Stone Pale Ale 2.0 - Failure to Launch

In my last post I linked to a San Diego Union Tribune article about Stone's layoffs.  At the end of the article, journalist Peter Rowe noted that Stone has discontinued its Pale Ale 2.0, the 2015 reformulation and relaunch of its original pale ale.  I liked 2.0 but it was more a traditional pale ale than the new, leaner and hoppier pale ales being brewed by Ballast Point (Grunion Pale Ale), AleSmith (San Diego Pale Ale .394), and others.  The new pale ales deemphasize malts and are essentially IPAs with lower ABVs, but with more depth than one-dimensional session IPAs.   To Stone's credit, it did not linger over Pale Ale 2.0, and has replaced it with a "hop-forward" pale ale called Ripper.  I am a fan of the new style pale ales, and want to try Ripper soon.