Thats all well and fine but do you think EVERYONE at the VF show is a AZB member?....NO!
I'm not saying he should or should not have brought them....just that many folks (who are not familiar with Zinzola or AZB) saw the pseudo-finished cues and made thier assessments.
i dont understand what that has anything to do with what i said. u asked the question why tony would show unfinished cues so i gave u an answer. that was the only point i was addressing. i never said everyone was an az member nor is that relevant. all i said was that he brought them there because he wanted to show some of the other customers their cues, which is an answer to your question.
but if u want to talk about the cues then i guess we can do so. i recognize that some of the cues have flaws, tony has acknowledged this as well, but to claim that the 4 point 4 veneer cue with black paper veneers, an elephant ear wrap, ivory joint and ivory hoppe ring along with expensive wood (this isnt just a simple cocobolo into maple cue) as a 700 dollar cue is preposterous. if u can find someone who makes a decent cue and can put all that stuff on the cue and sell it to me for 700 dollars let me know. heck, find someone who can make a well constructed cue like that with 2 shafts with a normal joint and no hoppe ring or elephant ear wrap for 700. u might find some but it'll be hard.
also, regarding those cues, what did u find was a problem with them aside from the finish and slightly dirty wraps as those werent completed yet/
it's like u said tho, u didnt bother to ask talk to him at all but now u're going taking the time to criticize his work (not meant to sound negative). it hardly seems fair to criticize some of his incomplete work does it not? and like i said, whether he should have brought incomplete work to the show is up for debate, all im saying here now is that since u now know that the cues were incomplete, would it still be right to criticize it without having seen the final product? if the answer is yes then tony shouldnt be the only one we are talking about since i doubt other cuemakers cues are "perfect" even when they're incomplete.
what i do want to know is what problems do ppl have with the cues? cuz so far i've just seen a lot of comments stating that they saw the cues and werent impressed. some have brought up the inlays but aside from that there hasnt been much else. so is there anything else that ppl have problems with? i just wanna know cuz no one has said much so far. i believe some ppl see what mr. gracio did as bashing because he didnt state anything specific. all he said was that the cues werent very good. but without any details it just seems like he's bashing the cue.
another thing to address are the pics of the fleur de lis inlays that jay posted. they look a lot worse because one is from the forearm and the other is from the buttsleeve. those who have seen the cue in person will know that the buttsleeve inlays are much larger. but they are the same size in the pics jay posted so clearly one was blown up which accounts for the difference. also, they werent meant to be identical since they're different sizes.
