Magic: The Gathering Pro Tour season 1999–2000

1999–2000 Pro Tour season

Pro Player of the Year	Bob Maher, Jr.
Rookie of the Year	Brian Davis
World Champion	Jon Finkel
Pro Tours	6
Grands Prix	20
Start of season	3 September 1999
End of season	6 August 2000
← 1998–99 2000–01 →

The 1999–2000 Pro Tour season was the fifth season of the Magic: The Gathering Pro Tour. It began on 3 September 1999 with Pro Tour Boston and ended on 6 August 2000 with the conclusion of 2000 World Championship in Brussels. The season consisted of twenty Grand Prixs, and six Pro Tours, located in Washington D.C., London, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, and Brussels. At the end of the season Bob Maher, Jr. was awarded the Pro Player of the year title.

Pro Tour – Washington D.C. (3–5 September 1999)

Washington D.C. was the first team Pro Tour. In a high-profile Top 8 featuring six players who were later inducted into the Hall of Fame, team Your Move Games (YMG) came out on top. YMG consisted of Dave Humpherys, Rob Dougherty, and Darwin Kastle, all eventual members of the Hall of Fame.^[1]

Tournament data

Players: 243 (81 teams)
Format: Urza's Saga Team Sealed (Urza's Saga, Urza's Legacy, Urza's Destiny) – first day, Urza's Saga Team Rochester Draft (Urza's Saga-Urza's Legacy-Urza's Destiny) – final two days
Head Judge: Mike Guptil^[2]

Top 8

Final standings

Place	Team	Player	Prize	Comment
1	Your Move Games	Rob Dougherty	$30,000	2nd Final day
		Dave Humpherys		2nd Final day
		Darwin Kastle		4th Final day
2	Game Empire	Kurt Burgner		2nd Final day
		Alan Comer		3rd Final day
		Brian Selden		2nd Final day
3	Antarctica	Jon Finkel		6th Final day
		Steven O'Mahoney-Schwartz		3rd Final day
		Daniel O'Mahoney-Schwartz
4	THL	Marc Aquino
		Richard Jones
		Drew McLean

Grand Prixs – Tohoku, Memphis, Lisbon

Pro Tour – London (15–17 October 1999)

Kyle Rose won Pro Tour London, defeating Austrian Thomas Preyer in the finals. Darwin Kastle's back to back Top 8 appearances in Washington and London brought him to five final day appearance in his career.^[1]

Tournament data

Prize pool: $151,635
Format: Urza's Saga Booster Draft (Urza's Saga-Urza's Legacy-Urza's Destiny)
Head Judge: Carl Crook^[2]

Final standings

Place	Player	Prize	Comment
1	Kyle Rose	$25,000	3rd Final day
2	Thomas Preyer	$15,000
3	Mike Bregoli	$10,000
4	Ben Rubin	$8,000	3rd Final day
5	Gunnar Refsdal	$6,500
6	William Jensen	$5,500
7	Marc Hernandez	$4,800
8	Darwin Kastle	$4,300	5th Final day

Grand Prixs – Kyushu, Sao Paulo, Milan, San Diego, Tours

Pro Tour – Chicago (3–5 December 1999)

Bob Maher, Jr. won Pro Tour Chicago playing a blue-green-white control deck. He defeated Brian Davis in the finals 3–2. First time Pro Tour attendant Davis reportedly played so horribly, that around spectators the joke went, that Davis was the first to have played 5–0 in the finals and lost, referring to their perception that he could and should have won every single game.^[1]

Tournament data

Prize pool: $151,635
Players: 344
Format: Extended
Head Judge: Nat Fairbanks^[2]

Top 8

Final standings

Place	Player	Prize	Comment
1	Bob Maher, Jr.	$25,000
2	Brian Davis	$15,000	Pro Tour debut
3	Christian Lührs	$10,000	2nd Final day
4	Raphaël Lévy	$8,000	2nd Final day
5	Alan Comer	$6,500	4th Final day
6	Dirk Baberowski	$5,500	2nd Final day
7	Tony Dobson	$4,800
8	Hector Fuentes	$4,300	1st Spaniard in a Top 8

Grand Prixs – Manila, Seattle, Madrid

Pro Tour – Los Angeles (4–6 February 2000)

Trevor Blackwell defeated Chris Benafel in the finals to become Pro Tour Los Angeles champion.^[1]

Tournament data

Prize pool: $151,635
Players: 337
Format: Mercadian Masques Booster Draft (Mercadian Masques)
Head Judge: Dan Gray^[2]

Top 8

Final standings

Place	Player	Prize	Comment
1	Trevor Blackwell	$25,000
2	Chris Benafel	$15,000
3	Kurt Burgner	$10,000	3rd Final day
4	Mike Long	$8,000	4th Final day
5	Erno Ekebom	$6,500
6	Bruce Cowley	$5,500
7	Andrew Nishioka	$4,800
8	Brian Selden	$4,300	3rd Final day

Grand Prix – Taipei, Philadelphia, Cannes, Kuala Lumpur, Frankfurt

Pro Tour – New York (14–16 April 2000)

Sigurd Eskeland won Pro Tour New York, defeating Warren Marsh in the finals.^[1] Eskeland played a blue control-deck with the centerpiece of the deck being Rising Waters.^[3] His opponent played the deck most present at this tournament, Rebels.^[4] PT New York is considered to be the first time where there was a dominant deck at a Pro Tour, the deck did not win the tournament.

