It’s story time, dear throwkin! Story time! Find your carpet squares and join me in the circle! So last year, after Jacky won the standard tournament, I did a little interview. It was a good one, and I was so excited to post it. And I did, dear reader! But in the move to new hosting, several (I think a dozen or so) posts were lost—the great sea of data overtook a few of my fleet, to put it more scientifically. So Jacky and I met again at the Urban Open this year to do a replacement axe thrower interview.

And, dear reader, it was a big ol’ interview. We got into it. So here’s what we talked about, I do hope you have a little bit of time.

We started the interview talking about what it was like to win the standard and still have the rest of the weekend to throw:

It destroyed me for the rest of the weekend.

I’ve realized while talking to other people this weekend that I was so exhausted from that standard tournament, I barely ever even remembered this place because that was my first year in the mid for this, which I was like, “Oh, that’s cool, but whatever.” I threw complete trash.

The only match I really remember, and I’m glad I do, was with Peachy. And I’ve hung out with him. I didn’t know him particularly well, but I always hung out with him at the after party because he’s a karaoke fucking superstar and just knows how to get down with the get down. So I kind of casually knew him there. So we had a match and he saw that I was struggling and he made it fun the whole time.

He talked like a robot the whole time, was acting like he was short circuiting while he was going up for the clutch. And he just made it like, that was the best way to lose because I couldn’t throw at all. So I’m glad that I remember that match.

So what do you think has changed for you in that year?

Oh my God, so much. So right before last year, I had this real big skill bump, and went to the standard tourney here.

My average was like, I think what they said on paper was 60, but I was really, because they do it by a certain date, but I was really throwing 63, close to 64. And I had just got my first 81 three weeks before. So I was on this big climb and I threw really well that day.

I lost one match to Bert. I had an overtime loss to Butcher. And then in playoffs, I totally botched the first. I got knocked to the B and then I just fucking clawed my way up. And just by keeping my mind straight, which I was really proud of, and I hope to do consistently, but it’s not always there, I won from the B and I brought every match to the last possible around.

So I was really like, yeah, this is the beginning of me really going up. And I had this expectation. I think you even asked me about how do you prevent a plateau? And I thought I knew. I remember saying that I recognized that I’m moving up, so I’m going to be a small fish in a huge pond. So I voiced awareness of it. I was aware that was going to happen, but you really truly don’t know how that’s going to feel until you’re there.

So I still continued to do well. I came in second for the Under at Throwtober in Boston. I was getting at least one 81 a month. I was podium. I even podiumed a Premier League, which I was like, “Holy shit.” And then it kind of cooled. Then I threw for Round One for the first time and I actually threw good enough to get to Round Two.

And ever since then, it’s just been like a descendant to madness. And it’s subtle until you realize you’re like, “The things I was doing well consistently, I’m not even doing those well. What am I doing to myself?” I changed axes. I did all kinds of shit that I was just complicating things.

Do you think that’s what it was, was the addition of your own self-made complications or do you think something shifted mentally?

I think it was a bunch of different things. Yeah, definitely the mental shift and then being like, “Okay, I got this far with these axe or this axe.”

For instance, I really loved this ABC Axe. Shannon’s awesome, he’s the artist, but I really love that axe. And I would get little bleed threes and I got the voice in the ear from people that are hugely, way more skilled than me being like, “That is a really big blame for Premier. You’re throwing Premier, you should look at something else.”

But I kind of didn’t just consider it. I kind of think I looked at it way too concrete and just was like, “I got to get a smaller axe. I got to do this. I got to do this this way.”

And then so even I started being kind of shaky, but I’m like, “These things will fix it.” And it didn’t and made it worse.

And my last playoffs, they were fucking terrible. They were my worst playoffs in two years. I was knocked out in two matches and that doesn’t happen to me. I don’t always win playoffs, but I haven’t podiumed a league in a few seasons. I did come in third in a MS standard marathon, but marathons I’m usually strong at because before I did axe throwing, I did Krav Maga and I had to do these multi-hour black belt tests and stuff like that. So I’m pretty good at, when I’m exhausted, not thinking about how exhausted I am.

It’s when I started thinking about my mistake sensor happening.

That’s what I was going to ask you. As far as I am just coming off of a real dip maybe six months ago or so. I just sunk. I had the worst averages I’ve had since I started throwing. Couldn’t hit a clutch. I was just failing everywhere. And I realized that I was beating myself up about it and by beating myself up about it, I was digging that hole more.

Exactly. And I’ve been doing that too. I think I answered to your article that was addressing the mentality of a slump and I really identified what you said a lot. I’m like, “Yeah, brother, I’m right with you.”

