03/04/2005
Seattle and Tennessee join the USCL in 2006!
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by IM Greg Shahade
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The USCL announced it's two new teams today, as Seattle and
Tennessee were welcomed into the league. Seattle is being managed by
Clint Ballard, famous for the tournaments he runs under a new scoring
system to encourage fighting chess and decisive games (more info on
that can be found here) and
also for producing a public access television show dealing with the
themes of scantily clad female models/chess/science fiction and a bit
of sumo wrestling (Click here
for photographs of the cast of this show).
It's clear that the organizer of this team is interested in
unique and exciting ways of bringing excitement to American Chess, and
let's hope he leaves his imprint on the new Seattle team. Seattle
should be an exciting new team as they have received committments from
powerful players such as GM Gregory Serper, IM Giorgi Orlov and IM Eric
Tangborn, and with such firepower and experience they should surely
compete for the championship in their first season. Seattle has also
chosen their nickname and will be known as the "Seattle Sluggers".
Our other expansion team belongs to the state of Tennessee, which
is only fitting as Tennessee is the new home of the United States Chess
Federation. FM Todd Andrews will be managing the team and playing on
it, along with experienced IM Ron Burnett and FM Peter Bereolos.
Tennessee becomes the first Midwestern team in the USCL and hopes to
compete with some of the top chessplaying cities in the country. Team
manager Todd Andrews is very enthusiastic about the buzz and excitement
that this team will bring to the Nashville, Tennessee chess scene.
The first move of the 2006 USCL is still about 6 months away,
but teams are going to start getting their lineups ready and preparing
themselves for a new and exciting battle to determine which American
city of chessplayers reigns supreme. Stay tuned for tons of new
features, the unveiling of both teams new logos, the 2006 Schedules,
the team rosters and so on, as updates will be made on a constant basis!