Magic: The Gathering Drive to Work Podcast - #622: Brian David-Marshall

Episode Date: March 22, 2019

Brian retired from doing coverage, so I decided to dedicate a podcast to his long Magic career.

I'm pulling up my driveway. We all know what that means. It's time for another drive to work. Okay, so yesterday, my time, Brian David Marshall announced that he was retiring from coverage. So I thought I would do a whole podcast on Brian David Marshall. So some of you know exactly who I'm talking about. Some of you have no idea who I'm talking about. So part of my goal today is to explain who Brian is, what impact he's had on magic, and talk a little bit about, you know, just all the many different ways he's impacted magic. Now I should stress that Brian's not dying or anything. He's just stopped doing coverage.

I'm sure we will see more of Brian. He will continue to do magic-related things. I don't think we're going to get rid of him from being part of magic. But he is moving on from coverage. So that is what prompted today. So for those that do not know who Brian is, he right now is the magic historian. He's had a role for many years where it's his job to sort of mark history at the Hall of Fame induction. He always leads the Hall of Fame induction. Usually there's interviews with people talking about people being inducted.

And he does a lot with sort of helping retain the history of magic. As a fellow magic historian, I have great appreciation of that. The other thing is obviously he does a lot of coverage. If you ever watch the Pro Tour, now the Mythic Championship, you'll see him there. He's been a staple for a long, long time. I'll get into that as I walk through today. But anyway, that is who Brian is, people who don't know.

So the interesting question for me is, when was the first time I met Brian David Marshall? That's what I'm trying to figure out. Like today on Twitter, Gavin Verhey posted a very nice thread talking about all the influence he had had with Brian David Marshall when he was young. But the thing is, when Gavin was young, Brian was a known quantity. And, you know, he remembered meeting Brian David Marshall because it was Brian David Marshall, right? My problem is I kind of first met him before, you know, people sort of knew who he was, at least outside of New York. And so I think I figured out the first time we met. So there was an event in New York called The Gathering, which was a pre-release event

for Homelands. Now, I've done an entire podcast on The Gathering. It was worthy of a whole podcast. It's a crazy event. So if you want to know more about The Gathering, I did a podcast on it. But anyway, we were in the city of New York. And so one night, basically, I'm hanging out with the R&D folk. We're like, oh, we're going to go to

Neutral Ground. Okay, so for those who don't know, for many, many years in New York City, there was a game store called Neutral Ground. And it was like, it was in the city, and it was kind of like the place to be if you were a Magic player. And Neutral Ground was known as a lot of the early big tournaments. Some of the earliest sort of tournaments of any size were run by Neutral Ground. In fact, when Scaf and I were sort of plotting out the Pro Tour, I know that we looked a bunch at some of the stuff that Neutral Ground had done. And so we were well aware of Neutral Ground as a thing. And so we were in New York and we were like, oh, we got to go to Neutral Ground.

So what does Neutral Ground have to do with Brian David Marshall? Brian co-founded, he and his partner founded Neutral Ground. And so I believe the first time I ever met Brian is when R&D showed up at Neutral Ground. We went to this, I remember it was the middle, I don't even remember where it was, somewhere in the middle of Manhattan, and we had to take this rickety elevator up many, many floors. And it opened up, and the whole

floor, if I remember correctly, was this game store. Like, the game store filled up the floor. And there were just lots of tables and people playing. And at the time, the idea of a game store with this much space dedicated to play was an anomaly. I mean, now it's kind of the, you know, now you want to have a game store. Well, of course you have a play area.

That's just a given. You would not have a play area. Back in the day, that's not really, I mean, when Magic first came out, most game stores did not have areas to play. I'm not saying none did, but it wasn't the norm that it is today. And not only did Neutral Ground have some place to play,

the vast majority of what they had, I mean, they definitely had shelves and games. I mean, it still was a store. But they had a huge amount, they definitely had shelves and games. I mean, it was, it still was a store. Um, but they had a huge amount of, of, of space for play, which was very untraditional at the time. Um, and so anyway, I remember we went and we had a blast. It was, I had, I had heard of Neutral Ground. Um, but, uh, and if I remember correctly, uh, we were greeted, I believe, by Brian. And that is the first time I met Brian David Marshall, was at Neutral Ground. And like I said, my earliest connections with him was more as a store owner and as someone who ran events.

