Welcome to the Capital Combo, a blog of the Lansing Pinball League. Anything posted here can be blamed solely on the post’s author – usually Heather. It does not represent the official position (or sense of humor) of the League.
Blog
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Hat Trick: Danny Wins 3rd Consecutive Season of LPL
Danny once again defeated Tim to defend his championship in Season 24 of the Lansing Pinball League on May 12. For the third season in a row, Tim fought their way through the second-chance bracket to face Danny in the finals. This time, Tim won the first round of finals 2-1, giving Danny his first loss and forcing a second round. Danny then turned around and won 2-0.
Champion Danny, second place Tim, and third place Peter show their trophies with the new LPL logo. Peter also earned hardware in A division this season with a third place after being knocked into the second-chance bracket by Danny in the third round and then losing to Tim.
The B division champion was Jason Magnuson, normally an A-division player but hampered this season by several missed league nights. The second and third place were both newcomers to the podium, David in second and Abby in third.
B division champion Jason, third place Abby, and second place David pose with their trophies. The brackets had some notable upsets this season. In the A division first round, bottom seed Devon beat top seed Brian, and #6 Derik defeated #3 Tim. Derik continued his upset wins by knocking out #1 Brian in the second-chance bracket.
Abby plays Metallica. Abby went on to win third place in B division. Brian had some consolation, as we also gave out the end-of-season awards and he won Most Improved. Tim won Best Game for a gigantic score on Rush, and Nick won Worst Game (which Lexi accepted on his behalf).
B division champion Jason shows his typical pinball stance. Mackenzie presented league director Heather and her assistant Joseph with a thank-you card signed by all the league members, and gift cards to Meijer and Playing Picasso. Heather expressed her gratitude and added that she runs the league because she loves doing it.
Tim plays in the A division finals. The bar had already turned off the games upstairs and started putting the chairs on the tables. Season 24 has now come to an end, but the post-season split flipper tournament, variously known as “Super-Ball XIV” and “The Zen Tournament,” will take place tonight.
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League Night Recap for 4/28/26
We had our final qualifying night for Season 24, which would determine who would get the top seed (and thus guaranteed extra game choices all night in playoffs) and who would make the cut for A. It was a well-attended night, including a couple of guest players. Unfortunately, it is in a less jovial than usual mode that I am writing this report. Our very longtime league member Mike Stewart is currently in the hospital in very serious condition. Mike has been a member of the league since Season 3, making him the third longest-tenured member after me and Joseph. He has made friends of virtually everyone he has met in the pinball world over the years, and we are all fervently hoping for his recovery. I hope to report better news in our next update. But I admit I am writing this report without a lot of enthusiasm, so it will be rather short.
Chris working on a game of Tron. This night finished our rotation of banks 7 and 8. Tim had an insanely big game on Rush of about 1.6 billion, which was spectacular but did cause their group and the night to run a bit long. Despite this, Brian K. took first on bank 7. Danny won bank 8, thanks in part to a 1.3 billion game of Godzilla.
Eric got his first-ever Grand Champion score, on Elvira’s House of Horrors! With Season 1 qualifying in the books, Brian has taken the top seed position, Danny is in second, and Tim is in third. Devon managed to keep himself above the cutline and take the number 8 seed in A division, leaving Chris to be the top seed for the B playoffs.
Smackdown undercard winner Peter and champion Tim, who looks… thrilled? We also had a Tuesday Night Smackdown tournament, with the A division playing on Jurassic Park and the B division on Game of Thrones. Tim took the Smackdown championship, and Peter got the undercard win.
I’ll be seeing you all very shortly at the final playoffs. Be there by 7 pm or be disqualified!
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Lansing Lightning Flippers Recap 4/24/26
April 24 was another exciting meet for the Lansing Lightning Flippers women’s league. We had a high turnout of 12 players, which made for a tidy three groups of four. In addition to most of our usual players, we had a new player, Danielle – a friend of Lexi, I believe. Danielle did quite well for her first league night, finishing just a couple of points below the median.
