect.
October 7, 2009 at 1:39 pm |
The post above me was hilarious and well written. First little paragraph gave me a lol.
I think too many e-peoples catch feelings or just invest too much thought and energy into these games. I think that being able to watch Heath skate flatground is the best thing to come out of the whole BATB2. Dennis and Cole game was really rad as well.
October 7, 2009 at 2:41 pm |
I think the cheering of the onlookers when Ramondetta landed the nollie late front foot flip, and the FS nollie heel whatitdo said two things: 1. that was awesome that he landed them, and 2. they really wanted Peter to win.
Now maybe I’m reading too much into people shouting, “Yeah!” but they were really psyched when he did land them, as if to spur him on to victory.
The tricks Cory Kennedy did are awesome, no doubt, but at least with the Busenitz/Cole match, suspense was built up as the tricks got progressively harder. I’m of the opinion that warm-up tricks are necessary, because in my experience it is usually the most basic tricks that give people letters because of their own overconfidence/arrogance.
October 7, 2009 at 3:44 pm |
BATB is supposed to be fun to watch. A light hearted contest between some of our favourite skaters.
That game had its moments but it wasn’t that fun to watch.
I don’t think Kennedy will get any new fans. Notice the comments, we’re all talking about the 2 tricks that Ramondetta landed that we weren’t expecting him to land…
October 7, 2009 at 4:50 pm |
Cory Kennedy, Terry Kennedy, what’s the difference. Blah blah blah.
October 7, 2009 at 6:01 pm |
there should be a pro and an am BATB….in the pro BATB you would see chilled games and some stylish flips…in the am BATB you would see switch 540 underflips practied months before, over and over again, just to get a little bit of coverage.
CK is fighting big time to win this shit…matter of fact, he is prob. out playing skate against himself right now.
October 7, 2009 at 6:14 pm |
deficiency in the brain department
that’s the thing. look at CK and Mike Mo. I think Rickk (with the exception of alex olson) only picks up kids that are on an idiot savant level of skating. He even used that term to describe Mike Mo in the FF making-of doc. Mike Mo = b/s tail bigflip out both ways, CK = b/s nollie heel late shuv, sw bigger spin heel, etc. etc. Shit that is so crazy one would have to have some kind of brain condition to even think about doing them. Maybe the areas of the brain that control communication and socialization are smaller than the areas that control kinesthetic ability. Or some shit.
October 9, 2009 at 4:51 pm |
Word.
October 7, 2009 at 6:14 pm |
Good idea on splitting up the pros and ams, Ben. I’d probably just forget to watch the ams though.
October 7, 2009 at 8:26 pm |
I don’t think it was a dick move. In my hometown we’ve always had lots of games of SKATE tournament contests (spurred on by the Es Game Of Skate, and way before the BATB) and when you’re playing friendly games at the skatepark, it’s all about going through the basics and even doing tricks that you know your opponent can or at least has a chance to do. But if it’s in a contest type setting, just go straight for the throat. NO MERCY, NO HONOUR!!! I don’t think it’s a jockish point of view. I just think it’s two different situations.
It’s not like some little kid at a Berrics pizza party asked Cory Kennedy to play SKATE and he just melted the fucking kid’s face off. (Well maybe he did, but if so it didn’t make it on to The Berrics. (Well maybe it did make it onto The Berrics. I don’t watch anything besides BATB.))
October 7, 2009 at 10:52 pm |
beyond the obvious “who really gives a fuck” I would like to thank CK for wasting less of my time than the average BATTLE match. don’t get me wrong i enjoyed watching everyone’s fundamentals through the first round, but now its time to throw daggers. I was routing for Romendetta on this one, but I like the fact i didn’t have to watch someone miss their first nollie flip in 50 trys to get a letter. Its a competition. Physical competitions are inherently ‘jockish.’ I think in the end CK probably put a target on his own back.
p.s. everything Watson said except for everything ()’s
October 7, 2009 at 11:57 pm |
Arm chair “skateboarders” out in waves upset because some kid didn’t humor some made up code that you have to follow certain steps in playing someone that might not have the same tricks you do.
Give me a break. If internet “skateboarders” actually skateboarded a faction of the amount of time they spend obsessing about the skateboard industry they would be much more well adjusted.
I openly can’t stand people that can’t skate their way out of wet paper bag, but for some reason think they can present a valid opinion on things they can’t do themselves.
Someone does a kickflip backside nosebluntslide, I don’t care if the kid looked like he was having a seizure, I would NEVER talk shit about it.
Much like when someone posted Alex Olson’s newest Girl ad where he is fs 360ing a kiddie picnic table on flat.
Armchair skateboarder that could even dream of ollieing over one, says “hmmm, a backside 360 would have been impressive”
Amazing.
On another day, Pete could have beat Corey. With many of these it really comes down to who goes first.
October 8, 2009 at 4:26 pm |
Are you really amazed that someone criticized AO’s latest girl ad (lemme guess, Slap messageboard)? Lots of kids skate and a lot those kids are idiots. That’s not amazing; it’s as banal as it gets.
Having said that I think it’s fine CK pulled the extra tech shit out from the get. I also think PR nollieheelbodyvarial did look better than CK’s. I hope this means I can still call myself a skateboarder with out quotation marks!
October 8, 2009 at 5:39 am |
is anyone missing the fact that it looked like Ramondetta played 2 games of skate back-to-back? as all those kids were in the background watching the CK game, rapps was in the house for both games, he was wearing the same sweaty tee e.t.c.
October 8, 2009 at 12:21 pm |
ya, i know this boil guy lives in illinois, been told by many he barely can skate……….
October 8, 2009 at 5:06 pm |
NO WAY.
October 8, 2009 at 2:45 pm |
It’s completely fucked up that CK would have to lose to a veteran to win the affection of the BATB viewers.
The whole premise of the game is to do a trick, and have you oponent attempt to match that. Cory won fare and square.
And I’m sure Ramondetta has probably beat/or could have beat many pros when he was his age. Because hes just that fucking good.
October 8, 2009 at 9:32 pm |
maybe cory just fucking sucks at basic tricks
October 9, 2009 at 12:18 am |
This debate has allowed me to reach the same beautiful conclusion that keeps me skating: what’s so great about skateboarding is that you can’t make your skating great by trying/winning/beating your “competition”.
When I was younger than CK it used to drive me nuts that Gonz’s contest runs were so goofy. I would hear rumors of his darkslide railslides and 50-50 on handrails yet he would be Neil Blendering it on a curb. Took me a while to get it, it happened right when I stopped caring how much better I was than everyone else.
I’m sure CK will get it too, probably sooner than I did.
October 9, 2009 at 12:48 am |
After Cole / Busenitz–seriously–who the eff cares? That was the REAL final–because we all know that Haslam got knee-capped from behind in one of those ree-DICK-you-luss replacement skater deals….
October 9, 2009 at 9:11 pm |
Alls fair especially when cash is on the line. It was psychological. If he blew the out of the gate money trick it probably would have went different…
October 10, 2009 at 11:24 am |
I’m sure he has some respect for Ramondetta, but toss in 10G’s and it’s a different story. Maybe I’m a jock, but I’d have loosened the nut on his back wheels prior to the contest….for $10,000.
October 20, 2009 at 9:53 am |
Are you kidding me? the whole point of the game is to win. and that’s exactly what cory did.
get over yourself, get off your computer, and go skateboard.