43% of the players entering the tournament had chosen rebel decks. On the second day of the tournament rebels were even more present, comprising and unprecedented 57% of the field. These numbers were again topped by the final eight where six of eight decks were rebel decks.^[5] In contrast the winning Rising Waters deck comprised only 8.4% of the field on day one and 14.5% on day two. In the top eight the two non-rebel decks were both Rising Waters decks. Rising Waters on both days had the highest winning percantage of all decks played with 60% on day one and 53.8% on day two.^[6]

Tournament data

Players: 310
Prize pool: $151,635
Format: Mercadian Masques Block Constructed (Mercadian Masques, Nemesis)
Location: New York State Armory
Head Judge: Cyril Grillon^[2]

Top 8

Final standings

Place	Player	Prize	Comment
1	Sigurd Eskeland	$25,000	1st Norwegian to win a Pro Tour
2	Warren Marsh	$15,000
3	Ben Rubin	$10,000	4th Final day
4	Mattias Kettil	$8,000
5	John Larkin	$6,500	1st Irish Player in a Top 8
6	Mike Bregoli	$5,500	2nd Final day
7	Travis Turning	$4,800
8	John Hunka	$4,300

Winner's deck

Sigurd Eskeland played a blue control-deck with the centerpiece of the deck being Rising Waters.

Team Challenge

The Team Challenge was a predecessor to the Masters Series events that were held from 2000 to 2003. These events were open only to the most accomplished players and awarded cash prizes even for entering the tournament. The Team Challenge at Pro Tour New York 2000 awarded $3,000 for entering the tournament, $9,000 to the runners-up team, and $15,000 to the winners. Four teams were invited to enter the tournament.^[7] In a field composed of otherwise American teams the French team Black Ops defeated Game Empire and Antarctica to win the tournament.

Team	Player		Team	Player
Antarctica	Daniel O'Mahoney-Schwartz		Game Empire	Brian Selden
	Jon Finkel			Alan Comer
	Steven O'Mahoney-Schwartz			Kurt Burgner
Black Ops	Florent Jeudon		Your Move Games	Rob Dougherty
	Antoine Ruel			Dave Humpherys
	Olivier Ruel			Darwin Kastle

Grand Prixs – Nagoya, St. Louis, Copenhagen, Pittsburgh

2000 World Championships – Brussels (2–6 August 2000)

Jon Finkel won the 2000 World Championship, defeating teammate Bob Maher, Jr. in the finals. The second place allowed Maher to take the Pro Player of the year title, surpassing Darwin Kastle in the final standings. Finkel became the second player to win two Pro Tours and the first with seven Top 8 appearances. The US team won the national team competition, also with Finkel as reigning national champion at its head.^[1]

Tournament data

Players: 273
Individual formats: Formats: Mercadian Masques Booster Draft (Mercadian Masques-Nemesis-Prophecy), Mercadian Masques Block Constructed (Mercadian Masques, Nemesis, Prophecy), Standard
Team Format: Standard
Head Judge: Cyril Grillon^[2]

Top 8

Final standings

Place	Player	Prize	Comment
1	Jon Finkel	$34,000	7th Final day, 2nd Pro Tour win
2	Bob Maher, Jr.	$22,000	2nd Final day
3	Dominik Hothow	$16,000
4	Benedikt Klauser	$13,000	2nd Final day
5	Tom van de Logt	$11,000
6	Helmut Summersberger	$9,500
7	Janosch Kühn	$8,250	2nd Final day
8	Nicolas Labarre	$7,250	3rd Final day

National team competition

1. United States (Jon Finkel, Chris Benafel, Frank Hernandez, Aaron Forsythe)
2. Canada (Ryan Fuller, Murray Evans, Gabriel Tsang, Sam Lau)

Pro Player of the year final standings

After the World Championship Bob Maher, Jr. was awarded the Pro Player of the year title.^[8]

Rank	Player	Pro Points
1	Bob Maher, Jr.	72
2	Darwin Kastle	69
3	Jon Finkel	68
4	Alex Shvartsman	58
5	Trevor Blackwell	50
	Ben Rubin	50

References