Mackenzie plays in my group, on James Bond. I was in the top group with Tim, Mackenzie, and Amy. It was a very tough group and I was very pleased with myself to come in second, just two points behind Tim. Tim had first choice for the night and led by picking Ghostbusters, which was also one of their choices last league night. I was a little surprised because they had not finished first on it last time, but I realized that they must have decided (with some justification) that my performance last time was a wild fluke unlikely to be repeated. Instead I managed to come out on top again and Amy got second. Tim and I switched places when it was my turn to pick. I chose Medieval Madness and took third to Tim’s first, this time with Mackenzie getting second. There were several exciting games and I thought my group had a really competitive but fun night.
Engaging in the traditional Lansing league activity, crowding the alcove, with Linda, Lexi, Stephanie, and Dana. I still had one Lansing Pinball League shirt in size medium left over from the last time we had shirts made a few seasons ago. After being unable to give it away at the open league several times it had ended up forgotten in my attic. I dug it out again and brought it as a giveaway item, which Jen won (right after commenting, “I could probably wear a medium”).
We also had our usual one-ball tournament on The Flip Side, to try to get players rated. Linda put up one of the best single-ball scores I’ve seen, while our frequent champion Tim had a near house ball. In the finals, Linda prevailed over Danielle, Stephanie, and Amy.
I like the vibe of this photo of Stephanie, Danielle, and Lexi, even though it didn’t turn out. Our league meeting tomorrow will be the last of the season. We will be having our final qualifying session immediately followed by the playoffs. The playoffs will take the top seven players (or eight, if we get any more new players) to a fast ladder finals. Ladder is a very unpredictable format since a single loss knocks someone out, so it really becomes anyone’s tournament to win or lose. We will also be playing three, count ’em, three one-ball tournaments to try to get ratings for anyone left who still needs them!
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League Night Recap for 4/14/26
Our last league night saw us embarking on a rotation of our last two banks, known according to my whim as “Locke” and “Leibniz.” Despite the alliteration, as far as Enlightenment philosophy goes, you probably can’t get more opposite than Locke’s representative realism and Leibniz’s… whatever the hell the deal with the monads was. The important thing for our league is that this marked the beginning of the end of Season 24.
Danny makes blowing up The Simpsons look like serious business. We had a new guest player join us, Eric’s father Dean, who expects to join the league as a regular player next season. We rigged the drawing to put him into a group with Eric for his starter LPL experience, and I just have to hope that their third player, Devon, behaved himself. (Maybe it’s just me that brings out his trash talk.) One of our previous guest players, Kathy, also returned, and says she is likely to continue in the league next season.
Eric and Dean watch Devon studiously as he takes on Godzilla. Our Tuesday Night Smackdown game was randomly drawn on Jaws, with the B division assigned randomly from among the nearby games as usual, this time falling on Game of Thrones. Danny won the championship on Jaws, and Joseph won the undercard.
Joseph gives the ASL sign for “B” and holds up a finger, to indicate “B division first place.” He looked up the sign ahead of time, apparently expecting this result. The winner of the night on Bank 7 (Locke) was Danny, with standout games on The Simpsons and King Kong, although remember that this is only against half the league so far. On Bank 8 (Leibniz) Brian has the top spot so far, with an amazing 592 million on Indiana Jones. At our next league night tomorrow (or, technically, later tonight) we will finish banks 7 and 8 and therefore the qualifying season. Everyone is waiting eagerly to find out will get the higher seeds (and therefore more game choices) and who will make A division in this increasingly competitive league.
By the time the Smackdown game finished Danny had already moved on to playing something else and I didn’t want to interrupt him to ask for a winner photo. Joseph suggested I should just take a picture of him playing to show how you can’t keep him off a pinball machine. -
Lansing Lightning Flippers Recap 4/11/26
The last Lightning Flippers meet was our fourth, which also means we were starting the second half of the season. We had seven attend which means we were missing a few members, but we were graced by the return of Linda, Sarah, and Mackenzie after their absence last time. We were split into the top group with four and the bottom group with three.
