History of the IPT

Nick B

This is gonna hurt
Silver Member
Dude learn to read. I said I was the FIRST to mention the online gambling ban and state that Trudeau would PROBABLY use it as an excuse for shutting down the IPT.

Yes I was a HUGE supporter BECAUSE it was a chance for the players to finally have something that could give them life-changing money. Kelly told me it was the first time in her life that she really felt like a professional after attending the initial player's meeting in Orlando. I wanted the IPT to succeed because I wanted my friends to have a viable tour with the chance to earn a decent living. I was also a supporter because it was equal opportunity for ANYONE who could qualify.

Yes, you were a negative person about the IPT and you were right...yay you. That and $1 will get you a coffee.

It lasted just over a year. My comments about the online gambling ban were made months after we all knew the IPT was done and we were all dissecting it and hoping the players would get paid.



My reading comprehension is just fine, thank you. To the uninitiated or those with no history here the way you wrote your first post implied you were warning people about the IPT. You defended their silliness until the end and no they did not last a year because they did not complete the events they had scheduled but instead did a couple of "exhibition type events" to kind of imply the whole sham was not over.

It was a fantasy from the beginning from a spin master who had good history fleecing the ignorant and those who needed help or were helpless (sick or broke). The BS could be smelt from the moon. Why do you think he had a bunch of bottom dwelling players who had zero business being there? Simply answer to keep the dreamers thinking that maybe I to can join the IPT. I forget the dreamer who used to post here (with the toothpick in his mouth) who had an average game winning average of 12% and had ZERO business being there and he wasn't the only one.

John you got this wrong. Not kind of wrong. Completely wrong and you pestered all off us (in your usual fashion) who weren't drinking the cool aid with two hands.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KiHVKhgFoCo
 
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JB Cases

www.jbcases.com
Silver Member
My reading comprehension is just fine, thank you. To the uninitiated or those with no history here the way you wrote your first post implied you were warning people about the IPT. You defended their silliness until the end and no they did not last a year because they did not complete the events they had scheduled but instead did a couple of "exhibition type events" to kind of imply the whole sham was not over.

It was a fantasy from the beginning from a spin master who had good history fleecing the ignorant and those who needed help or were helpless (sick or broke). The BS could be smelt from the moon. Why do you think he had a bunch of bottom dwelling players who had zero business being there? Simply answer to keep the dreamers thinking that maybe I to can join the IPT. I forget the dreamer who used to post here (with the toothpick in his mouth) who had an average game winning average of 12% and had ZERO business being there and he wasn't the only one.

John you got this wrong. Not kind of wrong. Completely wrong and you pestered all off us (in your usual fashion) who weren't drinking the cool aid with two hands.

Nonsense, and who cares anyway? The IPT is ten years behind us.

Bottom dwelling? Please. he put out a call to apply and chose 150 players from thousands of applications, players who had next to zero expense for the first year of play. Some of course had no shot at retaining a tour card but IF the tour had actually continued then there would have been hundreds of qualifying tournaments around the country to get into the bigger tournaments and then into the main events. That would have been a clear path to becoming a touring pro for ANYONE wanting to try.

We all laughed at $2000 entry qualifiers but they all filled up. Now ten years laters high entry fee tournaments are becoming normal. We held a $100 entry fee qualifier for a spot in one of the $2000 qualifiers and it filled in less than one hour.

I don't care how much you think you were "right", the fact is that Kevin dumped a lot of money INTO the IPT in that first year. He paid out a lot of money, much more than he took in. Yes, he stiffed some players in the end, yes he stiffed most of the vendors, but the fact is for a year the players actually had a glimpse of what pool COULD BE.

The negative nellies were not helpful in the least. Some of us looked on the bright side and hoped for the best and tried to be supportive. 150 players in year one got to play on the big stage with relatively small expenses in comparison to what they could win. For the "dead money" players they got a great pool vacation.

Trudeau even invited a bunch of senior pro hall of famers to the first event and paid each one of them $30,000 just for showing up. So again, yay, you were right that Trudeau didn't hold up his end and keep it going for the promised three years. You're incredibly awesome Nick...most prescient person on Earth and honestly one of the people I'd least like to be like. I hoped for Trudeau to be finally doing something honest and many others did as well. It hurt no one to be positive and hopeful. Something that the negative people of the world don't get.

For those of us who were more involved, it was something we won't forget as a chance for pool to turn into a mainstream pro sport.
 

JB Cases

www.jbcases.com
Silver Member
Plus it's not drinking the kool-aid to simply be positive about an endeavor. You act like all the pros were supposed to boycott the shot at free money.

