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Welcome one and all to the BattleBots Beaties! It’s a bit late, considering the season’s been over for how long, but I’m making the executive decision that next week I’ll just write up a briefer recap of the remaining bounties, because I’m currently four episodes down, there’s one left, and they’ve been out for months, so I’m not spoiling very much. So with that, let’s go give some awards out.

Please note, that this is only for the regular season. I reserve the right to give additional awards for the bounty fights themselves in the briefer recap.

First off, the honest to goodness actual BattleBots awards:

Most Destructive: Questionable Designs, Valkyrie
This award is voted on by the judges. And I can’t say it’s not without some surprise and controversy, but what did it was the fight against Rotator. Just three minutes of grinding away at an extremely sturdy robot, taking off the wedge face and other stuff. Apparently the reason why the judges came to inspect damage after this fight wasn’t to determine the winner. It was to marvel at the damage done by Leanne Cushing and co.’s bot. Apologies and honorable mentions to Uppercut, I presume.

Founders’ Award: Bot Bash Party, Skorpios
This award is, obviously, determined by the founders, Greg Munson and Trey Roski. This award is for teams that push the sport forwards, inside and outside the BattleBox. (Admittedly it’s a general award that Greg & Trey can give for whatever notable achievements.) Zach Lytle & Diana Tarlson run Bot Bash Party, a company that, well, throws robot-fighting parties for kids, among other things. It’s turned into a full business between parties (both kids and corporate), teaching robotics, and generally giving the next generation a chance to get into robotics (and yes, combat robotics included). They were hit hard by the pandemic, and this, combined with [redacted spoilers regarding Bounty Hunters] can hopefully get the business back up and running when the world comes back to almost-normal.

Best Newcomer: Iron Force, Rusty
Okay, it’s a bit of a meme award for Rusty, which went 1-2 in the main tournament but managed to be surprisingly resilient. Much love to David Eaton and the “junkyard bot,” this season’s fan favorite. (I’ll give my own Rookie of the Year later on.)

Grant Imahara Best Design Award: The Machine Corps, Chomp
A fitting tribute for an icon of the sport. Before MythBusters, and before everyone’s favorite robot sidekick Geoff Peterson, Grant Imahara built robots for himself! (Okay, and also all the stuff for THX and ILM.) This included Deadblow, a middleweight robot that competed in every season of classic BattleBots, was the Season 1.0 runner-up (losing to Hazard), and was at one point ranked #1 in the division, then becoming the in-house “we need a robot” in episodes of MythBusters. Grant continued to have an active part in the bot-building community, being the presenter of a TV special focused on RoboGames, and was a judge in Season 3 of modern BattleBots.

The best design award, as voted on by the pits, went to Chomp. I mean, it’s the first walker in 20 years, it’s essentially The Judge on a turret, and still has all the lidar technology of previous versions of Chomp. It may have only went 1-2 on the year, but goddamn do Zoe Stephenson, Jascha Little, and the rest of the team think big.

Onto the funner awards.

Best Driver: Matt Vasquez, Team Fast Electric Robots, Whiplash
I was all set to give this to Victor Soto, who handled Rotator absolutely masterfully all year, balancing offense and defense brilliantly throughout, even if it also seemed that Rotator got continuously screwed. And then comes the tournament, where between HUGE, Valkyrie, Hydra, and Black Dragon, Whiplash was absolutely masterful. Absolutely brilliant.

Sorry, Victor. You do get an award later on though! Like right now!

Giant Screw (single fight): Team Revolution, Rotator
The Giant Screw was a joke award given out by the builders one season of classic BattleBots for the robot who took the most damage BUT managed to survive the three minutes. There were a lot of candidates, but if it was the one fight that gave Valkyrie the Most Destructive, the bot on the other side, being more than game throughout, deserves recognition. Because Rotator is an absolute tank.

Giant Screw (season): CE Robots, Kraken
Due to there being multiple fights in the fight card format, it’s worth breaking down the Giant Screw into a single fight and season award. And for the season award you have to give it to Kraken. The fight against HUGE and the fight against SawBlaze were enough to show just how much of a tank this bot has become. Because at no point this season did Kraken lose by KO. Or win by KO, actually. Every single fight went the distance, and at the end of those three minutes the bot was still in the fight. Props, Matt Spurk. Mad props.

