By: Jeff Barnes
The year is 2010 and it's January in Las Vegas. Team Smashing Time has just put the finishing touches on their second consecutive World Series of Beer Pong title. The team's star player, Michael "Pop" Popielarski, is sleeping in his bed while members of Smashing Time's entourage enjoy the spoils of Vegas. In walks Maryland player Sean Foster, who promptly removes the shoes from the 6'6" sleeping giant.
"I want to know what it's like to walk in the shoes of a champion for a day," Foster says.
When it comes to beer pong champions, there's Smashing Time and then there's everyone else. Winners of the $50,000 World Series of Beer Pong IV, the $25,000 Atlantic City Beer Pong Championship, and the $50,000 World Series of Beer Pong V, the duo of Popielarski and the louder, more theatric Ron Hamilton have more cash winnings from three beer pong tournaments then many of their fellow players have earned in their entire professional lives.
Pop & Ron
While much of the spotlight tends to focus on the wild antics of the much bigger, much louder Hamilton, it's the near-flawless shooting of Popielarski which still lands him at the top of most player rankings. Although Smashing Time came up short in its attempt to three-peat this year in Las Vegas, most people still consider Pop the player to beat. In a sport usually dominated by drunkenness, distractions and disputes as to who is better than whom, for the most part the New York native chooses to let his play do the talking.
"I just want what I deserve. I want to win. I'm not into all the hype like some of the other guys are."
Popielarski, 26, is not what you'd expect from a two-time world champion. With three major championships, multiple singles championships, a Beast of the East title, numerous Satellite™ tournament victories and feature articles in ESPN, Time and Maxim, among other things, you would expect some cockiness. But rather than dwell on past successes, Popielarski instead seems more interested in seeing the sport of beer pong continue to grow as a whole.
It was in that now-infamous ESPN article that Ron Hamilton told writer Rick Reilly he chugged a bottle of Jack Daniels during the final day of competition. Popielarski, who recently earned his degree in business management, apparently was paying attention in class.
"That made us look like idiots," he said. "That's not helping the sport grow."
It's fitting that Popielarski is known as "Pop" to most people. With perhaps the most decorated career in beer pong history, he has been doing it better and for longer than most players. One of the most recognizable people in the international beer pong community, Pop finds himself talking to a lot of new players at tournaments and on Facebook. He says he doesn't turn down a single friend request, and answers every question he is asked, even if it takes him a while.
His string of successes extends far beyond the final tables in Las Vegas. In some ways, he has become a victim of his own success. In bars and tournaments around New York, he has found himself banned from competition, with owners and organizers fearful he will scare away the prospective players. Despite the restrictions, however, Pop says his inclusion on the first D.O.E. Top 25 list and tournaments with partner restrictions have made him a better player.
New Talent, Old Rivals
Restrictions have also helped create some other great players, too. Pop began playing regularly with the young, baby-faced Jon Basile last year when the first Top 25 restrictions came about. Since last year, Basile has gone from relatively unknown to being mentioned among the top five. While Pop can certainly take credit for much of Basile's success, he also says that playing with Basile now makes him a different kind of player. He compares playing with Basile to playing with a better-shooting version of Ron Hamilton.
"I learned how to share," Pop says. "It's always been all on me."
A beer pong veteran, Pop has seen it all in his journey from the beginning to the top. He's been a part of almost every major rule and equipment change. He says it helps keeps his game sharp. On any given night he will be playing tournaments with different rules, different tables, different balls, and different cups. On top of that, he's seen the level of his competition increase dramatically.
"Beer pong now is not what it was five years ago," he says. "I only had like 6, 7, 8 guys to worry about. Now you have 15-20 guys to worry about. And we really do get everyone's best, no matter how good or bad they are."
But Pop is not without his detractors. A semi-public feud has developed on both Facebook and the BPONG forums between Pop and Kevin Kessler. The two fell short playing together in Atlantic City this past summer, and most recently Pop has criticized Kessler for allegedly targeting his prospective partners for upcoming tournaments.
"I just don't like the way he conducts business," Pop says.
Beer Pong As A Sport
Popielarski's most important battle, he says, is furthering the legitimacy of beer pong as a sport. While the debate of whether or not beer pong is a sport has been argued for years, Pop believes there are two ways to look at beer pong.
"Is it a sport or isn't it? I look at non-leaning [beer pong] as a game—it's more fun and less serious. I look at leaning [beer pong] as a sport."
Almost every beer pong player learns the game in the house party setting, Pop says. Anyone can play a game of beer pong at a house party and have fun without taking it too seriously. It's the level of skill involved and high-shooting percentages which distance the competitive sport from the traditional house party game.
Pop also believes that if players want beer pong to be taken more seriously as a sport, they need to start acting more seriously as players. He thinks teams should look more like teams, with each team wearing a shirt or uniform. He also thinks distractions have become a little too much, with some players making the distractions and trash talk their sole motivation to play.
"[Excessive distractions] are a rookie game," he says. "That makes it look like a game, not a sport."
Pop believes that if things like billiards, darts, poker and Scrabble have a home on ESPN, than beer pong certainly belongs. He contrasts a game of beer pong to a basketball game, which lacks clutch moments until the final moments of play.
"You have to be clutch 10 times in one game of beer pong, not just once."
Upcoming Competition
With the sun setting on the Smashing Time chapter of his career, Pop has a slew of top players lined up for the next four major tournaments. This weekend he will defend his title at the $2,500 Maryland Spring Classic with Vince Bolhuis. In April, he will be teaming up with Maryland's Jordan McAllister for the Drunken Bear $10,000 tournament and Kyle Williams for the SJ Pong $5,000 tournament. And then this summer, he will be teaming up for his first major with his protégé, Jon Basile, for the World Pong Tour's $25,000 Atlantic City Championship.
After that, he is not sure who he will be playing with in this year's World Series of Beer Pong. He hasn't ruled out a reunion with Ron Hamilton somewhere down the line.
"I never really close the book on anyone," Pop says. Despite his success, Pop wants to be known as more than just another beer pong player.
"People think I'm just some dumb kid who plays beer pong and is drunk all the time, [but] I was just smart enough to realize a talent and was able to cash in on it. If you have a talent, go ahead and use it."
