Welcome back to the Beat! Last week,

Minotaur had a fire. Tombstone had a fire. And Pain Train’s batteries had a fire.

Well, I can pretty much guarantee there will be fewer fires. If there were more fires I’d be pretty damn impressed because that would essentially be every fight. Onto the fights!

Yeti vs. MadCatter
Some of the best personalities in the sport square off, as Greg “Don’t Be a Dick” Gibson and Yeti return after he mulled some sort of quasi-retirement. Well, he called upon old vet Christian Carlberg, and as a C2 Robotics vehicle they’ve teamed up for this iteration of Yeti. A little less chonky (but still fairly big considering some of the svelter bots in the sport), which snazzy-looking new forks, we’ll see what Yeti’s got after moving to the Central Coast.

On the other side, there’s MadCatter and Macho Man Martin Mason. Best current interview in the game, and I’m waiting for a Martin Mason/Stephen Felk interview. It would be legendary. MadCatter surprised everyone by going 3-0 last year, only losing to the lower seed in their first round matchup, some upstart bot named Tombstone, and making the Bronco bounty final before losing to Rotator. They’ve got their usual assortment of vertical disk and lifter, which have now updated to 10 motors with even more power. And the disk is now a 48-pounder. I remember that’s an improvement from last year, but I don’t know how much heavier.

Yeti was forks up but went up MadCatter’s wedge, getting thrown upwards and flipped for its efforts. The forks did their job self-righting, but MadCatter pulled the two hit combo once Yeti was back upright, another big hit flipping Yeti then coming for a second strike before Yeti could even drive again.

Driver Calvin Iba (that’s now NHRL champion Calvin Iba) kept MadCatter’s pressure on Yeti as the drum bot was down a wheel and down a drum, as a belt came off off early. As MadCatter’s assault continued, Yeti’s drum looked like it was off its castings and hanging on by a thread. Nicely for the drum, MadCatter worked the back, but unfortunately for Yeti, took that panel off too. Another rear shot might have led to some disemboweling, as Yeti moved a little but that was it. To quote Kenny Florian, “MadCatter out-Yetied Yeti.”

MadCatter by KO in 2:01. Rough return to the box for Yeti as it got absolutely trashed, as Martin Mason can continue his Randy Savage impersonation, and Team Bad Kitty shows that 2020 was no fluke.

Defender vs. Ribbot
The first of our “secondary” bots to show off for tonight. It’s time for younger brother Jason Vasquez to do his own thing as the Vasquez family throws a second bot into the ring in Defender, a clamper with a lot of forks and a lifting arm under the bot as well. There are six things to control on the bot (movement, lifter, flamethrower, clamper, other… things?) It’s a lot to do.

The quarterfinal frog that managed to beat both Beta and Uppercut returns, but members of Ribbot have graduated from WPI, so that makes some things getting the bot together a little tougher, because now they have real jobs. They also went to brushless motors, which means that they can get more power, though at the possible cost of reliability. (Motors either run brushed or brushless. Here’s an article describing them.) Ribbot also has the vertical spinner running for this fight rather than the under cutter, because that has a better chance of getting through Defender’s forks.

Defender went for the rush, as expected, pushing Ribbot back as the frog tried to grind away at the forks. But once Defender had to let go, one of the inner forks took damage, and once it got bent up it was doing more harm than good. It’s the SawBlaze problem, essentially. Ribbot could immediately get that leverage and punt Defender into the corner with a flurry doing damage, taking pieces off the bot, flipping it over, flipping it back over, and getting it stuck on the rails where it stayed.

Ribbot wins by KO. Rough first start for Jason Vasquez as Ribbot hit him with the srimech wave.

HiJinx vs. Mammoth
So, after Mammoth had their legendary… bot dancing routine… against HUGE last year, the tallest bot gets another battle of the biggest. Quick, if I told you who had the longest horizontal spinner in BattleBots, who would it be? Believe it or not, it’s undercutter HiJinx.