Stripped Screw: (tie) Team HUGE, HUGE & Team Revolution, Rotator
The Stripped Screw is more regarding which bots did get the most screwed, either by matchups or by decisions. And these two bots got those respectively! HUGE faced off against the only robot bigger than it, which was interesting as all hell. But then after that loss was Hydra. Should be fine, right? Nope! Bike rack! That fight doesn’t even get to mean anything because it didn’t get to do much. Then once making the round of 32, they got the only robot that might hard-counter them, Whiplash. Because the lifter with the weapon on it actually hits the center panel of HUGE. So just like that, HUGE, through a combination of bad luck, bad matchups, and questionably legal tactics, goes 1-3 on the year.

As for Rotator… the Beta fight and decision (even though I think it was correct) and the End Game fight and decision (still not sure I agree). Two rough split-decision losses. That kinda year for both bots.

Brass Ball Bearings: CE Robots, Kraken
Basically, see the seasonal Giant Screw Award. the Brass Ball Bearings is for going head-first into matchups, maybe a little beyond what’s expected of your bot, and coming out of it, win or lose. And Kraken did just that, showing that Kraken’s able to hang with the big boys—Black Dragon, Witch Doctor, HUGE, and SawBlaze is a Murderer’s Row of opponents to go the full twelve minutes with.

Senor Weaselo’s House of Pain Award: Team Ua!rrior, Black Dragon (vs. Ribbot)
This might be the truest iteration of the House of Pain Award yet, given by me in honor of my sometimes-running column that I swear I’ll update soon! Because with all the fire, the robot still worked. And worked well! Better than the other robot! And it was a lot of fire! Like half the robot was engulfed in flames! And it won the fight!

Brazilians be crazy, yo.

James May Award: Mike Gellatly, Team Witch Doctor, Witch Doctor
As some of you may know, the James May Award is for getting lost. On a racetrack. In BattleBots it’s for getting lost in the BattleBots. In this case, it’s for Mike Gellatly lining up a hit on SlamMow! dead in his sights… and driving straight into the wall. Twice. In a row. Even he admitted it was stupid! So congrats, Mike. You’re probably a better drifter than James May, but now you win an award named after him too. Let the Eurobeat intensify.

Alex Day Angry Ball of Physics Award: Team Whyachi Robots, Fusion
On the other end of the spectrum, you might not know Alex Day, but he’s one of my favorite YouTubers with his FailRace page, celebrating the weirdest and wackiest in racing video games, and then trying to race sensibly during said wacky things. An angry ball of physics, for instance, would be a car getting stuck somewhere it’s not supposed to and then getting spat out of the place at like 800 mph into space.

Or, you know, Fusion after hitting WAR? EZ!. As opposed to Fusion hitting other robots and blowing up internally. Which would be a different angry ball of physics, so still works.

Plunderbird “Have You Got a Srimech?” Award: (tie) Team HyperShock, HyperShock & Vegas Combat Robotics, JackPot
Here’s the reference:

These two robots did! Kinda.

For HyperShock, they had a new gearing (I think?) so that way their srimech would work this year. But the guy who was working on it hurt his leg so it ended up being a rush job and didn’t work. Against End Game, a big vertical spinner likely to flip you over. And Hydra, a flipper. Yeah, didn’t go well, though it showed the Secret Shop QR code well.

As for JackPot, they had a srimech, and removed the srimech for armor against Rotator, a horizontal spinner that would have difficulty flipping you over. So of course they ended up flipped over and lost the fight that way.

“Break the Internet” Moment of the Year: The bike rack
It’s this year’s version of Tornado vs. Razer, and we’re talking about that almost 20 years later. Once again, leave it to Team Whyachi to have to have an update to the rulebook. But that’s how it works, you go by the letter and you can get away with some ingenious things.

Quote of the Year: Anything said by Martin Mason
Is there a Martin Mason compilation? There needs to be for the MadCatter captain.

Upset of the Year: Extinguisher over Gruff
When we saw this fight we figured “okay, with a win over HyperShock and a loss to Whiplash, Gruff gets a fight against a robot considered a lower-tier than it, so assuming a win it’ll have a middling seed.” And for the first minute and change that was about right, as Gruff dominated and lifted and suplexed. It got its forks in there that they had to separate the two bots by cutting Extinguisher’s weapon belts. And then as the fight went on Gruff slowed… and stopped. And Gruff never stopped last year. In fairness it was all but stopped this year by Whiplash, barely surviving to the bell. But crapping out and dying against Extinguisher? Nobody expected John Flaacke’s bot to pull it off, and that’s a win you can hang your hat on. Though I fear Extinguisher may become another vert considering that was the configuration for this fight and it worked.

