Who Plays In The USAPL?

[Naitch]

Anyone on here play in a USA Pool League? How is it? Do you prefer it over APA, VNEA, TAP or the BCA?

 

[David in FL]

Anyone on here play in a USA Pool League? How is it? Do you prefer it over APA, VNEA, TAP or the BCA?

I do. 8, 9, and 10 ball.

Pretty good league. Equivalent to BCA in my opinion which I also play. Normal CSI/WPA rules...

As with any league, you'll find some nits, but for the most part it's pretty competitive and unlike APA it is not solely oriented towards low rated players.

All reported to FargoRate and the matches are handicapped by FargoRate.

Overall it's as good of a league as I've found. 1000 times better than APA.

 

[Rocket354]

I play it. It's fine, similar to BCA, but with 1/10th the total players. So national tournaments are much smaller. That can be good or bad, depending on your perspective.

 

[Badpenguin]

USAPL is going into its 2nd year in my area. I love the format and consider it better than the APA and TAP leagues.

Pros:

• alternating break, rack your own
• 8 ball on break does not count
• scratch on 8 ball, if 8 ball is not made, is not a loss
• match handicapping is based on fargo rates
• ball suit selection open after break
• scratch on break gives incoming player ball in hand anywhere on table
• jump cues allowed
• fairly simple score keeping
• handicapping system leads to fairer/closer matches
• If you happen to win to go to the nationals, the airfare and hotel are fully funded.
  • Nationals are played alongside a pro tournament (predator/CSI Pro Billiard Series).
  • None of this raffle and fundraising tournament nonsense to fund players to go, like other leagues in my area.
• free fargo app premium features included
  • must request the membership from fargo after at least one scored match exists
• much more difficult for higher rated players to win against lower rated players
  • some people see this as a con

Cons:

• Like any other league, there are attempts to manipulate fargo rates.
  • The league manager maintains the initial fargo rate for unrated players or players without an established robustness of 200 games. I have seen multiple instances of players having existing fargo rates that were manipulated by creating a new player with a slightly different name variations. For example the league manager creates John T Doe and lowers the fargo rate, when John Doe is already rated and established with a higher fargo rate.
  • Once a team becomes qualified to play in the nationals qualifier, they (sometimes blatantly) sandbag during interim league sessions in an attempt to get their fargo rates down or keep them from raising.
  • Players with non-established fargo rates going to outside tournaments and sandbagging in an attempt to get their league fargo rate dropped, while the league manager is tweaking it.
  • Players with non-established fargo rates attempting to manipulate their fargo by using Salotto to get established so that the league manager can no longer tweak it. Wether or not those Salotto matches are legitimate is impossible to determine.
• Local league rule changes by the league manager have not been reported to the league, which has led to confusion, conspiracy theories, and appearances of playing favorites. Particularly with local rules related to the requirements to play in playoffs and/or nationals qualifiers.
• Like any other league, there seems to be a tug-of-war between the league manager (via rule changes) and teams attempting to game the rules.
• The scoring app and league reporting site is a bit clunky.

Even with the cons, I would say USAPL, at least in my area, is less able to be manipulated and has a better ruleset than the other leagues. After fargo rates get established, it tends to level out. Unfortunately, the common denominator with other leages is pool players, and not all pool players want to win simply by playing good pool.

 

[hang-the-9]

Anyone on here play in a USA Pool League? How is it? Do you prefer it over APA, VNEA, TAP or the BCA?

Equal to BCA, maybe the level of play is a bit under that. Much better than APA or TAP. Rules are pretty much 100% WPA "pro" rules. They treat the players like grownups, no stupidity about marking pockets, forgiving fouls, etc..

At least in my area, the league does a lot to send many players and teams to nationals, covers airfare and hotel fully and the tournament entries. Ties into Fargo to the ratings are fairly transparent and can be filled in from outside events not connected with the league. You play in a random tournament that reports to Fargo, that affects your league rating, like it should. No APA 4s winning 650 Fargo events then going back to playing as a 4 next week.