Home League Tip - Interleague Play: Or, the CPL accepts the challenge to crush the West Side Poker League

If you have an enduring home poker league you're going to inevitably hear about other area leagues. Or, sometimes, as was the case with the CPL, you'll have some members who strike out on their own to form a league on a different day or with their own structure. These other leagues offer a great opportunity to add an element of fun and excitement to your own home game via the InterLeague Challenge. This is the live version of the online forum challenges that you sometimes see. For your home game it offers a common "opponent" to go after as you determine which league has the better players. Be sure to set the structure and ground rules for such a match well in advance of game day. Extra fun comes into play if your league's are able to communicate in some way to talk smack before you play.

Here are some examples of the whole idea (including some smack talk) from our own CPL challenge that will be conducted with the West Side Poker League this Saturday. As background, several former CPLers, including the highly successful "Ninja" Milne and JP "The Executioner" left to create or join their WSPL. The idea was put forth to see if the students (that's the WSPL) were now better than the masters (that's us) and a challenge was issued.

We've created a two match challenge - No Limit Hold 'em (played each week by the CPL) and HORSE (played often by the WSPL - though they also play NLHE). Each match has a total value of 100 pts with position finish accounting for number of pts given to a player/league. The league with the most pts will be crowned the winner. And, since it's poker after all - we kept elements that cater to the individual as well as a "team" component. For fans of either the CPL or West Side - here are the team lineups:

HORSE TEAMS
CPL-----------------------------vs.---------------WSPL
Mark "Verbal" Cardenas----------------------Gene Milne
"Karaoke" Phil Fuehrer ----------------------Brad Smith
Mike "Blind Me Down" Behr ------------------Jodi Milne
Pam "Black Widow" Muldoon----------------Brandon Altman


HOLD EM TEAMS
CPL-----------------------------vs.-----------------WSPL
Greg "NewLife" Durand -------------------------Amy Altman
Bill "Comeback Kid" Lanoux --------------------John "JP" Pouliot
Steve "The Chaser" Bennewitz-------------------Larry Delmatio
Mike "Unabomber" Bowman--------------------Victor Bettendorf
Voni "The Rookie" Khang ------------------------Jill Schmidt

Then there's all the pre-match hype that goes into these sorts of championship events (sorta like a UFC vs. Pride event). We've used the end of the last several podcasts to advocate for the CPL, but some emails have been flying around as well - such as:

From Gene: All I want to say is when we kick some CPL butt , "Your going to have to tuck that tail pretty far up the back side" :)

From JP: Is Phil actually playing? I thought he retired, and is now committed to
blowing smoke up the CPL skirts full time on their podcast!

and,

From BMD Behr: I'm actually surprised we're still going through with this game next weekend. I expected the West side guys to have come up with some excuse for not being able to play so as to not be completely humiliated on there own home turf.

So, there you have it. Add some inter league competition to your home poker league to spice up the action, add some camaraderie and create something a little special.