Mammoth is meant to be a meta breaker, and we actually got a segment about the meta and the attempts to break through the meta with Mammoth and HUGE and SMEEEEEE and Fusion. There are more designs obviously, but after all, with the new floor and the new box geometry the metagame formula seems narrower than ever: 4WD wedged (or forked) vertical spinners. If you can find something that counters that, you’re in a really good place because of all the top bots that are exactly that: End Game, Witch Doctor, Bite Force if Paul Ventimiglia wasn’t doing the noble thing and holding out so that way builders get better stipends, Whiplash kinda, MadCatter, Ribbot when in vert mode, Tantrum-ish… it’s a long list.

Mammoth has a new spinner for this fight made of the HDPE. It’s to be malleable in the direction HiJinx’s spinner spins while rigid vertically. Also important, Mammoth’s weapon now has redundant chains this year, so it won’t break almost immediately. And in “stop the presses” news, it actually shrunk 10 inches this year, from 6’ 4” to 5’ 6”.

Mammoth came in with the bot rush and used its size to its advantage as it pushed and corralled HiJinx towards the new short corner, using the Upper Deck to trap the undercutter. At first it seemed like the HDPE spinner wasn’t doing very much and was in fact bending in the direction that it wasn’t supposed to, but suddenly HiJinx got airborne and got flipped—it looked like it was part Mammoth and part HiJinx getting air on its own from Mammoth recoil. And then a wheel came off of HiJinx on impact. One, I don’t think HiJinx has a srimech. Two, with a two-wheeled bot losing a wheel is probably the end of the fight. Also Jen Herchenroeder swearing might signify the end of the fight. She was not happy.

Mammoth wins by KO. Even though it apparently blew up the previous night. I have to admit, the big bot keeps proving me wrong!

Kraken vs. Rotator
A Florida Bot Mafia pair that seemingly will not die. Kraken is the lone crusher this season, now with more power (from 60,000 lbs. to 100,000 lbs. of force.) in those pneumatic jaws. That is 50 tons, which is more than what Quantum claimed to have in their hydraulic crusher, but for some reason it hasn’t translated into breaking through and piercing bots’ armor for the sea monster. What may help is new teeth—instead of being circular, they’re now properly blade-shaped. At the least, the teeth shouldn’t break apart as quickly.

Meanwhile, Rotator is officially no longer a double spinner. Just a single spinner and an absolute tank, but now with brushless motors. Could that take away some of its tankiness, as previously mentioned? Then again, it won Most Destructive last year, and now has more power due to the brushless motors. That is a frightening thought. Victor Soto and crew are going with the forks and overhead blade for this fight, since that should protect it from Kraken’s jaws. Somehow, though it’s been steadily improving, making last year’s top 16, losing a controversial decision to End Game, and winning Bronco’s bounty, Rotator has never won its first fight of the year, dating back to its debut season where it lost to Witch Doctor in 42 seconds. And that seems generous.

Rotator turned to avoid the rush to spin up, and Kraken almost took out beloved minibot Wally the Narwhal after bumping off Rotator. But she was undeterred, and yes, the second time Wally was indeed sacrificed but Kraken also got the squeeze on Rotator. But also caught on fire, because apparently Rotator hit the fuel line, unbeknownst to anyone until they let loose the fire. So Kraken had successfully pulled a Diotoir, especially with all the plastic on the head. Kraken tried to release after the mandated 30 seconds but they were stuck, with their teeth wedged right behind Rotator’s wheel. So they needed the crewbots to unstick. (The crewbots are the formal name, but in reality it’s just Trey Roski with a crowbar.)

That was big for both bots. On one hand, if for some reason the mighty crowbar couldn’t get the two bots stuck, just over a minute had passed and the fight would go to the judges. Rotator had done some damage but would probably lose the control and aggression categories considering the main thing from the fight was getting caught in Rotator’s jaws. Meanwhile, Kraken, still on fire, benefitted from the unstick thanks to the also almighty fire extinguisher.

The unstick was successful, so at the sound of the buzzer the bots would continue with 1:52 on the clock.

Rotator got a bump up off of Kraken’s wedge and took both teeth off Kraken in one shot. Kraken was able to push Rotator to the wall, but Rotator could spin around because Victor Soto has become a fantastic driver over these last five years, working around the lower parts of Kraken, first damaging, then removing entirely the left wheel.