I was so bad for years. I’ve thrown for four years, and for about two and a half I was dropping a lot. But I stuck with it because I like the people and I like a challenge.

So when stuff started coming together, I did premier straight for a year with no standard, just big axe, premier and that’s it. I did two premiers and I went back to standard and I was like, “Whoa, I can see the difference.” So then I was just open-minded.

At some point when I got to a certain level of success, it became an expectation that I was projecting on other people, but they were really my own.

It was just this kind of mind fuck, and it stopped being joyful. I was losing the joy of throwing.

Sometimes, when I’m throwing, I catch that groove and I feel that joy, I’m like a bullseye machine and I don’t have good balance. I have chronic pain issues, I have MS and stuff. So I know that holds me back a little bit, but I work around it and I give myself grace when I know it’s that because I can’t help that. But then when I was getting into situations where I’m just like, it’s not my balance, it’s not my grip, it’s not anything else. There’s something going on with me. And that’s one of the things that is so frustrating.

But also it’s so weird because – and you’ve probably heard somebody say this or you said it yourself – to just throw better.

I’m like, “I’m trying, but I’m trying not to try, but that’s trying, so fuck it.” It’s like what do I actually do or not do?

I’m going to shift a little here because one of the things I talked about it, I think I talk about it pretty regularly and I wrote a whole big thing about it, but I have cerebral palsy, very mild and it’s offset by hypotonic dysplasia, which makes all your muscles loose. So my throwing is almost never about who I’m throwing against or just throwing better or this is how you become more accurate. There are some league nights where my hand won’t listen to me. And on Thursday it might be that my shoulder isn’t working. My body is an unreliable narrator.

As somebody who has MS, how do you, one, rectify your expectation with reality and two, create systems either for your mental health or just for acceptance of like, okay, today’s going to be a day where I can’t do this or I’m not going to do as well as I think I should. Do you have things that you can do?

I do. And one of the things I realized was I was looking at other people’s grip and some people really kind of put their fingers in certain ways. I can’t consistently do that with a hatchet.

So I realized that I have to have basically my whole paw around it and a square straight handle works great for me because even when I can’t feel my hand or my hand’s on fire or I’m not letting go, if I have that nice square handle, it’s not going to roll. And then I also compensate with chalk, so it’ll slide out. Even if I’m not letting go all the way, my finger’s not going to drag. So there’s certain things that I’ve done that have helped and it’s taken a long time. And I give myself grace.

But like, 90% of the time, it’s not something I advertise because I don’t want people to feel bad for me or feel like I lost because of the MS. There are plenty of times where it’s not that, it’s me. It’s something else and my opponent beat me and that’s totally fine.

But there are some times, especially recently where I’m like, my body isn’t working properly. If my left leg wasn’t lead today, I would have done better in whatever match. Sometimes I drive myself a little mad trying to compensate for it because as you know, that compensation might work for that problem on that day but not the next time it happens.

So it does get frustrating, but at the end of the day, if I’m really going to obsess about that, I’m just, why am I doing this?

I like what you said earlier, too, about turning it into a puzzle. The options for people who have physical challenges are either “ well, my body’s horrible and fuck it and I can’t do anything right and I just have to accept that I’ll never be good at this.” Or you can do what I think you’re suggesting you do where you’re like, “okay, today my left leg is lead or today my hand’s not opening and closing. And so how am I going to figure out how to work around that?”

You’re playing a different game than what everybody else is playing, but you’re still playing a game.

Yeah. There’s a whole, you’re playing that game, but also there’s this kind of other layer to it or maybe not quite a side quest because it’s like running parallel.

Today, my last match, I’m mad at myself because I threw bad, not because my body let me down. I could feel the majority of both my hands. I was just, I think subconsciously there was something happening where I was shorting my throw. I was doing something. I’m like, that’s not a body mechanic thing. My knees feel fine. And that’s when I get the most upset at myself – when it’s not my body mechanics dealing with MS – it’s something else going on.

When it comes to the double elimination tournaments, I don’t do well at a lot. And I try not to think about, well, because I don’t do well at this type of tournament, I’m not going to do well.

I try to have an open mind. But I think somewhere in that whole Freudian iceberg, somewhere in the water underneath, there’s something that’s screaming and my body can hear it or the mechanics can hear it and I’m not completely aware, but I’ll feel I’m shaking.

It’s really frustrating, but not to be a shithead, seeing the top tier people having struggles with mental focus or whatever – it makes me feel a little bit better. It reminds me that I’m not a freak. Like, listening to Alex and Jacy and Adeline talk about it, especially listening to the episode where Adeline talks about the whole process of IATC and her just her nerves getting to her.

