my experience with apa in tunica

TheNewSharkster said:
- APA 9ball isn't like traditional 9ball. The 9ball is worth 2 points and other balls are worth 1 point and it is a race to X number of points. Its actually a fun way to play. A good mix of 9ball and straight pool.

- I agree that push out would be a nice rule to have in APA 9ball

- Skill levels are based on the number of innings, win/loss percent and the skill level of the person they beat. If somebody is a SL3 they are for a good reason. I personally have seen people that can't do a stop shot but can make some pretty incredible cut shots. You see the handicap system doesn't take into account if a player can perform a stop shot or not but how they play as a whole

- APA has a Master Division for people who do not want to play the "regular" APA 9ball rules. You can push out, no handicap and the 9ball is the only point.
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I agree that Masters is the best way to play league, but it is still team based (where you are generally either carrying a team or being carried by the team like myself LOL), plus in my area, its all valley barbox, which is just a whole other issue for me.

Regarding the point version of 9ball... that's just a terrbile bastardization of the game IMO. Break, make a ball get hooked, go kicking, then make every 9ball and still lose. I mean cmon... it teaches you how to play 9ball incorrectly... Plus the lack of three foul rule can cause a stalemate where you then mark all the balls as dead and rerack... ?!?!?!

It's just a bit too of the norm for me. Sad thing is APA is where I got my real start in pool. I do owe it a lot for me getting to the current level I am at, but I dont owe it a damn thing for me trying to stay at that level...

OK, Im done hijacking lorider's thread...
 
Pre-Flag Master said:
First of all, calm down.

If I am to understand that APA's target audience is lower skill level players, OK fine. You can still teach them to play the game right. In fact it's probably more important at that point. A lower level player misses a lot. But a lower level player doesn't really slop in that many balls either. So what's the point of the asinine rule to keep shooting after slop? Even most bar bangers know better. I would even say that most people joining their first pool league and it happens to be APA are probably surprised that slop counts.

I never said that I was a world beater. I never said that there's anything wrong with being a low skill player. Just that "slop counts" is a stupid way to play the game.

And also see post #3. The APA basically sucks the life out of "teamsmanship" for the sake of profit. Why don't they just run another, completely independent league? A scratch league, WPA rules. Or maybe a series of "skill level leagues" - Open, Grandmaster, Master, A, etc. No handicaps. Once you start a season, you are there through to the end of the tournaments for that year. If you get better, you move up to a harder league the next year. They kick you out of the league if you joined a league at too low of a level and keep the fees - screw your team because you sandbagged. Why can't they have more than one type of league going at the same time?
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Yeah yeah, I know, I get my panties in a bunch over APA too easily.. so I do apologize for coming off a bit harsh after your quote(part of it was more in a general response).

APA does have the Masters league and also supports the WPBA and the uhh NWPBA or something, too.

I play APA because I enjoy helping others, I enjoy trying to outrun a lower player shooting better than average, I enjoy playing some of the decent players around here and I see it as a fun hobby. I'm slowly phasing it out, but it allowed myself and people I know to get into the game and to improve. For that, I can't knock it.. I accept that it's catered to the recreational newbie-ish player and that's fine. I've got BCA and am about to join a straight pool league and to do both while trying to bounce around from one APA team to another would get a bit tiresome.

If I was asked to run anything for pool players, my first question would be how much am I going to get paid to babysit? I have no problem with paying a small yearly league fee(my car uses that much in a week or so), small weekly fees(for which I get access to stats/history/teams/etc) and I go into the game knowing what the rules are.

The constant bashing of the league for what it is gets to me, since most people refuse to accept that it's not even attempting to model itself after the pros. It already lasts until 11pm or later, anything that speeds it up is fine by me. :wink:
 
Banks said:
APA does have the Masters league...
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I like the Masters format. There was a thread a while back about having to be in a "regular" APA league to be allowed to play in a Master's APA league. Is that how that works? Seems like it was posted as a question, but never got answered as I recall.