Okay, that’s gotta be it. Kraken’s a two-wheeled bot, so there’s no way she can move with one wheel, right? Nope. Kraken was still mobile, barely. Rotator came in and obliterated the rest of the cosmetic plastic off K’s mouth. Somehow, Kraken pieces were across the Box… and the robot survived. You cannot kill the sea beast, you can only keep her at bay. Matt Spork gave a “Whoa!” as the two builders gave props to each other. To the judges!

Damage: 5-0, because you can’t give Rotator 6.
Control: 2-1: That first bite and first full minute of the fight gets Kraken a point.
Aggression: 2-1: Kraken kept trying to bite, even toothless.

So I have it 9-2 Rotator. And in a decision surprising absolutely no one, Rotator wins by unanimous decision and continues to show why it won last year’s Most Destructive. And they finally win the season opener.

Rusty vs. Blip
Everyone’s favorite rookie bot from last year returns! There was much rejoicing as Rusty, the bot that could, returns for a sophomore season, now armed with sledgehammer under a traffic cone. But what’s surprising is that this is stil Rusty 1.0, the Season 5 version. Not the Season 6 version that’s on the page! We’ll see what happens.

Aren Hill’s new flipper Blip has the same flywheel flipper concept that Warrior had, combined with a Tantrum level of armor. But it’s a much smaller flywheel than Warrior essentially pulled with a rope, similar to a trebuchet. And lookitdat smile! It’s so cute!

Blip circled around, dodged a hammer blow from Rusty, and sent Rusty flying. And then a second flip towards the Upper Deck. A third, an attempted out of the arena (though with new rules you have to watch out for that). A fourth into the pulverizer. And Rusty’s back armor came off. A fifth flip was just the back armor, which was flattened by the pulverizer as Blip went into a victory gyro dance. Oh, the flipper can gyro dance. That’s new and not at all terrifying.

Blip wins by KO. Okay, Rusty isn’t End Game, but that flipper’s for real. And Rusty’s popcorn bowl is dented. I guess Rusty 2.0 comes after this fight?

Tantrum vs. Malice
Now the older Seems Reasonable bot comes, fresh off its semifinal run. And since Aren Hill’s running Blip (officially), there have to be new captains, naturally. (Technically the rule is you’re only allowed to be on one team, officially. But obviously there’s cross-pollination here.) Alex Grant and Ginger Schmidt at the reins of last year’s semifinalist.

Meanwhile Malice will hopefully not do The Thing this year, where they end up on the back of the bot and can’t use their weapon to right. Because it did it twice last year. So there’s a new bunny tail on Bunny Sauriol and co’s bot. It’s a tough matchup against the brick that is Tantrum, but they have a new bar instead of their signature disk, called Rolling Blackout.

Tantrum’s box rush sent Malice flipping, and that first blow killed Malice’s weapon, because it wasn’t spinning. Tantrum could pretty much start to pick and choose its shots as it fired up its death hum, while Malice was playing keep-away as best as possible. But Tantrum’s wedge was winning the ground game over Malice’s not-wedge and getting under Malice every time, delivering another flipping shot to Malice, eventually pushing and pinning the bot into the corner.

Malice was stuck under the rails, possibly with its new tail wedged in the wall (because that would be fitting), but Tantrum actually unstuck them… in order to pin them against the wall some moreand keep the horizontal flipping. It may have cost them as it seemed like it killed Tantrum’s weapon, but Tantrum was busy controlling and winning the pushing match, sending Malice into the rails in the dying seconds. It went to the judges as Malice just barely stayed off the Upper Deck.

Damage: 4-1: Losing the weapon at the end keeps Tantrum from going 5-0.
Control: 3-0
Aggression: 3-0

Tantrum wins by unanimous decision.

YouTube Exclusive: Shatter! vs. SubZero
Shatter! has a new sword weapon meant for spinners. (See picture for details.) SubZero is not that though, so the standard hammer goes on. I’m admittedly not sure about any changes with SubZero, but I imagine they’ve armored up the top for this fight. Once again, you can just watch the fight through totally legal embeddable means! Hey, less work for me.

