Longevitiy in cuesports

[Terry Ardeno]

Folks:

If I'm not mistaken, isn't Bill Dunsmore in his mid-70s? He's playing some great pool right now, and someone told me he was the last person to defeat Cicery Murphy in 14.1.

Thoughts?
-Sean

Sean,
Mr. Dunsmore did beat Cicero Murphy at 14.1 (150-63) at the 1995 Maine Event 14.1 Championships. Murphy's HR that game was only 23. In their respective primes, Mr. Murphy was a far more accomplished player than Mr. Dunsmore.

It's funny you mentioned Bill Dunsmore because I remember him solely from that one match vs Murphy. I did a fair amount of poking around to get some more info on him but didn't come up with a lot.

I shoot w/ a KF Cues cue that I bought from Tony Crosby. I've never been to Florida but I like to follow the tour results, especially when the KF Cues had a pro event. Last year, I was looking at the results of an amateur tournament that they sponsored and saw that Mr. Dunsmore finished in 7th place. Here's a link to those payouts....
http://azbilliards.com/thepros/2000showtourney2010.php?eventnum=9

I think Mr. Dunsmore is a pretty strong local-regional player. About the same speed as a Don Polo.

 

[Terry Ardeno]

Luther Lassiter

First, a little background.....Lassiter was born on Nov 5, 1918 and died at age 69 on Oct 25, 1988. He was a great player by the time he was in his 20s, but, in the 1940's and 1950's, there were hardly any major 9 ball tournaments being held. By the time the Johnson City tournaments came into being starting in 1961, Lassiter was already a legendary road player. Starting in 1962 (the 1st Johnson City 9 ball tournament) Lassiter dominated the field and won the first of his 6 World 9 ball championships. These Johnson City and Stardust tournaments were the defacto World Championships and they had fields that included Harold Worst, Ed Kelly, Irving Crane, Joe Balsis, Ronnie Allen, Danny Jones, Eddie Taylor, Larry Johnson, Jim Marino, Buddy Hall and many other great players. Lassiter won titles in 1962, 1963, 1964, 1967, 1969 and 1971. Keep in mind that at this time, he was 44 in 1962 and 53 in 1971....His peak as a player was argueably past, yet he still beat very, very talented players.

Now, not only was he a great TOURNAMENT player, he was also one of the greatest MONEY players that ever lived. His favorite game was "money pool", any game he could bet on. Believe me when I tell you this, his game went UP several notches for the cash. Some players play better in tournaments than they do when they gamble, and others, visa-versa. Lassiter was a better money player than a tournament player.
So, put those two facts together, add in his longevity at the top (30+ years) and I can make a very strong case for him. And besides his greatness as a 9 baller, Lassiter also won 4 World 14.1 Championships, PLUS 5 14.1 Championships at Johnson City, 5 World All-Around Championships and 1 World 1 Pocket Championship. And in 1970 & 1973, Lassiter finished 2nd to Steve Mizerak in the U.S. Open 14.1 Championships! That an amazing feat when you consider that Lassiter was 55 in 1973! And, in 1978, at the age of 60, Lassiter finished 3rd in the U.S. Open 9 Ball Championship, behind Mizerak & Rempe!

Think about this....Lassiter won 6 World 9 Ball Championships from the age of 44 till he was 53. How many more would he have won had there been 9 ball tournaments in the 2 previous decades? But there weren't any.
So, if he won 6 World Chamionships 20 years after his prime, what would he have been like from the 1940's to 1960's?

Luther Lassiter was a very gifted player indeed. He's my all-time #1 favorite player, so I'm kinda slanted for him!

 

[pt109]

Btw, I think that it was Fred's brother Joe who was indirectly responsible for killing off English billiards, not Walter Lindrum as another poster has suggested. This was because Joe was responsible for promoting snooker as a serious game, fit to be played by professionals. And it turned out that English billiards could not compete with snooker, at one end of the scale as a spectator sport and at the other end because of the perceived learning curve for new players. English billiards was killed by snooker not by (the great) W Lindrum.

Sorry, I think the main reason Joe made snooker a major cue sport was
BECAUSE of Walter.He confided to my mentor, George Chenier, that it was
a good thing Walter didn't take up snooker.
Joe tells in his book about going to Australia to bring the billiards crown back to Merry Olde.He walked into Walter's club as a big roar went up
from the crowd.Being very short, he asked someone what the fuss was
about.He was told that Walter had just gone through his third piece of
chalk on a run.He then realized the enormity of his task.
Walter did to english billiards what Schaefer, Cochran, et al did to balk-
line....they would keep shooting till you turned a fire-hose on 'em...as
Mcgoorty said in Robert Byrne's book.

Walter has record runs that still remain standing.

 

[Terry Ardeno]

....they would keep shooting till you turned a fire-hose on 'em....as
Mcgoorty said in Robert Byrne's book.

Remember in his book where he had to "rent a dad" to get into a pool room?

 

[pt109]

Remember in his book where he had to "rent a dad" to get into a pool room?

Robert Byrne introduced himself at the Nawlins trade show.
He laughed when I mentioned that 'firehose' line.
He still played pretty good billiards for his age also.
He spoke deprecatingly about his game...so I reminded him of when he
ran 8 caroms off the break on Ceulemans in his own club in Belgium.
He laughed and said "You're a serious reader."I said "I don't miss a word...
..I just don't understand most of 'em."

