The Battle of the Breweries (2023)
The Battle of the Breweries – 2023
Let’s do it again! Round 3 – FIGHT! We started this tradition in 2021 and continued it in 2022, and now its 2023’s turn to get in at it and have the breweries duke it out. And this time, on top of potentially angering the NCAA with our “March Madness” tournament, we’re also hoping to anger FIFA by stealing an idea from the World Cup.
Every year I like to change up how we do our version of March Madness – The Beer Thrillers Battle of the Breweries. First year we had 48 breweries compete for the prestigious championship, then in the second year we had 128 breweries battle for supremacy, this year, instead of doing a linear tournament, we are going to have a starting group stage similar to that of the World Cup, followed by a ‘knockout’ tournament or normal linear tournament structure. This year we are also beefing it up to 160 breweries fighting for the honors, the glory, the fame, the prestige, the big she bang, The Battle of the Breweries Champion!
The group round will be the same structure as the World Cup’s – the top two “teams” (ie. breweries) with the most points (ie. most votes) move on to the tournament. The big difference is that each group will be five breweries instead of the four teams in the World Cup.
The tournament structure is pretty straight forward. Four conferences of 16 breweries. The groups will be kept for the conferences, so each conference will have 8 groups that are locked in for that conference. After the group round ends, and the breweries advance, I will seed them based on their Untappd scores. (So a 4.04 Untappd rating will most likely result in a 1 Seed, whereas a 3.31 Untappd rating will most likely result in a 16 seed.)
The tournament then runs linear similar to NCAA’s March Madness and other similar bracket tournaments. 16 vs. 1, 15 vs. 2, 14 vs. 3, 13 vs. 4, etc. The winner of each conference will then face off in a fatal four – way to determine the true champion of The Beer Thrillers’ Battle of the Breweries (2023).
Past Tournament Announcements
See our announcement and rules articles for the past tournaments here:
- March Madness (2021) – The Beer Thrillers Way
- March Madness (2022) – Bigger, Bolder, Badder – The Battle of the Breweries
Past Champions
In 2021 we had 48 breweries compete to determine our first inaugural champion. Instead of doing a 64 competitor tournament or 32, we decided to do a crazy thing like pick 48, which resulted in a Triple Threat to determine the winner.
The initial tournament finals consisted of The Isle of Que Brewing vs. Rubber Soul Brewing Company vs. Troegs Independent Craft Brewing Company.
The Isle of Que Brewing emerged victorious.
In our second tournament, we decided we would raise the stakes a bit. Instead of going from 48 to 64 – which would be the logical conclusion – we decided instead to go all the way to 128 competitors. Four conferences of 32 breweries each divided into divisions of 16 (two divisions per conference). Its like I thought we were the NFL or MLB or something.
At the very end we had the four conferences face off in a fatal four – way match up, that saw Von C Brewing vs. Bunnyman Brewing Company vs. Axemann Brewery.
Von C Brewing company emerged victorious from the fatal four – way with barely scraping by Bunnyman Brewing Company in a very close and hard fought battle. (Both breweries amassed over 3,000 votes!)
You can read about the winners here:
- The Battle of the Breweries (2021) Winner Is….
- The Battle of the Breweries (2022) Winner Is…..
- The Battle of the Breweries (2022) – Full Recap
The Rules
There’s gotta be some kind of rules to this madness right? This madness of March (and well, this year the end of February as well… and yes… also a bit of April as the tournament goes into that month as well). So… what are the rules involved?
To pull straight the initial March Madness / Battle of the Breweries post:
So how’s this going to work? Who all is invited? What all breweries are going to be in it? How many breweries? How’s voting going to work? Who decides whose in and whose out? Whats the seeding? Why is Rick such a jerk to Morty? Why is Jurassic Bark the saddest episode of Futurama ever? Why is it also B. Kline’s favorite episode? What does that say about him? Why is the sky blue?
Ok…. enough with the questions!
March Madness (2021) – The Battle of the Breweries (2021)
Firstly, the only way for a brewery to be eligible for the Battle of Breweries… is quite simple – be a brewery that a member of The Beer Thrillers has visited in person. So that means all 160 breweries involved were visited by myself – B. Kline, Amy, Josh, Leela, or Scarlet. (And yea… there’s gonna be quite a bit of overlap there with Leela and Scarlet.)