Let me recap this for you. To apply was FREE. 100 players were picked to get a tour card for year one.

The prize money for year one was millions. So 100 players got in on that FOR FREE. Their only expenses were travel, lodging and food to compete for hundreds of thousands PER EVENT.

50 more players had to qualify. The money taken in for the qualifiers wasn't even close to the money paid out at the main events. In addition KT often paid out bonuses during the qualifiers like $1000 for break and runs and stuff like that.

Many rooms around the country were on board holding qualifiers and mini-qualifiers. Everyone was positive and upbeat about the prospects of the IPT except for a few negative people on this forum. In actual pool rooms the buzz was great.

You act like the players had any real choice....none of them wanted to sit on the sidelines and see everyone else taking part of the FREE pie.

Players had backers signing them up to pay all their expenses to try and get in on it. Everyone wanted a piece of the promised 13 million that KT promised was allocated to the tour for three years.

And lastly, Kevin sold books that were clearly stupid.....yes he was an infomercial huckster....SO WHAT? There are millions of stupid people on the planet and they can't wait to give their money to someone smarter than they are. Kevin preyed on those people just like dozens of con men prey on them every single day. He didn't do anything illegal...immoral maybe....then again maybe not since the information in his books isn't much different than in dozens of self-help books. He is in jail now for contempt-of-court for failing to disclose his assets in defiance of a huge fine he was hit with. Maybe the fine was deserved, maybe it wasn't when we look at all the hucksters who get away with similar bullshit.

But none of that changes the fact that for a brief moment in time we were all treated to a vision of what pool should be IF it were treated as a respectable sport and the players treated with dignity and respect as professionals.

Too bad it was KT who was the backer but in the end very few people in pool actually got hurt. Most who were involved profited in some way and a few got life-changing money.
 

Nick B

This is gonna hurt
Silver Member
Your initial post kind of implied that you warned people about the IPT scam.

Let me recap this for you. You bullied everyone who thought it was obviously a scam. Your memory is like your stroke. Crooked and fails you when you most need it. He stole from people who had no hope. The sick and terminally ill. He's not pool's version of Robinhood but instead is the worst form of scum. Defending it puts a bow on your persona.

75% of the threads from back then have been closed or removed because you gave them all the JB-treatment. Now you spin spin spin.
 
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JB Cases

www.jbcases.com
Silver Member
Your initial post kind of implied that you warned people about the IPT scam.

Let me recap this for you. You bullied everyone who thought it was obviously a scam. Your memory is like your stroke. Crooked and fails you when you most need it. He stole from people who had no hope. The sick and terminally ill. He's not pool's version of Robinhood but instead is the worst form of scum. Defending it puts a bow on your persona.

75% of the threads from back then have been closed or removed because you gave them all the JB-treatment. Now you spin spin spin.

More nonsense. Everyone was talking about the IPT back then. I "bullied" no one. Bullying implies that I can influence someone through force. I stated my point of view - which was a positive take on the IPT and hopes for it's success.

Stole from people who had no hope? he hawked books on infomercials that ran at 3am. No one FORCED anyone to pick up the phone and buy the books. I am sorry, my dad is a cancer survivor and if he had bought one of KT's books I would have told him he is an idiot. People spend far more than $50 chasing miracle cures. If the worst that KT did is sell books through infomercials that were essentially lists of quack cures then he is a freaking saint compared to people like Dr. Oz who get away with far worse on daytime national tv.

Yes, he sold books that were little more than rehashes of all the holistic gobbdlygook found elsewhere. That makes him a snake-oil salesman. Yes he got rich off that. Yes, he is an asshole.

But so far as the IPT is concerned he dumped millions into pool that year and did in fact give hope to a lot of players that they would see a true professional tour grow up. Lots of players got paid and that money was used to enhance their lives for the better.

I don't spin anything - I was there and part of it and you weren't. You were just another negative nobody talking crap about things that didn't affect you. My friends were players in the IPT. My friends were part of the IPT. My friends were vendors to the IPT.

So don't tell me about the IPT. I knew more than you then and I know more than you now. Again it cost nothing to be positive and hopeful for a good outcome and that's exactly what I was back then. Those of you who prayed 20x a day that the IPT would fail so that you could be right can't even see that you are actually part of the problem why pool can't get anywhere.
 

Nick B

This is gonna hurt
Silver Member
I met Tom Cruise. That doesn't make a movie star or Scientologist.

You got friends...I call BS.
 