Fatz
 
uwate said:
Handicapped leagues are tough. Every large event is going to have various issues with the handicaps. Its almost a given.

The BCA event mixed grandmaster/master/advanced and open in their 8 and 9ball events. Sounds doable on paper, with the higher ranked players giving up weight, but not in the reality of tunica 2012 where the BCA let in a few well known road players who play master speed as open players. They also only paid three spots so these road players took all the cheese too. They were short races to 5 and 7, so even the fact they underrated these action players it would have been ok if they paid 1/3 of the field.

I got a good look at NAPA while there and for 8ball handicapping its pretty good in it forces the better players to play lights out or lose. The only issues I saw at the tourny was anyone the league operators didnt know was handicapped really high. This I understand, if you dont know someone, you dont let them come in and rob the event. You rate them high and force them to play above their heads to win. Next event, after they have had a good look at you then maybe adjustments can be made.
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I was looking for some feedback at the Tunica NAPA event. Thanks for your post.
 
Pre-Flag Master said:
I like the Masters format. There was a thread a while back about having to be in a "regular" APA league to be allowed to play in a Master's APA league. Is that how that works? Seems like it was posted as a question, but never got answered as I recall.

Fatz
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As far as I'm aware, you do not need to play in regular league to be in the Masters league. But, you do need to be in the regular league to participate in the singles and other handicap-involved events.

The format is nice, but it seems like the 3 or 4 divisions in the PDX area are in every part of town but mine. Combine that with only wanting a couple nights of league at most and that's a no for me. Too many nights and I end up either too tired or too busy catching up the other nights.
 
Icon of Sin said:
I agree that Masters is the best way to play league, but it is still team based (where you are generally either carrying a team or being carried by the team like myself LOL), plus in my area, its all valley barbox, which is just a whole other issue for me.

Regarding the point version of 9ball... that's just a terrbile bastardization of the game IMO. Break, make a ball get hooked, go kicking, then make every 9ball and still lose. I mean cmon... it teaches you how to play 9ball incorrectly... Plus the lack of three foul rule can cause a stalemate where you then mark all the balls as dead and rerack... ?!?!?!

It's just a bit too of the norm for me. Sad thing is APA is where I got my real start in pool. I do owe it a lot for me getting to the current level I am at, but I dont owe it a damn thing for me trying to stay at that level...

OK, Im done hijacking lorider's thread...
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APA 9ball wasn't designed to teach people how to play regular 9ball. Its just a different game. I personally enjoy it.
 
APA doesn't figure it that way for whatever reason. Several things will trigger you getting raised or lowered. Win %, balls made per inning, etc. Plus they only take your best 10 games out of your last 20 into the formula. So players thinking if they lose rally bad then they can bag. Well not really. Because those games drop automatically to the bottom 10. Also one game with a lot of innings doesn't help an overall score as much as you would think. Because they have a formula that says if you're a 5 with a certain win percentage then you should average X amount of innings per game. If you go over that, the extra innings don't count for or against your handicap. I haven't captained an APA team in a while and they tweak the formula a little every so many years so there is probably more to it than this even.
PaulieB said:
I don't understand this. Wouldn't a handicap that keeps you at around 50% make more sense. If you start to win more than half your games than your handicap needs to be raised. If you are losing more than half your games then your handicap should be lowered or kept the same. Especially since there was a history of over 600 games, the baseline was set. I know people sandbag, but who sandbags for over 600 games?
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Well, well, well...

How about that! The APA screwed someone over? Someday these people will learn that it's just not worth the freakin' headache to play in the Anti-Poolplayers-Association. I have not played for years and will absolutely NEVER play APA again! I had my share of negative experiences for the short time I participated, but nothing beats what I saw during this past cities tournament here in Chattanooga. It was certainly interesting to see and hear about so many handicaps going up the day of the tournament, then once the big, exciting event was over, it seems all the handicaps returned to where they were beforehand. Funny how there were teams from certain bars whose handicaps were not affected... Funny how teams who were expected to do well suddenly couldn't play their better players and even had to forfeit due to the 23 rule... Funny how teams from the bars with the biggest APA participation were not complaining about anything...