After the 160 breweries were picked, they were then randomly placed in each of the conferences. (Random number generator.) They were then once again random number generated (RNG) into their different groups. Once we come out of the group stage, they will be seeded based on their Untappd global average rating (as of February 24th, 2023). In the case of ties (ie. a 3.63 and a 3.63), I will flip a coin to see who gets the higher seed; in the case of multiples (for example three breweries with a 3.63), I will roll for it or use a random number generator. Remember – I was once (…ok, still am) a huge nerd, so I have D3’s, D4’s, D6’s, D10’s, D12’s, and D20’s. (I even have a D100 laying around somewhere in my office.)
Voting
Each day you will be able to come to the site to make your votes in the polls. It will be set-up by IPS, so it limits you to voting just once per day per vote. You can vote as many times as you want per round, but only once per day.
Rounds will be last one week (ending on Sunday nights at 11:59:59 PM EST) and the new week of voting starting up the next day (Monday) when I get the articles posted (usually around 8:30 – 9:30 AM EST).
The first round – the group stage – will begin Monday February 27th, 2023. This will most likely be around 8:30 AM – 9:30 AM. There will be more details in each voting page’s article. There will be an individual post for each conference.
The last week – the fatal four-way will be two weeks. This will give adequate time for voting for the championship.
Conferences
In the past two years I used the names of professional wrestlers (Stone Cold Steve Austin, Triple H, The Rock, Ric Flair, Roman Reigns, Brock Lesnar, Charlotte Flair, Ronda Rousey, etc.) for each conference, but I think this is a bit confusing, and will instead switch it up. I know using ‘hop’ names is the typical go to for other tournament brackets around this time, but it does seem the most straight forward and keeps it with the ‘beer’ theme. So for this year, we will be going with hop names.
Those hop names and thus the conference names are:
- Chinook
- Nugget
- Saaz
- Walhalla
I chose four different varieties that I grow at home / (aka The Beer Thrillers Headquarters). Each of these conferences will have 8 groups of 5 breweries each, after the group stage each conference will have 16 breweries in a tournament.
Let’s take an early look at what breweries are in what conferences:
Chinook
- Hackensack Brewing Company
- Chubby Squirrel Brewing Company
- Compass Mill Tap Room
- Acclamation Brewing Company
- Forbes Trail Brewing
- Bronx Brewery
- Dancing Gnome Brewing
- Vanish Farmwoods Brewery
- Bright Path Brewing Company
- South County Brewing Company
- Capitol City Brewing
- Tattered Flag Brewing
- Wrong Crowd Brewing
- Valhalla Brewing
- River Horse Brewing
- Harper’s Ferry Brewing
- Dogfish Head Craft Brewery
- Sly Fox Brewing
- Bolero Snort Brewing
- Steinhardt Brewing
- River Trail Brewing
- Breaker Brewing
- Bucket Brigade Brewing
- Burley Oak Brewery
- Black Flag Brewing
- Mudhook Brewery
- Boom City Brewing Company
- Pineknotter Brewing Company
- Sapwood Cellars
- Rusty Rail Brewing
- Rough Edges Brewing
- Flood Zone Brewing
- Little Fish Brewing
- Chilly Water Brewing
- Hop Farm Brewing
- Schaylor Brewing
- Cox Brewing Company
- Attaboy Beer
- Cushwa Brewing Company
- Ever Grain Brewing Company
Nugget
- Brix City Brewing
- Willow Creek Brewing
- Elder Pine Brewing and Blending
- Inner Groove Brewing
- ZeroDay Brewing
- Masthead Brewing
- Hitchhiker Brewing Company
- Mellow Mink Brewing
- Ten Eyck Brewing
- Lost Mined Brewing
- Victory Brewing
- Imprint Beer Co.
- Sterling Pig Brewing
- Bog Turtle Brewing
- Von C Brewing
- Loakal Branch Brewing
- Bunnyman Brewing
- J.J. Ratigan Brewing
- Liquid Art Brewing
- Shy Bear Brewing
- Aslin Beer Co.
