Our Young American Players Lose

[jay helfert]

I know I'm tilting at windmills here and have been for decades. Pool should be an interscholastic sport, offered at high schools across the country. PERIOD! IMO the BCA has totally dropped the ball here, spending all their energy on trying to get Pool into the Olympics, when they should have been focusing on high schools across the USA. I pointed this out to the powers that be at the BCA many times and was totally ignored for the most part or given lip service only.

I'm so disappointed with what the BCA has done for our sport in terms of promoting the game that I'm no longer a member. I also advocated creating a pro tour and even made presentations over 25 years ago on how it could be accomplished. Again I was dismissed and this at a time when the BCA had the necessary funding to make it happen.

Of course my experience in the pool world has left with me with many disappointments and quite a few successes, so I guess that's to be expected in life. At this point in time, Pool could be viewed as a fun sport to play for young amateur players, much like volleyball or table tennis. If we have any great young players in the future they will likely come from dedicated pool families or from wealth, where playing professionally is not that important to them. To be a top pool player you must fall in love with the game and not really be focused on making it your livelihood.

 

[CallShotCowboy]

Jay - did you know the BCA funded 100% of the USA players travel, food, and hotel for this event (Atlantic Challenge Cup)?

I know I'm tilting at windmills here and have been for decades. Pool should be an interscholastic sport, offered at high schools across the country. PERIOD! IMO the BCA has totally dropped the ball here, spending all their energy on trying to get Pool into the Olympics, when they should have been focusing on high schools across the USA. I pointed this out to the powers that be at the BCA many times and was totally ignored for the most part or given lip service only.

I'm so disappointed with what the BCA has done for our sport in terms of promoting the game that I'm no longer a member. I also advocated creating a pro tour and even made presentations over 25 years ago on how it could be accomplished. Again I was dismissed and this at a time when the BCA had the necessary funding to make it happen.

Of course my experience in the pool world has left with me with many disappointments and quite a few successes, so I guess that's to be expected in life. At this point in time, Pool could be viewed as a fun sport to play for young amateur players, much like volleyball or table tennis. If we have any great young players in the future they will likely come from dedicated pool families or from wealth, where playing professionally is not that important to them. To be a top pool player you must fall in love with the game and not really be focused on making it your livelihood.

 

[qfans]

American youth

i think the style of play has more to do with tournament play than anything. I've played with a few of those young people and their dedication and knowledge is at a very high level. Do they play differently when matching up? Of course. In eliminating mistakes in tournament play your playing style changes. This group was down big time and made an amazing turn around. Chalk it up to more seasoning and what they've learned on their trip and they are going to be even tougher to play now. I don't see the reasoning in this instance where there is a need for drastic changes.

 

[jay helfert]

Jay - did you know the BCA funded 100% of the USA players travel, food, and hotel for this event (Atlantic Challenge Cup)?

That's good to hear. I'm sure that was like pulling teeth to get that level of support. Hats off to whoever was responsible for making it happen. I can guess who was behind that effort. When I see the BCA get behind an effort to make Pool an interscholastic sport, then I will be impressed.

 

[billiardthought]

Maybe Americans are spending too much time on the forums to get in quality practice

 

[duckie]

Jay - did you know the BCA funded 100% of the USA players travel, food, and hotel for this event (Atlantic Challenge Cup)?

That's not what he is talking about.

My towns high school football team plays other towns high school football teams.

Why are there not any high school pool teams playing other high school pool teams.

That's his point. No is even trying to do the above. There needs to being a major pool industry voice or voices trying to get pool into school programs. BCA is one of them.

 

[hang-the-9]

There is no support structure for youth pool like there are for other sports. How many towns have football, baseball fields and so on yet no pool room or very limited.

Any youth pool leagues? My nephews play and other little kids in know play soccer, wrestle, baseball and so on, yet there is no youth pool at all.

My daughter, in her senior year of high school, was able to take bowling as a class, yet pool was not offered. Pool room owners also have a part in how pool grows and its imagine.

Where most pool is played, parents do not want their kids to go to.

There are pool rooms not bars, the Old California Billairds as example, that was idea for youth pool, yet never tried. Edges is another. I go there early on the weekends and majority of tables are empty and I think what a waste. Perfect time for youth pool. But never have.

Why is this? Why is the youth market not tapped in order to grow pool, change the imagine of what pool is about and what being a pool player is about, cause it for sure ain't the money for most.

I got my first exposure to pool because the city had a couple of rec rooms with 8 foot tables. Pay a small fee, I played as much as I wanted. There never was a pool room in the town. None of my family played. But I got hooked way back then because the city did have rooms with tables in a safe place I could play so mom didn't worry when I rode my bike there.

if I was to ever open a room, getting the youth and families in, supporting youth pool would be part of my goal.

I think the only junior league in the country I know of is the one in our area, run out of Ayer, MA. Used to be APA, now is the USAPL league. Kids play in their league, but are also welcome to play in the regular leagues, and several do. There is a boy that drives over from NJ ever other week or so with his dad since there is no junior league, or any league that allows kids in his area. That boy finished second in the Junior Nationals and went to Worlds in China. Our pool room had two players that went to the Junior World championship from the US. Tyler who played in this Atlantic Cup is also from our home room, he played in the junior league for years at Ayer.