Shatter! wins by unanimous decision. Basically, the only question is… did SubZero get a point? The flipper was out of commission for what, 2:59? So… I’m gonna say no, 11-0 Shatter!. The sweet shiny vinyl is purely cosmetic (as they made sure of last year), so no damage was done. And I can’t say 2-1 in either control or aggression, so, yeah, Shatter! picks up a dominant win against a bot that made the top 32 and was a bounty hunter last year, the quarterfinalist picks up where they left off.

Main Event
Bloodsport vs. Whiplash
We got the #1 seed vs. the champ in the season premiere, now we get the #2 seed vs. the runner-up. Bloodsport was the one bot to beat End Game last year. They’ve gone from S7 to AR500 with the weapons. It’s a little softer, but it’s also tougher, and they had bar breaking issues towards the end of last season, so they don’t want to deal with more of that.

Is there another “runner-up curse” of a slow start as seen by Bombshell, Minotaur, and Witch Doctor, or will Whiplash be able to do what Tombstone did and do one better than last year? Matt Vasquez is one of the few people happy about the new box geometry. Whiplash might be able to use the short corner and use the Upper Deck to its potential. And they have new wedgelets! That’s been a question I’ve had about Whiplash. With the advancement of forks and the ground game even more with the new floor, Whiplash’s plow needs a little more. They are also in their anti-spinner heavy formation, so they don’t have the vertical disk for this fight, like in their two Valkyrie fights last year.

Obviously Whiplash went for the box rush against the powerful overhead, but Bloodsport was able to spin up enough. Whiplash was mostly getting under Bloodsport, but B was getting away from prolonged rams and chipping away at Whiplash’s wedge. Whiplash got a lift in and Bloodsport actually shed a tire. It didn’t seem to affect them too much as they spun back up, but Whiplash took them into the screws, and in a new piece of ingenuity, used the lifter to clamp to guide Bloodsport into more of the screws.

The two bots went back and forth as a cat and mouse game, with Whiplash the cat, until Whiplash was able to get a flip in the perfect place. Right at the screws, by the Upper Deck, and with Bloodsport’s srimech caught in the screws. The screws reversed to give Bloodsport a chance to get free and to self-right, but immediately after Whiplash flipped Bloodsport back over, and pushed Bloodsport through the screws onto the Upper Deck. Bloodsport had to try and spin up to self-right and then get off the new hazard, but between the damage to the srimech and any damage to the weapon they weren’t getting enough wiggle room, and there was just enough time for Bloodsport to get counted out.

Whiplash wins by KO in 2:59. Matty Vasquez does it again, and calls his shot—he wanted to use the Upper Deck and have it come into play, and it absolutely did. If it did go to the judges, here’s what I’ve got:

Damage: 3-2 Bloodsport. Wedge damage on Whiplash vs. the lost tire on Bloodsport is fairly even.
Aggression: 2-1: Bloodsport definitely deserves a point because they were in it throughout and trying to attack, but at the same time, they were the mouse to Whiplash’s cat.
Control: 3-0: It’s close between 2-1 and 3-0 but even so it never seemed like Whiplash was in any real bother.

So that would give me 7-4 Whiplash.

That does it for this week. In next week’s action:

Last year’s 32nd seed, the mercurial HyperShock takes on Danby breakout bot Slammo!, no longer sponsored.
Hard-hitting undercutter Valkyrie takes on “33rd seed” P1.
The original meta-breaker HUGE takes on the Bloodsport offshoot, Riptide.
Team Whyachi’s double-ended Fusion takes on Team Carbide’s built bot Cobalt, now a Gigabyte offshoot.
Quarterfinalist Black Dragon takes one of last year’s bounty bots, Icewave, returning as a full-time competitor.
2019 runner-up Witch Doctor takes on the seemingly indestructible DUCK!, making it’s return.
In the YouTube Exclusive, the speedy Claw Viper takes on rookie drum Pardon My French.
Main Event: Last year’s 3rd seed Copperhead takes on the former Desperado and Beta bounty winner Lock-Jaw.

See you next week!