And then, I'm trying to remember the transition here so then we started doing the Pro Tour and the very first Pro Tour was in New York City PT1 and once again I did a podcast all about PT1 that was a crazy Pro Tour and I believe that's

I think the second time this is stretching back many many years I think the second time I met Brian was at PT1 I think the second time, I think this is, this is stretching back many, many years. I think the second time I met Brian was at PT1, I think. Um, and what happened was, um, at some point Brian started getting involved in the pro tour and I believe he started originally as a reporter. So going back in the early days of magic, um, there wasn't... The only video we did was on the final day and was...

Like the quarter semis and finals we would videotape. And people who were there would stream it live. I mean, not stream it. We would air it so people who were live at the event could watch the video.

But there was no streaming back then. That wasn't a thing yet. So the only way to watch a Pro Tour was being at the Pro Tour. We did tape them, although not all those tapes. Over the years, some of those tapes have disappeared but we taped them all and some of them you can still watch on tape

but you didn't... A lot of our coverage online, or almost, I'm sorry, all of our coverage online was written coverage. And so feature matches started super early. I think I did the first feature matches not at PT1. At PT2, I did this thing where I said hey, these are matches to watch out for. I listed table numbers. And I think it was the third PT where we actually moved them to a location

where people could watch, if I remember correctly. Yeah, before it was the feature matches. PT2 was called the Rosewater's Picks. Anyway. And so Brian was one of the reporters that would cover feature matches. That is the earliest place I remember Brian, as far as working at the Pro Tour.

And the other thing I remember is that Brian has always had a great love for drafting. I mean, my assumption is Brian must also play some constructed, but I know him as a drafter that he just loved loved drafting and I remember after the pro tour was over at night the staff would usually we would do drafts

we'd worked all day long and I remember a lot of my earliest memories of Brian is playing drafts against Brian after hours at the pro tour and he really had a passion I mean he still does I mean of Brian is playing drafts against Brian after hours at the Pro Tour. And he really had a passion. I mean, he still does. I mean, I think of all the aspects of Magic, the one that Brian really, really sinks his teeth into is drafting.

He loves drafting. And he was always, you know, whenever someone wanted to do a draft after hours, he was always game to do that. And so I remember Brian doing coverage, playing with Brian late night. Okay, so now I'm trying to get to the next thing. So I went to the Pro Tours for the first eight years of the Pro Tour. And then eventually, when my kids, when my twins were born, I struck a deal with my wife that I would travel less.

And so I gave up the Pro Tour. So I stopped going. I continued to go to Worlds for a lot of years. But I didn't go to all the... There's a period where I went to every Pro Tour. I was in charge of the feature match area. And then I was in charge of the production of the video on the final day. on the final day.

And if I remember correctly, I think we occasionally used Brian to do spotting, I think. But anyway, Brian became a staple on the Pro Tour. And he mostly at the time was doing a lot of coverage. But he wasn't yet the... So part of my job as part of my job as the guy who did the video on the final day was

to make sure that all the video was going smoothly. And at some point, I'm trying to remember, at some point we started using Brian to do commentary. Randy Bueller and Brian, BDM as he's known, became a team. And they became one of the real big teams. Like, if you talk about sort of classic magic announcing teams,

there was a period of time where they just, they did it all, you know. Now that we do sort of coverage, constant coverage all day long of all the Pro Tours, there's a lot more

mixing things up. You know, there's multiple people in the booth. But back when we did just one day and just the quarters, the semis,

and the finals, we tended to have just one pair of people doing it. And so the tail end of me being on the Pro Tour the quarters, the semis, and the finals, we tended to have just one pair of people doing it. And so the tail end of me being on the pro tour was Brian and Randy doing commentary and me producing. So the way it would work is we would be in the booth. They would be on, you know, doing the commentary. And then I'd be off to the side. I would be talking with the director. Like, I would say to the director where the game was going

or where we wanted to go to next, or if there was something important, like, magic-wise that the director might not have understood, because our director, while being a very good director, a guy named Bruce, his magic knowledge was not as high as the rest of us, you know, in the booth, because he had over the years learned magic and got better at it.

But I mean, a lot of times if something weird was happening, we'd be like, oh, be aware, this thing's going to happen, it's in his hand, stuff like that. I would tell Bruce, sort of give him warning of things that might be upcoming. The other thing I used to do is I would give notes to the commentators and that one of my jobs was whenever there was sort of a history to do, I was really big on the history, and so I would write down stats. And sometimes I would do the stats ahead of time,

and some on the wing, like on the fly, as things would happen, I'd go, oh, this is the first time this has happened, or the second time this has happened, and I would pass notes to Brian and to Randy. The first time this has happened, or the second time this has happened, and I would pass notes to Brian and Randy. And Brian shared my love of Pro Tour history.