Bottom line is, the APA is business. There is only one way to put a business out of business: stop patronizing the business!! Does anyone honestly think the APA gives two flyin' fornications about poolplayers? They care about that $35 signup fee and those weekly dues. The LO in this area has made quite a living over the past several years spreading the APA propaganda. It makes me sick! The only thing we can do is try to educate the newbies before they get sucked into it. Maybe, if enough people get angry about it, a movement could be started to ban the APA from poolrooms... That may be pipe dream...
 
miscrewed1989 said:
How about that! The APA screwed someone over? Someday these people will learn that it's just not worth the freakin' headache to play in the Anti-Poolplayers-Association. I have not played for years and will absolutely NEVER play APA again! I had my share of negative experiences for the short time I participated, but nothing beats what I saw during this past cities tournament here in Chattanooga. It was certainly interesting to see and hear about so many handicaps going up the day of the tournament, then once the big, exciting event was over, it seems all the handicaps returned to where they were beforehand. Funny how there were teams from certain bars whose handicaps were not affected... Funny how teams who were expected to do well suddenly couldn't play their better players and even had to forfeit due to the 23 rule... Funny how teams from the bars with the biggest APA participation were not complaining about anything...

Bottom line is, the APA is business. There is only one way to put a business out of business: stop patronizing the business!! Does anyone honestly think the APA gives two flyin' fornications about poolplayers? They care about that $35 signup fee and those weekly dues. The LO in this area has made quite a living over the past several years spreading the APA propaganda. It makes me sick! The only thing we can do is try to educate the newbies before they get sucked into it. Maybe, if enough people get angry about it, a movement could be started to ban the APA from poolrooms... That may be pipe dream...
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What I heard.

Edit: All this whining people do about APA is like fat people suing McDonald's.
 
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miscrewed1989 said:
How about that! The APA screwed someone over? Someday these people will learn that it's just not worth the freakin' headache to play in the Anti-Poolplayers-Association. I have not played for years and will absolutely NEVER play APA again! I had my share of negative experiences for the short time I participated, but nothing beats what I saw during this past cities tournament here in Chattanooga. It was certainly interesting to see and hear about so many handicaps going up the day of the tournament, then once the big, exciting event was over, it seems all the handicaps returned to where they were beforehand. Funny how there were teams from certain bars whose handicaps were not affected... Funny how teams who were expected to do well suddenly couldn't play their better players and even had to forfeit due to the 23 rule... Funny how teams from the bars with the biggest APA participation were not complaining about anything...

Bottom line is, the APA is business. There is only one way to put a business out of business: stop patronizing the business!! Does anyone honestly think the APA gives two flyin' fornications about poolplayers? They care about that $35 signup fee and those weekly dues. The LO in this area has made quite a living over the past several years spreading the APA propaganda. It makes me sick! The only thing we can do is try to educate the newbies before they get sucked into it. Maybe, if enough people get angry about it, a movement could be started to ban the APA from poolrooms... That may be pipe dream...
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A person moving up a skill level isn't APA trying to screw you over. The system is designed to move players up or down based on how they play. It sucks that it can cause a 23 point issue but that is life. If teams were loaded with all SL7 then it wouldn't be fun or competitive.

Now if a LO is moving players up or down based on some sort of bias that is a different story. I am sure that is the exception not the standard.
 
ok fellas i am calmed down now so ya'll chill out with the apa bashing. i never intended to start an apa bashing thread.

yea i was po'd when i got in.

i was also tired as heck and my feet were killing me from being on them all day for 4 days straight.

it was frustrating to see your chance to get in the finals go down the drain because no one noticed our 2 went up until after we started the 5th round. we were up 2-1 and had no choice but to put our just raised 2 and our average 3 up against a 5 and a 4. we were going with the same line up we did in the 3rd round with our supposed 2 up against their 5 and me up against their 4. we only needed 1 win to get in the money. the way i was shooting their 4 was no match, it was a sure win. it was frustrationg to see our 3 almost pull it out against their 4 when i should have been out there.

i guess i was not pissed so much because she was raised , i think i was pissed because i was not out there locking up our place in the money bracket.
 
