PHIL SCHLAEFER – Foosball Expert
Phil's Foosball career started in 1976 at the San Tomas Park Recreation Center in Campbell California. That day he and his pal T-Bone got whipped by some local kids a year younger than they. That was it. No more losing to 7th graders! Dominating the neighborhood in short order within a year pushed him to find better competition. Enter Merlin's Castle and Time Zone arcades, which featured big time tournaments! The Tournament Soccer juggernaut was in full swing and there was no turning back.
With no local promoters on the west side of town in 1981 Phil started to operate a couple of coin-op foos tables at the Control Room arcade in Campbell. He then expanded to Zapps, a hot local nightclub. Starting the Bay Area Foosball Association in 1983 was a landmark. The NorCal Championships were held at San Jose State from 1983 to 1985. This marked the beginning of the intense rivalry with the Fremont foosers at Galaxy arcade. This sparked one of the greatest proliferations of Pro Foosers in the United States: Thor Donovan, Adrian Zamora, Scott Stewart, Dana Marr, Tom Phippen, Pat O'Gorman, Mitch Curley, Marv Puha, Steve Corioso, Anthony Nagy, Roy Albert, Victor Fong, Chuck Costello, Ed Lee, Chris Dube, and Phil. This in turn spawned the next generation of legends: Fernando Rosa, Serge Aragones, Mark Torres, Kin Lo, Jay Batholow, and James Castillo. Many of these players are still top Masters today!
The last decade has seen new growth for foosball. Companies like Apple, Yahoo, Google, Ebay, Microsoft, and Sun have foosball tables on their campuses. Most have consulted with Phil for inter-company tournaments and charity events. The Leukemia Lymphoma society has also been involved. Phil has done dozens of seminars, exhibitions, and lessons for these companies as well.
Mr. Schlaefer most recently guided Table Soccer Ltd., a company that operated, retailed and marketed over 500 foosball tables in the Bay Area in 1996. He served as President until 2005 and was a consultant until 2007. Phil is currently on the Board of Directors for VIFA, the international foosball league arm of Brunswick's company Valley-Dynamo.
He also is a contractor for Brunswick acting as Co-Tournament Director and Public Address Announcer at the national Foosball tournaments in Las Vegas. Inventing and patenting a number of foosball table accessories currently in use today including the Quik-Change Handle System and Universal Rod-Guards is also on the resume as well as custom Foosball tables as well as the producer of a line of instructional foosball dvd's.
Encouraged by response at tournaments for his announcing work, Phil tried out for the "Voice of the Oakland Raiders" Public Address Announcer’s position in 2006. He was the runner-up for the position.
Phil is currently producing The Foosball Master Tour and other television and film projects with director/producer Mark Teague of Dreamhaven Studios. He is continuing to develop innovative foosball accessories with the 2008 Apple Mac Design Award winner Nik Levy and Snap-Up Products and website development with former Macromedia web production manager Bernard Southam.
MARK TEAGUE – Writer/Director
Mark Teague’s 15-year career in the filmed entertainment business has lead him to found Godspeed Studios. As CEO, Mark has called upon his expertise in animation and 3-D effects to make Godspeed one of the most sought-after companies in the independent film business when it comes to post-production and special effects.
Mr. Teague has established his considerable reputation in the animation and special effects world by working with limited financial resources to deliver an end product quality associated with high-budget projects. His work has garnered him the prestigious title of Animation Director for various Disney projects (Pocahontas II, Lady & the Tramp II, The Crow, Timon and Pumba). His expertise as a character designer and animator is featured in Universal’s Hercules and Zena. Marvel Films acquired Mr. Teague’s talents in redesigning the characters of its most profitable and oldest franchises. Mr. Teague worked with Stan Lee in redesigning Spiderman, The Incredible Hulk, The Fantastic Four and Iron Man for theatrical exposition and promotional materials.
As a special effects director and coordinator for Creative Light Entertainment, Mr. Teague developed new applications of current software to achieve effects that are gaining the attention of independent producers and studios all over North America. His intuitive ability to flawlessly blend practical effects and computer generated effects can be seen in Lion’s Gate Tamara, Bravo’s Superheroes, Villains & Vixens, and most notably in the award winning independent documentary Comic Book, The Movie.
Mr. Teague has put his talents as a producer, animator and director in the market place with great success. In 2000, Mr. Teague wrote and directed the critically acclaimed Super Guy. Creating special effects not yet seen in the computer generated 3-D world, Mr. Teague’s ability as a story-teller and his acumen as a businessman combined to create a cult hit still regarded as the progenitor of the now popular ‘super hero as regular guy” sub-genre. Mr. Teague is currently in negotiations with National Lampoon and Paramount studios to develop Super Guy as an episodic comedy for national television.
Under the auspices of Godspeed Studios, Mr. Teague has positioned himself to direct his next feature motion picture, Tony Loco. Mr. Teague’s experience in the independent film world has honed his ability to tailor the picture to fit the tastes of today’s technology-savvy audience and still deliver to them a timeless story of loss, obsession and self-actualization by confronting the inner demons from which most of us run.
Matt Savage – Tournament Director World Series of Poker, Monte Carlo Millions
Position: Tournament Director
Casinos: World Series of Poker, Bay 101
Resides: San Jose, CA
Ambition: To maintain high standards and integrity in poker tournaments
Matt Savage has become the most sought after poker tournament director today. Matt has directed the World Series of Poker for the last three years and has been a part of its growth into the largest poker tournament in the world. In 2004, the World Series of Poker attracted almost 2600 players to the main event with a top prize of $5,000,000.
Matt's charisma, enthusiasm and love of poker has helped to bring more and more celebrities to the tables, joining the professionals and amateurs across the worlds in high profile, high stakes tournaments. Since 2002, he has appeared on ESPN, Fox Sports Net, and the Travel Channel, hosting tournaments around the globe.
Additionally, Matt founded the Tournament Directors Association and has been instrumental in standardizing poker tournament rules worldwide.