Obviously, you'll see where I'm going. And oftentimes, he would beat me to the punch. I would remember the little notes, and before I would give it to Brian, he would say the note. And one of the things that I really got into during my time, because I went to all the Pro Tours, and I was very invested in, I did a lot of early coverage stuff and a lot of, you know, sideboard and stuff. At the time, early on, I was editing the do list and stuff. And so I had a lot of coverage stuff that I did. Um, and so I was just always fascinated with the pro tour as I sort of moved away and stopped going to all the pro tours.

I kind of the baton got passed to Brian, uh, to sort of pick up as, as being the historian. And at some point we have, we became official. Like we, he officially became the historian. I think that happened when the hall of Fame got made, if I remember correctly. We decided it was the 10-year anniversary of the Pro Tour. And we decided to honor that. We started the Pro Tour Hall of Fame. And the idea was, in order to be inducted in the Hall of Fame, you had to have been playing pro magic for 10 years.

And then you had to have a certain number of pro points. And then there was a group of people that would vote on you. Early on, the pro players had some votes and the other people had some votes. Anyway, it changed over the years how we did the voting. But I believe when the Pro Tour Hall of Fame started, I think that's when Brian officially became the Pro Tour historian as an official title. It didn't exist. I talk about in the early days, I did

allow that function, but there was no job. It was just things I did. And Brian officially took the role. And so one of Brian's jobs was whenever he did all the inductions for the Hall of Fame, he did all the interviews. One of the things, for those that have probably never for the Hall of Fame, he did all the interviews.

Like one of the things, for those that have probably never seen a Hall of Fame induction, Brian would be kind of the emcee. And then for each person, he put together a video segment about that person. And what that would be is he would go, usually he would come out to Seattle. And between pro tours and visiting Seattle,

so he'd interview pro players at the pro tour, interview Wizards people when he came out to Wizards. He would put together a segment on each person. And the segments would vary, but usually five to ten minutes. And it was just people talking about the person and sharing stories and just giving some context of the role this person played. And Brian did a great job of that. And I think what happened was

one of the things that people realized was Brian did such a good job of interviewing people that eventually as the Pro Tour coverage expanded, as Pro Tour coverage went beyond just doing the finals, they needed more and more, they needed to sort of spread people out more. And while Brian still did some coverage, I think Brian really enjoyed interviewing people. Um, that now also going on, Mike Flores, uh, had started a podcast, um, what was it called? Top 8 Magic. Uh, and they had many, many, many years ago.

And they, one of the, one of the earliest podcasts on magic. Um, I don't know the history of podcasting well enough, but it was one, it goes back to one of the early ones. And, um, they really enjoyed a lot talking all about sort of magic and the Pro Tour. And, you know, like Brian's sort of fascination with the Pro Tour goes way back. And so one of the things that we watched

Brian transition over the years is he started doing less on-air commentary and started doing more sort of interviewing, and he was just really, really good at it. And so it was, you know, Brian, I think most people now that know Brian know him more from his interviews at the Pro Tour than necessarily his commentary,

although if you've watched for any length of time, you've seen Brian do commentary. One other thing that's always interesting is I see Brian, like back when I used to go to the Pro Tour all the time, I saw him all the time. But now, you know, I go to maybe, I go to Pro Tour every once in a while.

You know, my travel has cut way back. So normally, nowadays, I'll see Brian in the office. He comes out at least once a year in his portrait historian job to do interviews and stuff. Often when he's out, we will often test things on him. Brian has a really good, I mean, he's just been playing Magic a long time, and he really sort of has a good sense of the audience. And so we love testing things with Brian, and we'll show him stuff. He's under nda obviously

and um he's someone who we can always give sort of feedback uh he loves drafting so um normally he's in we'll let him draft the latest thing to get some feedback what he thinks about it um his notes are always really good um yeah i mean one of the things that's interesting is the... One of my big beliefs is I would love to see the Pro Tour Hall of Fame one day become the Magic Hall of Fame. While I believe the Pro Tour definitely deserves sort of its own wing, I believe that it wants to be a little bit bigger than that. I believe that there's a lot of people that have a lot in...