Tim is a hell of a player… but I am an artiste. My group included the formidable Tim as well as Amy and Dana, and we had a really fun night of competition. The highlight of the night was when Tim ran up the score on Ghostbusters (a game I am usually weak on)to 600-something and I thought, no way, I’ll just try to get second… then I somehow managed to do over 800! Even a blind rabbit finds a carrot once in a while, as the saying goes.
How are things going for Amy on Uncanny X-Men? 
… That good, huh? Our Lansing Lightning Rater tournament, the most ridiculous possible IFPA tournament, had a four-player final match between Tim, Sarah, Amy, and Dana. None of the scores were exceedingly high, but Tim took the W.
Dana has her turn on The Flip Side while Amy watches. Everything is having to get more strategic with game choices as people are starting to run out of their favorites to use (as a game can be chosen only once in the season). I know that I’m down to mulling over which Williams games are left in my roster. I haven’t decided on a game for our next meeting yet… which is tonight! I hope to see all of the Lightning Flippers ladies soon!
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League Night Recap for 3/24/26
New player Cody attacks Mars in the Smackdown finals. We finished up our rotation of banks 5 and 6 at the last league night. The banks are named Berkeley and Hume. Berkeley is Bishop George Berkeley, is an underrated (in your league director’s view) 18th century empiricist known best for his claim that esse est percipi, “to be is to be perceived.” There is a famous pair of limericks by Ronald Knox about Berkeley’s subjective idealism:
There once was a man who said “God
Must think it exceedingly odd
If he finds that this tree
Continues to be
When there’s no one about in the Quad.”“Dear Sir,
Your astonishment’s odd.
I am always about in the Quad.
And that’s why the tree
Will continue to be
Since observed by
Yours faithfully,
God”There, don’t you feel more erudite just from having read that? Hume, meanwhile, is David Hume, the 18th century skeptical empiricist, about whom I do not know of any limericks. They make a good pairing; actually, they are considered part of the classic empiricist trio along with John Locke, but that’s bank 7.
Mackenzie watches Tim play in the Smackdown finals. Sorry, were you hoping to read about pinball? All right then. We had a pair of guest players join us, Kathy and Cody. (At this point in the season we only allow new players to join as guests, since they don’t have a possibility of qualifying for finals.) Cody ended up playing in the Tuesday Night Smackdown tournament on Attack from Mars and made it to finals, taking third.
At the end of the night we were now three-quarters of the way through the season. Top honors on Bank 5 (Berkeley) went to Brian, and the champion of Bank 6 (Hume) was Danny. In the overall standings, Brian is now on top, 12 points ahead of second place Danny. Peter has been having a great season, especially the last few weeks, and is now in third. The rest of the people currently swimming above the cutline are Tim, Joseph, me (!!), Derik, and Devon. Joseph only has two lousy points on me, I feel obliged to point out. Top of the B division is Chris. With two nights left a lot can still change, especially with some of the tight jockeying around the fourth-through-sixth and seventh-eighth positions.
Our Tuesday Night Smackdown, as previously mentioned, was on Attack from Mars. The champion was Tim, and the B division champion on Venom was me.
Smackdown champion Tim and B division winner Heather, i.e. me. What the heck is going on with my left thumb?! That don’t look normal. After an unusually long break due to the calendar this month we will be returning to league in just a couple of hours. I hope to see everyone soon!
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Lansing Lightning Flippers Recap 3/28/26
We finished up the front half of Season 1 on March 28 with, unfortunately, a much smaller turnout than the previous meet. Linda was living it up on the JoCo Cruise, Mackenzie and Sarah were in California, and we were also missing new players Beatrice and Jen. The up side is that with eight players we were able to have four-player groups for everyone.
Tim is hoping that witches are eligible to try out for the Monster Bash band. Tim made sure it was a pretty long night for their group by completely blowing up multiple games. I know that at least Indiana Jones and Fall of the Empire were huge games and the others must have been good too as Tim took all firsts in their group against Abby, Lexi, and Marnie. Unfortunately, Marnie had been told by her mom that league would only run until about 6:00 and was very much over it by the time her group finished another hour-plus later.