Dick Jaspers came by the booth I was tending..my first words to him...
...I growled "You make me sick."
He said "What did I do?"
I said "You made a carom on Raymond...run-check-check-check."
He couldn't remember so I drew a diagram and we argued for a few
minutes...later I realized that he fluked it..he was trying to go three
rails...run-run-run and hadn't spun it enough.

A fine person, Dick, and I'm glad he took my 'first impression' the right
way.

 

[Bobby]

If I recall correctly, Fred got to the semi finals of the world snooker championship when he was well into his 60's. Of course the standard was not as high then (and like a number of pros of that era, he could not compete against the long potters who came into the game in the 80's).

Btw, I think that it was Fred's brother Joe who was indirectly responsible for killing off English billiards, not Walter Lindrum as another poster has suggested. This was because Joe was responsible for promoting snooker as a serious game, fit to be played by professionals. And it turned out that English billiards could not compete with snooker, at one end of the scale as a spectator sport and at the other end because of the perceived learning curve for new players. English billiards was killed by snooker not by (the great) W Lindrum.

It was killed by snooker but the reason it was killed by snooker was because Lindrum dominated to such a degree that Davis took up snooker knowing he had no chance of ever beating Lindrum at billiards and he also knew Lindrum wouldn't play competitive snooker, he considered it a far inferior game to billiards.

Some of the numbers Lindrum put up were out of this world:

high break over 4,000 points
I believe highest for any other player was 2,800
Only a small few players had ever had a 2,000 break in their whole careers (Davis never did it) Lindrum had over 40 breaks over 2,000 points.

 

[pt109]

It was killed by snooker but the reason it was killed by snooker was because Lindrum dominated to such a degree that Davis took up snooker knowing he had no chance of ever beating Lindrum at billiards and he also knew Lindrum wouldn't play competitive snooker, he considered it a far inferior game to billiards.

Some of the numbers Lindrum put up were out of this world:

high break over 4,000 points
I believe highest for any other player was 2,800
Only a small few players had ever had a 2,000 break in their whole careers (Davis never did it) Lindrum had over 40 breaks over 2,000 points.

Walter had a run, 3,900 and change, on a cotton cloth for the World.
The cloth was called Janus 'cause it was playable on either side (named
after the Roman two-faced god)
So next year they threw the horse-blanket at him, a thick nappy cloth.
He broke his own record on it, exceeding 4,000 points.

Two players I would most like to have seen....
..Walter Lindrum and Harold Worst

 

[Bobby]

Walter had a run, 3,900 and change, on a cotton cloth for the World.
The cloth was called Janus 'cause it was playable on either side (named
after the Roman two-faced god)
So next year they threw the horse-blanket at him, a thick nappy cloth.
He broke his own record on it, exceeding 4,000 points.

Two players I would most like to have seen....
..Walter Lindrum and Harold Worst

Those are also two players I would have loved to see play...and I'll add James Evans to that group.

At least with Lindrum there is quite a bit of footage from The Walter Lindrum Story.

 

[hunger strike]

Six years.....

First, a little background.....Lassiter was born on Nov 5, 1918 and died at age 69 on Oct 25, 1988. He was a great player by the time he was in his 20s, but, in the 1940's and 1950's, there were hardly any major 9 ball tournaments being held. By the time the Johnson City tournaments came into being starting in 1961, Lassiter was already a legendary road player. Starting in 1962 (the 1st Johnson City 9 ball tournament) Lassiter dominated the field and won the first of his 6 World 9 ball championships. These Johnson City and Stardust tournaments were the defacto World Championships and they had fields that included Harold Worst, Ed Kelly, Irving Crane, Joe Balsis, Ronnie Allen, Danny Jones, Eddie Taylor, Larry Johnson, Jim Marino, Buddy Hall and many other great players. Lassiter won titles in 1962, 1963, 1964, 1967, 1969 and 1971. Keep in mind that at this time, he was 44 in 1962 and 53 in 1971....His peak as a player was argueably past, yet he still beat very, very talented players.
Now, not only was he a great TOURNAMENT player, he was also one of the greatest MONEY players that ever lived. His favorite game was "money pool", any game he could bet on. Believe me when I tell you this, his game went UP several notches for the cash. Some players play better in tournaments than they do when they gamble, and others, visa-versa. Lassiter was a better money player than a tournament player.
So, put those two facts together, add in his longevity at the top (30+ years) and I can make a very strong case for him. And besides his greatness as a 9 baller, Lassiter also won 4 World 14.1 Championships, PLUS 5 14.1 Championships at Johnson City, 5 World All-Around Championships and 1 World 1 Pocket Championship. And in 1970 & 1973, Lassiter finished 2nd to Steve Mizerak in the U.S. Open 14.1 Championships! That an amazing feat when you consider that Lassiter was 55 in 1973! And, in 1978, at the age of 60, Lassiter finished 3rd in the U.S. Open 9 Ball Championship, behind Mizerak & Rempe!

Think about this....Lassiter won 6 World 9 Ball Championships from the age of 44 till he was 53. How many more would he have won had there been 9 ball tournaments in the 2 previous decades? But there weren't any.
So, if he won 6 World Chamionships 20 years after his prime, what would he have been like from the 1940's to 1960's?

Luther Lassiter was a very gifted player indeed. He's my all-time #1 favorite player, so I'm kinda slanted for him!

I was told that Lassiter went on a six year stretch in which he did not lose a single match to ANYONE. Is this documented anywhere? There are a few things about Lassiter that I would like to have answered by someone who knew him well. Who should I ask? (about technique.)
My 84 year old table mechanic Ted Pierson of Joplin MO visited Lassiter's poolroom with Ted's young son and he said Luther was very very nice to them.