Now, Brian, one could argue that Brian deserves a spot in the Pro Tour Hall of Fame from the coverage side of things. In fact, he does. But also, there's a lot of other contributions that he did. And I think a lot of people... I don't know if the average person knows, for example, his history with Neutral Ground and Organized Play and a lot of the, there's a lot of groundbreaking stuff he did very early on that influenced how stores function,

how Organized Play functioned. You know, there was stuff that we did in Wizards programs that was influenced by some of the stuff that Neutral Ground did. Like I said, when Scaf and I were planning early stuff, we were very conscious of Neutral Ground, and that had a lot of influence. I think Brian has had a huge influence just on how coverage is handled. Like, one of the things that Brian has been a real champion on

is sort of the stories of the people. That one of the ideas that Brian has been a huge champion of is one of the ways to make people care about the Pro Tour is to make people care about the people at the Pro Tour. And Brian has done a huge amount to really, I mean, humanize is the wrong word because they're humans, but to really put a face and a personality to people.

Gavin talked a lot about this in his tweet today. He had a little tweet thread about how Gavin was explaining how he really felt that he got nurtured by Brian, that Brian really went out of his way early on to put him at ease in his early events where he was real nervous. And, you know, Brian was the one that first got him a feature match and really did a lot to sort of bring Gavin to the world stage. And Gavin felt like a lot of what would come later for him, you know, working at Wizards and stuff, came from that profile. And a lot of that profile came from Brian.

And so Gavin was thanking him a lot for sort of being this platform that helped launch, you know, sort of Gavin, if you will, into the Magic world. And what Gavin had said, which I think is so true, is that he's done that for so many different players. That there's a lot of players that you know because Brian and other people like Brian, but really spent time and energy crafting the stories of who these people were. And whether that was writing it or interviews or, you know, whatever the means, that is something that he's been a big part of. The other part that Brian has been a big part of is I think that he and Randy were the longest pair doing commentary. Like, one of the ways early commentary worked, back when I did commentary,

is I liked having a color guy and a play-by-play guy. And normally, the play-by-play was somebody who just knew the rules really well, knew the cards really well, and the color was somebody who had been a pro player. And so in that matchup, Randy did color and Brian did play-by-play. And they were a really good team, and I think that watching over the years, you know, a lot of,

I think a lot of the way commentary, just like Brian had a big influence on how coverage worked and how tournaments worked, I also believe he had a big influence in sort of how coverage was done. There's a certain sensibility that he brought to it that I thought was really not just professional, but made it very friendly. It made Brian very approachable. That I think that's something that he really sort of, you know, put the, sort of marked how it, you know,

really set the standard, I guess maybe is the best word for it. And after, you know, there's a while where Brian did a lot of commentary with Rich. They were a pair for quite a while. And so, you know, like one of the things that I'm hoping to do today is that I don't know if the average person, like, I hope most of you know who Brian D. Marshall is, that I'm not just naming names you've never heard of before. But his influence and the way he's affected things, it's pretty broad. Like I said, I honestly believe that he's had a big impact on stores, on organized play,

on coverage, on organized play, on coverage, on commentary. You know, it is somebody who's really had a big influence on Magic. And once again, I don't want to, it's not like, I don't want this to be a eulogy. It's not like Brian has died or anything. Like I said, we've not seen the last of Brian. I'm sure we'll hear podcasts from him. I'm sure he will show up at the occasional Pro Tour.

I'm sure that he will still be involved in magic. Magic is too much part of his blood for Brian to disappear from magic. But he is stepping down from sort of the means by which most people see him, which is his role doing coverage and stuff. So anyway, that's what inspired me to do this. And, um, like I said, I, I am a giant fan of pro tour history, of magic history in general, but of, of pro tour history specifically. Um, and Brian is probably the only person I've met that rivals, uh, and probably I think surpasses on the pro tour level. Um, you know, like I, at one At one point, I was the utmost,

number one authority in pro tour history, and Brian has definitely passed me. I might maybe still take the realm of magic history, but Brian has definitely surpassed me in pro tour history. And like I said, he's become a staple for so many years at the pro tour, and really, it is, hopefully at the point of today's show, it's just a tip of the hat.

One of the things that i probably should do more of is more acknowledgement of individual people um there are a lot of people that have had a big role on magic and i don't think the average person necessarily knows a lot of them um like one of the things about being a high profile guy is everyone just assumes i do everything uh but the reality is, no, I mean I do the things I do, but there's a lot of people that do a lot of it. And so one of the things I'm curious, by the way, is would you like to have more podcasts about individual people? That's a little, sorry, let me finish up with Brian, but a thought as I'm

nearing work here. So let's say this about Brian, which is I've always been a giant fan of Brian. Drafting with Brian has always been a blast. I really love his passion for the game. I really feel that he, you know, every time he and I have interacted and worked together, it's always been great. He's wonderful to work with. And, you know, I'm glad that I've had a lot of opportunities to interact with him.

