[Karthik]

I'm judging this one based on the "wow factor" as I call it, thinks just made me stop and say wow. A lot of the robots that would be on my list have already been mentioned in this thread, so I'll leave them off.

1998 - Team 95
They took the big 24" balls out of the 8' high center cylinder. The only to team to even try this. It was scary.

1998 - Team 16
24" balls should not be squeezed through pipes that are only 16" wide that easily. Those Baxter people sure know what they're doing.

1999 - Team 95
Teams drove on the puck, they pulled the puck, but this team had their own approach to controlling the puck. They tilted it. Again, one of those things you see and ask yourself, "did that just happen?"

2000 - Team 308
The Mini-Me arm. The controls geniuses from Team 308, created a miniature version of their robot's arm, that was used to control the arm. It was so intuitive, and so precise. This Mini-Me arm was a definite pioneer in the realm of driver friendly controls.

2001 - Team 45
I know there were other teams who did it as well, but the Technokats autobalance routine was amazing.

2002 - Team 71
This robot deserves being mentioned over and over again. It was a sight to see. Many times no more than 10 seconds into a match, and they had it won. I'd never seen a chokehold strategy employed so well in FIRST before. Many people thought of grabbing all three goals, but most figured "it'd be too hard to do it well, and have any sort of robustness". We all obviously forgot that nothing is too hard for Beatty.