New Scaratings

I dropped by the Greenville area for a couple of days to check out the leading Buzztime sites, especially Sherby's Pub.

Sherby's Pub is a heartwarming place. Candidly, it's not a great place to visit as a player...the players there don't share answers especially well amongst each other, let alone guests. But Claire, the owner, is just an exceptional woman, and the site reflects her love for her patrons, including out-of-town guests.

Sky at Blue Ridge Brewing is an enigma. I visited for three nights. The first I had a great time at Sky. The second I couldn't get in until after 6:00 PM because of a private party (and I was very rudely thrown out for walking through an open door into the party when Sky should have been open after 5:00). The third we left at 9:00 PM because Sky was setting up for a concert at 10:00, and because a fifteen-foot wide bar can't support both Buzztime and a concert. Sky has great servers, great beer, and great food. It doesn't have reliable Buzztime, nor afternoon Buzztime. But where it's good, it's great...it also seems lucky, if you believe in luck.

The other sites are a standard suburban Buzztime mix of mediocre sites. I wish in retrospect I'd gone off to play at The Spot in Seneca: two of their players dropped by Sky our last night and they were both friendly and talented.

Bill: I just read the review you posted to the NTN website for Sherby's Pub in Simpsonville SC. It's one of the best-written pieces I've ever seen describing a BT location. I've written a few hundred reviews myself and I know how hard it is to capture the feeling of a room in a few paragraphs. You nailed it, buddy, and I hope to get there in my travels someday to see it for myself. Thanks for sharing,

Ref: http://www.buzztime.com/players/bt_site ... ?sid=36616

^ Agreed

they kicked him out for god's sakes... I can't wait to visit that place...

Edit: OK, I think that I understand.

Sky at Blue Ridge Brewing kicked me out on one of four visits. That's why I reviewed them as I did: despite great beer, great food, and overall great service, they're not a reliable site. I literally came back at the time suggested by my server the night before to find the place off limits to walk-in Buzztime players. The owner had handled the rental, and he hadn't communicated it to his staff until a few hours before the party, let alone posting a change in hours for the next day the night before. Given the pouring rain, that was frustrating. Sky also scheduled a benefit concert for the next night that led me to curtail my Buzztime earlier than I might otherwise have done. On two of three nights we visited Buzztime wasn't available during advertised hours of operation. When it was available, the place was great...but while one night's inconvenience could be random chance, two of three nights is a trend.

Sherby's Pub didn't throw me out. To the contrary, on two visits, Claire thanked me each time for visiting her site. The other players were pretty welcoming, too. The reliability issues were strictly with Sky at Blue Ridge Brewing, not with Sherby's.

***

As an aside, another downtown Greenville site opened the week after my visit. Ford's Oyster House and Cajun Kitchen, on the other end of Main Street about two-thirds of a mile south of Sky, is open for Buzztime play 11:00 AM to 2:00 AM. After just over two weeks' play, they're already ahead of Sky at Blue Ridge in Total Score. I didn't visit there, but I suspect that the site would be, if nothing else, more reliable than Sky for Buzztime play in downtown Greenville.