FranCrimi

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Not true. Trudeau stiffed the Reno winners before that online gambling legislation. He may have had delusions of grandeur about online betting and Stanley Ho but the truth is he woke up and realized there was no business case for his venture during that week in Reno.

The plan was all about online gambling, so he wouldn't have ditched the plan until it was clear that it wasn't going to happen. I'm sure he found out ahead of time that the legislation was about to pass which could be why it appeared that they weren't connected, but they clearly were.
 

Ruthless

~= Gator Nation =~
Silver Member
When they came around recruiting players for the "IPT" I could smell a scam from the minute they started talking (continued recently by Siegel's wacked out tour vision and countless others - even the US Open has to place money in escrow or the players won't show). They started the IPT recruiting right here in central Florida where 8 of 10 pros were living at the time and we all had several run ins with "KT" (infomercial scam artist). Most of us didn't fall for it and told them that if it survived 3 years with no problems we would all be in. These people are the reason why all real players are very cautious about anything new when it comes to tours. We have been being stolen from sine the 1980's in several different scams of this type. These people are the reason that there is not a big single national tour in the USA. They gave pool the bad reputation that keeps it a low paying sport with very little admiration in the world of professional sports. Pool players will never get the respect that they deserve as long as the scammers continue to line their pockets with our money and run off to ??? And JB you are wrong about every one being very excited in the rooms. At Pro Billiards in Orlando where Charlie Williams, Nick Varner and several others played out of at the time the only emotion was a very cautious one leaning towards "Chasing the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow" attitude, and they have never found it yet. Big fortune 500 sponsors wouldn't touch pool with a ten foot pole because of people like "KT". I don't know where you live but I was there and at "Ground Zero" when it came to recruitment for the IPT (The Florida 9-Ball Pro Tour, which the Seminoles destroyed forever). We don't have that anymore but Tony Crosby (with the help of XPC) is trying to slowly build another "Florida Pool Tour" and I can say that he is an honest man that is giving it 110%. He is slowly getting the bad taste out of the players mouths that the IPT, SPT and others have left behind as road blocks with sponsors.
 
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JAM

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
If you want to blame anyone for the demise of pool in the States, look at the history of the BCA organization, the so-called governing body of professional pool for North America. What a joke! They got rid of professional pool altogether. They should be stripped of their accreditation.
 

Banks

Banned
If you want to blame anyone for the demise of pool in the States, look at the history of the BCA organization, the so-called governing body of professional pool for North America. What a joke! They got rid of professional pool altogether. They should be stripped of their accreditation.

Lol.

Did the players ever take a drug test? :)
 

JB Cases

www.jbcases.com
Silver Member
When they came around recruiting players for the "IPT" I could smell a scam from the minute they started talking (continued recently by Siegel's wacked out tour vision and countless others - even the US Open has to place money in escrow or the players won't show). They started the IPT recruiting right here in central Florida where 8 of 10 pros were living at the time and we all had several run ins with "KT" (infomercial scam artist). Most of us didn't fall for it and told them that if it survived 3 years with no problems we would all be in. These people are the reason why all real players are very cautious about anything new when it comes to tours. We have been being stolen from sine the 1980's in several different scams of this type. These people are the reason that there is not a big single national tour in the USA. They gave pool the bad reputation that keeps it a low paying sport with very little admiration in the world of professional sports. Pool players will never get the respect that they deserve as long as the scammers continue to line their pockets with our money and run off to ??? And JB you are wrong about every one being very excited in the rooms. At Pro Billiards in Orlando where Charlie Williams, Nick Varner and several others played out of at the time the only emotion was a very cautious one leaning towards "Chasing the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow" attitude, and they have never found it yet. Big fortune 500 sponsors wouldn't touch pool with a ten foot pole because of people like "KT". I don't know where you live but I was there and at "Ground Zero" when it came to recruitment for the IPT (The Florida 9-Ball Pro Tour, which the Seminoles destroyed forever). We don't have that anymore but Tony Crosby (with the help of XPC) is trying to slowly build another "Florida Pool Tour" and I can say that he is an honest man that is giving it 110%. He is slowly getting the bad taste out of the players mouths that the IPT, SPT and others have left behind as road blocks with sponsors.

I will take your word for it. In other parts of the country people were optimistic about it.

Of course Varner and other old pros would be cautious having seen many things tried. But as far as I know the Hall of Famers all cashed the 30k checks KT handed out in Orlando or am I wrong about that?

What bad taste? I have seen like four incarnations of the Florida Tour in my life.

The Seminoles dumped a lot of money into pool, KT dumped a lot of money into pool.
 
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