You covered more subjects then the players playing essentially "Break and first shot" by the breaking player. Honestly, while there is more money then in the past only the winner gets the big check.
If a player plays a bunch of tournaments and isn't first, he is lucky to make at the end of the year the takehome of an assistant manager of a fast food joint.
Second place was only $16,000. First got like 2 and 1/2 times the guy who came in second. Go down much further and the week is a break even or total loss.
I don't know what the weeks total attendance was, but at the final the seats looked pretty empty. People are not falling over themselves to come to pool the tournaments.
I am not sure there is any formula that can make pool much more then essentially (meaning you can't make a living), an amateur sport/game.
I live in a town with over 190,000 thousand people and there is not one pool room.
Years ago when I lived here there were not including bowling alley five pool rooms and I owned two of them. Pool now is almost all bar room play.
Back to the break, I like it with a rack and everything more random. What ever happens happens. In baseball today they don't even need the plate umpire. A computer can call perfect balls and strikes. I would not like to see that either.
Agreed. I am also a huge baseball fan and I like umpires. Change doesnt always mean better in my opinion. I guess as a baseball purist, I like live umpires with the caveat of helping very important calls be correct....i.e. instant replay. But balls and strikes are balls and strikes called by an umpire. Some may argue that my position makes no sense but as I said, its just my opinion.
As to the prize money.....I see your point very much so. Hopefully, fingers crossed, we are headed in a direction where the break even point for the week is much deeper down the field and if you get top 16 or whatever, you actually came out ahead. Its the nature of the beat though as things stands right now. We can only hope things continue to grow based on all kinds of external factors.
The biggest thing is that sports and the millionaires who make up main stream sports are entertainers when its all said and done. Just because someone can throw a ball or hit a ball doesnt make them rich. But the fact that someone will pay their hard earned money to watch them perform that skill certainly makes them rich. Pro athletes, Taylor Swift and actors are essentially one in the same but at many different levels....they have a skill people will pay money to watch. Depends on your audience as to how much those people will pay. Love her or hate her, she has a product and people will pay a fortune to watch her and her product.
And unfortunately right now, pool players arent very high on that list because not a lot of people will pay to watch SVB run racks. I would.
But even my family doesnt understand how or why I am so addicted to this sport.