Spinner-Killer of the Year: Team Whyachi Robots, Hydra
Yeah, I know. I was expecting Whiplash or something, but with wins over Witch Doctor, HUGE, Uppercut, HyperShock, and Gigabyte, that makes 5 wins over spinners, where Whiplash had 4. Plus, Whiplash had two against Valkyrie.

It’s an unscientific determination, but 5-0, maybe 5-1 beats 4-1, even if the loss was to the other robot up for consideration.

Alternately it could’ve been Skorpios with wins over Tombstone and Perfect Phoenix, but losses to Bloodsport and Witch Doctor hurt. Or Tantrum, with the wins over Atom #94, Fusion, and Bloodsport, but again, losses to Valkyrie and End Game. But Tantrum’s a tank and may win this in the future.

Rookie of the Year: Vegas Combat Robotics, JackPot
No, not Rusty in my book. But the actual best rookie bot, the one that went 3-0 in the fight cards including a win over Lock-Jaw. Though no rookie made it through the first round into the round of 16. So highest seed/3-0 bots wins!

Breakout Robot of the Year: Team Uppercut, Uppercut
It was either them or Tantrum. I’ll go with the flashy KO artist on this one, because from the start of the season they just turned heads thanks to curbstomping Gemini. Hell, they were on their way to beating Ribbot before the bot just stopped. Uppercut vs. Black Dragon would’ve been interesting. As for Tantrum, it just all clicked at the right time which led to that semifinal showing. Nobody expected that, maybe not even Aren Hill.

Comeback Bot of the Year: Team Hurtz, Beta
Considering COVID it was a surprise to see international teams make the competition. Especially Beta, which last competed in 2016, since John Reid was doing things like competing in Robot Wars, or competing in King of Bots with not a hammer. The new pneumatic hammer hits HARD, even if there was a bit too much waiting for a good hit which led to some controversy. And the flat top didn’t work, they need a new anti-vert setup, so those are things to continue tweaking.

KO of the Year: Copperhead vs. Gigabyte
With apologies to Uppercut (vs. Gemini and HiJinx), de-shelling a robot to end a fight is a pretty dramatic way, even more so than punting a robot halfway across the Box or air juggling it over the wall. However…

Hit of the Year: Uppercut blows up SawBlaze’s fuel tank–Uppercut vs. SawBlaze
This was the hit of the year, and yet, the fact that that alone didn’t kill SawBlaze is a testament to how well it’s built, that it still needed to take more punishment to seal that fight. That hit’s in highlight reels rivaling Nightmare vs. Slam Job, Son of Whyachi vs. Nightmare, Icewave vs. Vanquish, the two Gigabyte deshellings… that’s forever. And unlike the rest of them, it wasn’t the KO shot.

Occurrence of the Year: Mammoth vs. HUGE
It’s a contender for Fight of the Year, but that wasn’t a fight. That was a glorious cosmic ballet. The hits, the flips, the two bots being intertwined. I gave multiple audible “What the FUCK”s from watching it, because that was the sound of my mind continuously being blown. And the ending, with HUGE having a wheel over the edge and being unable to get back? The only way it could have been even crazier was if they managed to get back over and continue the fight! It seemed a shame it had to end, because forget three minutes, I’d watch that fight for as long as the batteries ran.

Fight of the Year: Black Dragon vs. Ribbot
Apologies to Whiplash vs. Hydra and Black Dragon vs. Kraken, but this fight had everything. Black Dragon having the early lead before everything else happened, damage being done, fire, the robot on fire somehow winning by decision. Yes, fire makes everything better. Without the fire, sure, one of the other contenders probably gets the nod. But watching the durability of Black Dragon was just a sight to behold.

And without the fire it’s probably the Black Dragon-Kraken fight, so props to Black Dragon for probably having the top 2 fights of the year.

So with that, that’s every award I can think of for now. Maybe for next year we’ll have some more of them, but as for this year, this is not Senor Weaselo signing off because as I said, we’ll have a special article of all the remaining Bounty Hunter fights. So see you then!