Played my first game the other night and had a great time. We were tied in fans when all the matchups were complete, and I only lost during the scoreboard phase when all my opponent's cheating tokens were flipped. All 4 of his cheaters on the board (he was playing the Orcs) gained him star power, and he swept up all the contests.

Anyways, had one question that came up during the game, which we house ruled to both our satisfaction, but I told him I'd look up a ruling on it just to satisfy him. While we were playing, he went into rules lawyer mode, but finally relented. Here's the question:

The Guard ability says: "When an opposing player successfully tackles one of your players, you may apply the dice result to this player instead."

I took out one his players at the tournament, and he tried to use the Guard ability to transfer the hit to one of his linemen at another matchup. His argument was that the card and the rulebook don't specifically say that the ability can only be used at the matchup the guarding player is in, like other cards do.

I argued that it would be kind of stupid for a lineman at another matchup to take a tackle for a player playing at the tournament that he's not playing in. He then argued that the highlight reel matchup the lineman was in could actually also be part of the tournament. We went back and forth for a while, but he finally gave in and said logically it makes sense that a player couldn't Guard against a tackle at another game/matchup. But he still said the rules don't specifically prohibit it.

So just coming here to get everyone else's ruling on this one, though I'm pretty sure I handled it correctly.

 You want to check up page 16 in the rulebook:

Player Card Abilities

Player card abilities usually require that a condition be fulfilled before they
take effect. Some abilities only occur once during a certain part of the round;
other abilities can be fulfilled several times over the course of the round.

Unless explicitly stated on the card, all abilities only interact with players at
the same matchup. If two abilities occur during the same phase, resolve them
in turn order starting with the manager who currently holds the golden coin

Great, thanks for the quick response! Can lay that issue to rest...