I didn’t have that level of pressure, but I know what it feels like to want it so bad and be doing so well, and then all of a sudden it just starts evaporating and you’re trying to collect yourself, but it’s like trying to clean up glitter because it’s always, it’s everywhere. And even if you clean up the most of it, there’s still some specs.

So I am proud of sometimes if I drop, I don’t keep dropping like I used to. With the skills on the Yahtzee team, it was the first time I was on one and I chose big axe and I only missed one thing. I threw low so it didn’t count. I had to have it all in the paint. But I hit the clutch on the first time.

So I’ve enjoyed certain things, but those are newer things. I had an open mind. I just didn’t want to let my team down and just kept an open mind. I exceed my expectations, which was great.

I was hoping to keep that momentum, but again, it’s a different day. It’s a different throw sometimes.

Do you think with what you just said is basically shifting your goals, is that accurate to say?

I’m making it more simple.

That’s a new thing compared to the last time I interviewed you. Is that something you feel like is going to evolve again or do you feel like it’s more of a permanent sort of change in your mindset?

That’s a good question.

I think at this moment, I simplified things because I was losing the joy and I really, even when I was dropping and would be stressed out, I still had joy in my throwing.

As I got better, I think a big part of it was I wasn’t just getting praise from people, the recognition. I was seeing some improvement and feeling like I was growing. So I would kind of fall back a little bit, I was like, “Eh, whatever, this is growing pains.” I got away from that self-acceptance, I guess.

So now I simplified the goals and I’m thinking maybe that’s how I have to be permanently. But right now I’m just taking each event each time and being like, “Okay, I just want to throw well. What does that mean?” Okay, obviously eliminate all drops, minimize threes.

I don’t even give myself a quantity anymore because when I was, I wouldn’t make that mark. So I shifted what “good” meant based off of what was happening. It feels different when you throw well against someone with a 50 average vs. a numbered thrower – success is different.

But if I’m throwing well, if I’m throwing against someone and I almost tied to get to big axe, I’m like, “Okay, that’s pretty good because he’s got a number. He’s in the double digits.” So I’m cool with that. I’m like, “I threw well.”

It doesn’t have to be as concrete because I was getting to the stats, I was getting to the CRS. I had certain goals based on the stats and that was working for them, especially at the end of the year. I met almost all of my goals as far as those objective data.

But maybe objective data isn’t what I should focus on. Maybe it’s the byproduct of my subjective experience. of feeling joy in the throwing because the rest will come after that. I’m realizing, now, that when I started really getting some success and gaining some skill level was when the axe felt good to throw and I can more consistently control where I was going. Even when I can’t feel my hand, it was still working. I was like,” Okay, this is great.” I didn’t drop for a full season. And this was not even two years ago. It was a year and a half ago.

I was like, “I did not drop a single ax for a full season. That’s fucked up.” So then it was chasing that 81, and then I started getting crazy about it. I was like, “You know what? Fuck this. I’m just going to get it right now. I don’t want to do this anymore.” And I actually did. I was like,” Okay, when I decide to do things, it works, but not always.

I can’t chase every butterfly I see in the meadow. You know what I mean? I just got to swing my net and see what I get. I’m trying to hold onto that lately because I’ve kind of more shifted back into that achievement mindset.

You know the book Flowers for Alginon? Somebody who’s a dullard gets intelligence, didn’t realize he was a dullard before, was so happy, was fine, got intelligence, then lost it, was miserable once it was going away because now they know better.

So I can’t go back to before I met certain goals and got to a certain level. Now I changed my name to a Full Metal Power Bottom because I was a bottom seed and I was so happy just to be it. But now being in the mid kind of, I guess this is what it’s like to be a middle child: I’m not doing so badly that people applaud me when I do anything good, and I’m not doing so great that I’m constantly winning stuff.

Sometimes I feel like I don’t have an identity in the sport, kind of. You know what I mean? It’s a really weird place, but I’m in a better spot in that spectrum of misery, I guess, where I’m kind of like, “it is what it is.”

It’s taken me a while to get where I’m at. It’ll take me a lot longer. And the only way I’m going to get better is if I keep doing it. If I quit, I’m not going to get any better.

That’s a perfect place to end it. Any shoutouts?

Yeah. Well, as I did in my last interview, I need to thank Mackenzie for not being here because I think I threw a really good big axe because she wasn’t here, and I felt better when she’s not around.

At one point in time it switched. While I was around, she was throwing worse. So I like to acknowledge that that is still a thing. She’s in New York right now, so maybe she’s too close. So if she was in Boston, I would’ve done better.

So please, Mackenzie, next time be in a different time zone. If you’re a friend, you’ll do that for me.