- Wheatland Springs Farm and Brewery
- 7 Mile Brewing
- Burnish Beer Company
- Jailbreak Brewing
- Susquehanna Brewing
- Bullfrog Brewery
- Eclipse Craft Brewery
- Hysteria Brewing
- Big Dog Craft Brewing
- Columbia Kettle Works
- Saucony Creek Brewing
- Jackie O’s Brewery
- Sun King Brewery
- Allusion Brewing
- Black Forest Brewing
- Chatty Monks Brewing
- Idiom Brewing
- Yellow Bridge Brewing
- Troegs Independent Craft Brewing
Saaz
- Old Ox Brewery
- Selin’s Grove Brewing
- Strange Roots Brewing
- Southern Tier Brewing
- Wacker Brewing
- Noble Beast Brewing
- Lydian Stone Brewing
- AleCraft Brewing
- Liquid Hero Brewing
- Covered Bridge Brewhause
- Free Will Brewing
- Warwick Farm Brewery
- Levante Brewing
- Human Robot Beer
- Big Bottom Brewery
- Tall Tales Brewing
- Mustang Sally Brewing
- Hemaur Brewing
- Fat Bat Brewing
- Robin Hood Brewing
- Ocelot Brewing
- Fetish Brewing
- Cape May Brewing
- RAR Brewing
- Ripestine’s Brewpub
- Benny Brewing
- New Trail Brewing Company
- Three Beards Brewing
- Slate Farm Brewing
- Our Town Brewery
- Raney Cellars Brewing
- Gearhouse Brewing
- Urban Artifact Brewing
- Land – Grant Brewing Company
- Levity Brewing
- Pour Man’s Brewing
- Appalachian Brewing Company
- Fourscore Beer Co.
- Logyard Brewing
- Pizza Boy Brewing Company
Walhalla
- Funk Brewing
- Mad Chef Brewing
- Boneshire Brew Works
- Lost Rhino Brewing
- Oakbrook Brewing
- VooDoo Brewing
- Abjuration Brewing
- Bespoke Brewing
- Canton Brewing Company
- Lost Barrel Brewing
- Big Truck Farm Brewing
- Scrubby’s Craft Brewery
- Other Half Brewing Company
- Old Forge Brewing
- Braeloch Brewing
- Dew Point Brewing
- Punch Buggy Brewing
- Dewey Beer Co.
- Crooked Run Fermentation
- The Alementary
- Smoketown Brewing
- Axemann Brewery
- Adroit Theory Brewing
- Collusion Tap Works
- Gusto Brewery
- Cult Classic Brewing
- The Isle of Que Brewing
- Therapy Brewing
- Wolf Brewing Company
- LoveDraft’s Brewing Company
- Jackass Brewery
- Hell in a Bucket Brewing
- Brewery Fire
- Morgantown Brewing Company
- Braxton Brewing Company
- Wolf’s Ridge Brewing Company
- Juniata Brewing
- Snitz Creek Brewing
- Ministry of Brewing
- Abolitionist Ale Works
Note, these were randomly assigned to the conferences (rolled D4s to get them in their places). I will then use D8s to roll them into their groups for the group stage round. The above listing is no indication of their Untappd score or placements.
Wrapping Things Up Here
This article has taken me the better part of my entire evening last night after work, and all of this morning. It is seriously no simple task getting these groups into places. Tomorrow I will roll for the groups, and make the announcements on Facebook, maybe a blog post as well. Thank you all for the support with this big under taking.
Thank You For Reading
Ok, Amy and I are about heading out for our trip down to the Maryland border and hitting some breweries. We were supposed to do this trip last week, but the stomach bug hit Amy so we stayed home. We are also planning on then going to the Harrisburg Heat game tonight for their alumni night (Scoop and Wilsbach are being inducted into their Hall of Fame). So I gotta wrap this up so we can get going to our several breweries and then Heat game. I started this article last night after work and our plans, so I started this around 9:45 PM, and worked on it until about 1:30 AM, before going to bed. Scarlet has been a fussy mess all morning, and I’ve been up since 5:30 AM trying to work on this and help her at the same time. But its now finally done nearly at 10:30 AM.
Ok, thanks for reading. Any questions, comments, suggestions, etc, please leave in the comments. Or e-mail us directly at thebeerthrillers@gmail.com.
Thank you All!
Cheers All!
- B. Kline
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