Like I said, I don't think we've seen Blastin' or anything. But this is just a shout-out to all the awesome things he's done. And I don't know if the average person knows the amount of, the volume, you know. Like, when I talk about him doing coverage at Pro Tours, you know, we're going back to, you know, like when I talk about him doing coverage at Pro Tours, you know, we're going back to, you know, 95, 96, like we're going back over 20 years.

So Brian has been involved in the Pro Tour from, I think, the very beginning or very, very close to the very beginning. And there's not a lot of people you could say that were involved with Magic, you know, year one or year two that are right now involved with Pro Tour Magic. There's not a lot of people you could say that were involved with Magic, you know, year one or year two, that are right now involved with Pro Tour Magic. There's not a lot of people that can say that. And so Brian is one of a few. And anyway, this is just a tip of the hat to Brian. And for those, by the way, who don't know who Brian is, I'm going to say, A, go on our website and search for Brian David Marshall. He

writes articles quite a bit. And he writes articles, I believe, on other websites, too. But search out his articles. He's a great writer. If you want to see a lot of stuff he's written. He does podcasts, top eight podcasts. Sorry, top eight magic. He and Mike Flores do a podcast, which

they've been doing forever. You can listen to some of his podcasts. Some of his coverage also, I believe on Twitch. I think you can go back and watch some of his coverage, his interviews and his coverage. There's tons and tons of material. If you don't know who Brian is, you can go read him. You can listen to him. You can watch him.

He's left an indelible mark on magic history and the magic pro tour especially so for those that might not know him hey, go check him out and for those that do, hopefully this was a little I don't know a jaunch down memory lane like I said it's funny how much

interaction I've had with Brian and when I go back to try to remember some early things I'm curious to hear from Brian. And when I go back to try to remember some early things, I'm curious to hear from Brian whether or not I was right, the visit was during the gathering. That's what I think it was. It was one of my early trips to New York for Magic. Anyway, that's my best guess.

I believe that is correct. At some point I'll hear from Brian. I'm sure at some point I've said stuff here and Brian will go, no, no, no. Actually, and he'll correct four things I said that were slightly off, which is sometimes the thing Brian would do as a historian. Once again, I'm just driving up to work right now. What do you guys think of me doing more people? I really, I did a podcast on Chris Rush when he died.

But other than Chris Rush, I don't know. I've done other podcasts on people. Is this something you'd like? Do you like to hear me talking about people? I've told stories of the Pro Tour and stuff. I've talked about people in my stories. But do you like the idea of a more concentrated podcast all about a person? Is that something? Anyway,

like I said, I've done a lot of podcasts, so I'm extrapolating and trying new things, and I'm kind of curious what you guys think. And if you like the idea of more people, let me know. If you're like, no, don't do that, let me know as well. But anyway, I'll try to think of any final thoughts here.

I'm sitting at a stoplight almost at Wizards. I don't know. I guess the final thing I will say, my final sort of nod to Brian, is the... I really appreciate just the friendship over the years, the warmth over the years.

It's someone, you know, who whenever I see, no matter how much time has passed, is always a friendly welcome. And it's funny because we might not see each other for a bit at a time just because I'm not going to Pro Tours anymore. But it's always a friendly welcome and embrace

whenever I see him. So anyway, Brian, I'm sad to hear that you are retiring. But I know you're going on to do other awesome things. I'm excited to see what those are. And like I said, I know this is not the last of us. I know the end of Chris's podcast, I was in tears because it was sad to lose Chris. We're not losing Brian. Brian is not disappearing from magic.

I know that. So anyway, I'm sure I will see Brian. I'll see you around. Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed today's podcast. Like I said, Brian has been a wonderful addition to Magic's family, and I believe that he has had an influence on lots of

things, even if you've been unaware of all the things that he has had influence on. So, anyway, tip of the hat. And like I said, go read, go listen, go watch. Brian has a whole wealth of work that is all available to you. Please go give it a glance. Anyway, I am now at work.

So we all know what that means. It means this is the end of my drive to work. So instead of talking magic, it's time for me to be making magic. I'll see you guys next time. Bye-bye.