You can probably contact a league operation and see if they would be interested in doing a junior league, especially if you have the USAPL or APA in your area since they already have experience with junior leagues. Mark Griffin is on here quite a bit, and is the boss at USAPL and BCA, I'm sure a PM to him would get you some details about how to get kids playing more.

I'm very lucky that I am in an area close to a pool room where kids are encouraged to come play at any time, and the other players that go there respect them being there instead of viewing them as a nuisance. I spend hours every week with my son playing pool or taking him to league or tournaments, including travel to other states for Nationals every year. If not for pool and Roy Pastor who runs the league for the kids, I would not get the opportunities to spend that much time with my son away from his video games and for sure would not be visiting Vegas, Wisconsin, Kentucky, etc... for tournaments for him.

 

[Apocalypse2017]

snip...

At this point in time, Pool could be viewed as a fun sport to play for young amateur players, much like volleyball or table tennis. If we have any great young players in the future they will likely come from dedicated pool families or from wealth, where playing professionally is not that important to them. To be a top pool player you must fall in love with the game and not really be focused on making it your livelihood.

The last great table tennis player from America was Forest Gump I think?

 

[hang-the-9]

You know I do believe that eliminating smoking indoors is a good step in the right direction to get the youth back in the pool halls. Also doing a winter or summer youth league on midday weekends might be the answer.

It is and it is.

Issue is that the area needs someone to run the league and parents that don't view pool as something you do in a bar. I just ran into a bowling alley that had an age restriction of using their pool table of 18, like it was an adult only object like an X rated movie or booze.

One of my local room has a weekly junior league, we also send about a dozen kids each year to Junior Nationals through qualifiers, state tournaments and direct invitations for those kids that are dedicated and put in their time but for whatever reason did not qualify though a good finish in a tournament.

 

[2strong4u]

Don't think fundamentals are the problem. The Filipinos and Taiwanese are the best pool players in the world at the moment and it can be said they have very "un-textbook" mechanics.

I think it has to do with passion and interest. Pool is a hobby for kids now in the States, where's it a passion in the Philippines, and while Europe might not have the same passion as the Philippines, I think they're more committed to cue sports overall. Even the top junior girl said she has no desire to play professionally. She's also pretty textbook with her mechanics.

Also worth mentioning that most European and Asian cities are more condensed geographically, meaning a pool/snooker hall is probably within walking/train distance for most, so testing and bettering yourself against competition is easy to do. A young pool player today, if he doesn't live in one the East Coast cities, probably doesn't get as much table time and/or just practices by himself on a home table.

It's no surprise the great American pool players of yesteryear spent their formative years on the road, always in action. Not so for today's young players.

Furthermore, they only lost 11-9 playing "on the road," so it was a respectable performance.

Today's pros dont match up enough. It's partly due to distances apart and travel money. Still if I were a top player I'd throw the window wide open to keep in action. I assume these guys can get backing if needed. So why don't we see more matchups? Only answer I'm left with is they are afraid to lose and lose status.

You have guys like Jayson Shaw and Dechaine who have hardly played each other for money. Makes no sense to me. To play your best there has to be something on the line.

 

[alstl]

American kids have more stuff to do. Combine that with the expense of table time and pool isn't played as much as in other countries. When I was a kid I snuck out of the house to go to the pool hall just because there was nothing else to do. Now there is a lot of stuff for kids to do, a big problem is parents can't get kids to go out of the house. They just want to play video games.

Van Boening said he was picked on because of his hearing disability and pool provided him a refuge from the nonsense. Most kids don't have his focus and desire.

 

[Okie]

Jay has it right. We need to focus on getting youth to play. But everyone knows this already. I believe to get to the kids you have to capture the parent. To capture a parent to the point they hand down their love for the game to their kids the environment must be cleaned up. Integrity is what is missing in the pool room. Plain and simple.

Yes there are issues with other games, alcohol, and smoke but the first step to go in the right direction is to add integrity. For us in the US, it should start with the BCA but it won't.

So....in your local pool room advocate integrity and see what happens. It starts with you and me! Today!

Ken

 

[ososlow]

What about table size? Pretty sure our players seldom compete on the 9ft tables. Our players often took the hard shot instead of the right shot (safety). This comes from playing on 7ft tables where if you don't run out you lose. I know the two girls are regular 7ft table players. Do juniors from other countries play on 9ft tables exclusively? Seems we should be prepping them for the world stage on the standard pro size tables!

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[hang-the-9]

What about table size? Pretty sure our players seldom compete on the 9ft tables. Our players often took the hard shot instead of the right shot (safety). This comes from playing on 7ft tables where if you don't run out you lose. I know the two girls are regular 7ft table players. Do juniors from other countries play on 9ft tables exclusively? Seems we should be prepping them for the world stage on the standard pro size tables!

Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk

All the kids play on 9 footers regularly, the junior nationals that most go to are on 9, and April played in the SBE pro women's event that was on 9 ft Diamonds.

I think the reason that kids go for tough shots is because they think they can't miss, and making a tough shot looks good.