Our special guest Zog blogger this week resides in sunny San Fran. Kyle Smeallie is here to tell us what really happened behind the scenes in Vegas.
“Have you seen the setup downstairs?” my teammate asked at Friday’s happy hour. I’d been distracted by the sun setting over the Vegas strip, Honey Gobbler cocktails, and that guy on team New Jersey whose hair was just so Jersey. “Look through the pool.”
From water’s edge, through the windows lining the pool’s base, you could see the display downstairs: ping pong tables, corn hole set ups, a dozen pool tables, the works. All for us. That’s when it dawned on me: we were in for an insane Vegas weekend.
The ten of us on team San Francisco were all the fortunate winners of social media contests put on by ZogSports. Our prize was a weekend trip to the City of Sin, where American Honey had invited social sports leagues across the country to compete in the first-ever Bar-sity Athletics World Championship. Airfare covered, two nights in the Hard Rock Hotel, a little somethin’ to throw down on the tables, no-cover at over-the-top clubs, all sorts of perks. (American Honey, your marketing team: Doing It Right.)
Saturday started with eye black, game planning (i.e., drinking) and getting pumped for the main event, a kickball tournament. Winning team would take home $10,000 along with a billboard (!) in their hometown. Sixteen teams from cities around the country, no one out-and-out saying it but there was certainly some regional pride on the line. This made it all the better when our team, the fearsome squad from San Francisco, tasted defeat immediately, after we gave up 10 runs in the first inning. We ended up bringing it back to 10-7, but in the end we couldn’t get past Frankenstein’s fat foot. (Looking at you, Dallas.)
In at least one other respect, though, we absolutely crushed. That was in the category of impromptu interview skills, because when the dudes at BroBible asked our teammate Charlie, “why is playing in a kickball league awesome?” he knocked it out of the park.
With our kickball dreams dashed, we did the only responsible thing we could: We rocked out, threw dice at the craps table, doubled down on Blackjack, went all-in on Hold ‘em, and downed American Honey like they were giving it away (because they were). Then we hit perhaps the wildest club I’ve ever been to, Surrender. There was a pool with little floating pads for lounging, a mini-casino in the club and Zed’s Dead on the decks.
Basically, it was Vegas Vacation, and we were all Nick Papagiorgio getting the royal treatment we didn’t deserve. (Am I right?) All because we play ZogSports.
So hey, thank you Zog, and thank you American Honey. But most of all, thank you, Nick in a Box.
