I am sitting at my computer, an hour and a half away from Grand Prix Pittsburgh’s second day of competition. With how comfortable I was feeling with my deck choice (Infect; even though I had only been playing the deck a couple weeks), I just KNEW I was going to make day two.
Starting the day 4-0 (2 byes, wins vs RG Tron and Junk), I was obviously feeling ecstatic and felt I could be on camera at any time! This was fantastic! Then came the losing streak, I went through six straight games drawing only pump spells and no creatures. My first match loss was to Living End, which I was not angry about at all because I learned something in that match up that I could most certainly use later! (Living End gets around Grafdiggers Cage, who knew?!). Then I played against UR Twin twice in a row and only drew one creature a game with about 30 points of pump. After taking the six losses in a row, I decided it was time to hang it up with 2 rounds to go. I knew that if I played in the state that I was in, I would leave Infect on the table and not give a damn where it ended up.
On my drive home, I considered to myself “What if I’m not supposed to day two a Grand Prix, how will I ever get to a Pro Tour if I can’t T4 an RPTQ or T8 a GP?”. The more I thought about these questions (“How can I paris away a hand that is the stone-cold nuts if I keep a single guy on the board?”) the more angry I became at myself for not seeing subtle (“I should have Gitaxian Probed instead of playing the Elf on T1.”) plays that disrupted the entire flow (“Why did I double Vines my Noble Hierarch to save it when I knew they had Twin in hand?”) of the game for myself.
As a player, you should always keep improving and think about not only your losses to get better, but also your wins as well “Why did I search for that Forest when I OBVIOUSLY needed a Breeding Pool to play my Blighted Agent?*”.
So last night, I decided it was actually a great thing to be as upset at my performance as I was; It comes down to wanting “perfection”. Just like an artist (musician in this case), most demand perfection out of their play in their music. I only demand the same for myself when it comes to my Magic-playing. I just want to give my opponent the best games of their life, win or lose. If I am not playing to the best of my advantage, then I am not only letting them down, but I am letting myself down. I have to get better, I have to improve my A-game to be A++-game, there is no other option.