Abby, Marnie, and Lexi hang out while Tim plays. In fact, because we had a (relatively) long league meeting, everyone who was qualified to play in the Lightning Rater finals on The Flip Side decided to go home instead, except for Tim. Because the IFPA doesn’t allow any tournament to be submitted that has no direct-play component, I dropped a quick score on the game and actually was the top qualifier. Tim and I then played a two-player finals which they won.
In my group, which included Amy, Dana, and Stephanie, I had first choice and chose Attack from Mars. Second game choice went to Amy who chose Stranger Things. I pointed out, “That’s basically the same game!” Amy hadn’t thought of it before but conceded, yeah, the playfield is pretty similar. This gave me the chance to reuse a joke I learned from Tim and call Stranger Things “Vaporwave Attack from Mars.”
Lexi takes her turn on Monster Bash. I’m hoping to see everyone back at our next meeting in a few hours. New players are also still welcome! I have really been loving the format and chill vibe of this league and hope you are (or will) too.
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Lightning Flippers Recap 3/10/26
After a promising start to the season, our second meeting upped the ante even further with a record turnout of 14 members. Our newest joiners were Mackenzie’s friend Jen and Lexi’s kids, Marnie and Beatrice. This was Jen’s first pinball competition but she came in second for the night. Congrats! But that means she is going to end up in the top group next time so, uh, good luck with that. Marnie was another high-finishing novice, and currently has edged yours truly out in the league standings by one point.
I’m going to be honest, I’m not quite sure who this is. Dana, maybe? I’m sure someone will tell me but either way, I love the action hair shot! We had our usual fun making the newer players play their side tournament “rater” games on The Flip Side, my American Girl pinball machine. Or maybe I should say letting them play, since some of the players who really don’t need to be rated keep wanting to do it too. I’m a little surprised – I’d let them play it for fun for free, but if they do it for the tournament I gotta collect a buck for the IFPA! Tim won the honors on it this time.
The gang’s all here: Tim, Christy, Mackenzie, and Stephanie (I’m not sure who is partly visible in plaid). Now that we’ve had two meetings we can actually see the “correct” standings for players with their one drop night (instead of everyone being tied for first place). This should make it quicker to get the correct Swiss pairings for the next night, which held things up a little bit at the start of the last tournament. I did a bit of experimenting and I believe it randomly breaks ties when choosing groups for tied players.
Abby playing The Flip Side – just for fun, I think. See you soon for our next meet!
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League Night Recap for 3/10/26
Our last league night started the second half of the season with a rotation of banks 5 and 6, named for Bishop George Berkeley, the underrated and often misunderstood empiricist-idealist; and David Hume, the probably-correctly-rated and mostly-understood empiricist-skeptic. This is also the last night a player can still officially join the league this season, because it’s the last time it is still possible to make the minimum number of league nights to qualify for playoffs. From this point forward, we welcome guest players but don’t charge them any dues, and their games do not affect the final season standings.
New member Alex plays Pulp Fiction in my group. We did get several new players, all Grand Rapids-scene players of my acquaintance: Clyde B., Jaysin W., and Alex H. I should also mention that in my last league update I failed to mention another new player, Mike C. This was caused by Joseph mistakenly classifying him as a guest player, which caused me to overlook his name when writing the update. Sorry, Mike! Anyway, the result of this influx of new players is that this was the largest ever league night in the history of the league. We made use of the rarely-seen “A2” and “B2” group designations. Could this be a sign that the league is growing again? Only time will tell. The last time we had a big surge of players (which is when we began splitting into two banks by necessity) it proved temporary, and the league shrank back to its typical size the next season. Maybe this time it will be more permanent.
Devon is saying something to Chris like “Heather’s taking a picture, so pretend you don’t see her.” Then he told me I need to work on my technique since I’m not subtle. In my defense I can’t be subtle with my Canon ELPH, it has a slow-ass autofocus and shutter. My PEN Lite is in the shop. At our league meeting I was excited to announce that we had finally gotten T-shirts organized and that I had talked with the T-shirt printers and they had confirmed that we can have everyone choose their own color shirts as it will not affect our volume discount. League members can use this Google form to order a shirt to be paid for by Pinball Pete’s. Non-members should contact me (Heather) if they would like to order a shirt (payment will be required).
Since we are only halfway through each of the two banks, it’s a little premature to rank everyone. Still, I would be remiss not to mention that Peter had a huge night on Bank 5 and is currently leading the half-of-the-pack by a comfortable margin. On Bank 6, Danny is currently leading with an even bigger night. The problem for Danny is that no one is surprised when he does numbers like that. It’s a dog-bites-man situation.
Peter plays the winning Smackdown game on Rush. Our Tuesday Night Smackdown was on Rush and continuing his stellar night, the winner was Peter. (For a moment I actually thought I might win, surprising since Rush isn’t a particularly strong game for me, but it wasn’t to be.) Joseph won the B division on Pulp Fiction.
Peter and Joseph celebrate Smackdown wins. I’ll see you tonight for our next league meeting!
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Lightning Flippers Recap 2/28/25
My longtime dream was finally realized: Lansing now has a true women’s league! We previously held monthly women’s tournaments under the Lansing Lightning Flippers name, but they have now been transformed into a semi-monthly league. The league uses match-play scoring instead of best-game scoring (like the open league uses). Everyone plays five games against two or three other people, and is scored 7/5/3/1 or 7/4/1 based on their finishing position on the game. Game choice rotates, but everyone can only choose a given game once in the season (until finals). The lowest night is dropped, and after the end of the sixth qualifying night, there is a finals phase that happens immediately, which will use a ladder format.
Abby tries to get scared stiff! I was worried about whether we would get enough people to avoid having any two-player groups because then we would have to use 7/1 scoring, which is really suboptimal. The only way this would happen would be if we got five total players. Fortunately that was averted and handily: our turnout was a healthy nine! I had figured if we could get at least six people coming regularly the league would be successful. This did mean everyone played in a three-player group which is a bit less fun than four, but I’m sure our population will fluctuate over time, giving people a chance to play in a full group.
Dana watches Amy play Indiana Jones. Some of our usual Flippers players attended, including Tim, Mackenzie, Stephanie, Christy, and Linda. We were also joined by Abby from Grand Rapids and Dana and Amy who played in a previous season of the open league. Lexi had planned to attend but had a family emergency, but she is hoping to attend starting tonight.
Linda plays The Flip Side. People couldn’t decide whether standing or sitting was worse… As a side tournament, we will have something called the Lansing Lightning Rater every night. The purpose of the Lightning Rater tournament is to get people “rated” for IFPA purposes, which requires having played in five prior tournaments. If all our players are rated, it will make the league more valuable to the IFPA. The Lightning Rater tournament is the most minimal possible tournament: one ball qualifying on my American Girl pinball machine “The Flip Side” followed by a single four-player game for the finals. This is intended just for the unrated players but is technically an open tournament so I did not anticipate how many people would want to play. I figured I’d just get the unrated players to do it in our spare moments, but instead most of the rated players attending also participated. Ultimately Amy won, which I think will be her first officially recorded IFPA tournament win. The record of your wins doesn’t distinguish ridiculous from non-ridiculous tournaments, so congratulations!
Abby and Stephanie have some cooldown time. Overall I think the league got off to a great start and it seemed to me that people really enjoyed the match-play format. I have always wanted to run a match-play league but for various reasons I think the open league will be resistant to changing. Starting a second league ex nihilo gave me the canvas I needed to run a league the way I’ve always wanted to – and it seems like I’m not the only one to like the new format. It was a relief to have our first meeting go so well as I had been very worried about it being a flop.
That’s all for the first night’s report, but we’re about to have our second night very soon! Our league uses Matchplay and so you can view the results for the night and the season there.