Hungarian said:
You and your experiences.

Sounds like you need a bottle
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thanks for the effort and time you took to give me advice. unfortunatly it has been my experience your advice does not work.

you see ... i have hit the bottle many a time trying to drown my problems, they keep coming back.

cute picture of your kid btw :grin-square:
 
scratch divisions

Pre-Flag Master said:
First of all, calm down.

If I am to understand that APA's target audience is lower skill level players, OK fine. You can still teach them to play the game right. In fact it's probably more important at that point. A lower level player misses a lot. But a lower level player doesn't really slop in that many balls either. So what's the point of the asinine rule to keep shooting after slop? Even most bar bangers know better. I would even say that most people joining their first pool league and it happens to be APA are probably surprised that slop counts.

I never said that I was a world beater. I never said that there's anything wrong with being a low skill player. Just that "slop counts" is a stupid way to play the game.

And also see post #3. The APA basically sucks the life out of "teamsmanship" for the sake of profit. Why don't they just run another, completely independent league? A scratch league, WPA rules. Or maybe a series of "skill level leagues" - Open, Grandmaster, Master, A, etc. No handicaps. Once you start a season, you are there through to the end of the tournaments for that year. If you get better, you move up to a harder league the next year. They kick you out of the league if you joined a league at too low of a level and keep the fees - screw your team because you sandbagged. Why can't they have more than one type of league going at the same time?
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Obviously you don't know much about the different formats that are offered in the APA. Masters has no handicaps and combines both 8 ball and 9 ball with a push out in 9 ball and jump cues are legal. Super 30 divisions in 8 and 9 ball are available which allows teams to have a much stronger line up. skill level limit is 30 in 5 matches. Jump cues are legal and the super 30 divisions are a cash payout division.

Hope this will enlighten you a little.
 
lorider said:
it was lower than i was hoping for. bobby and jeremy put in a lot of hours trying to drum up some events for everybody. it seemed there just were not very many people interested.
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Yes, I advertised it at nationals on the stream, and put up flyers here in Columbus. Many tried to get a good turnout for the event.
 
How can a league where you can't even play with actual friends and have to break teams up every couple of months be considered fun? I'm glad that doesn't exist in my neck of the woods.
 
i do not know yet who won the apa tunica tournament but i would not be suprised if a team from north arkansas was in the finals.

we lost to them in the 4th round i think it was. they threw up a 6 1st and we countered with a 5. this 6 would be a 7 in our league. the match must have lasted an hour with them winning. it went 32 innings with 28 safties played.

next match we threw me "i am a 5 " they threw a 4. this match went 31 innings with 21 safties played. this 4 would be at least a 6 in our league.

cant tell you about the other 3 matches i went and smoked then browsed through the vendor section. we did win 2 though, with them winning the last match.
 
lorider said:
cant tell you about the other 3 matches i went and smoked then browsed through the vendor section.
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for someone who takes this stuff so seriously, I am quite surprised to see you deserted your team during a match.

/unsubscribing in 3, 2, 1...

-s
 
Lumocolor said:
How can a league where you can't even play with actual friends and have to break teams up every couple of months be considered fun? I'm glad that doesn't exist in my neck of the woods.
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Any team that needs to break up every few months is too good as a group for this league.

If you are all that good, why would you want to play against people that are so much beneath you, skill wise? To pump up your ego? So you can rob the beginners?

Short of that level of a player, teams don't have to break up that often. I have been playing with a couple of people for two years now.

Most of the time, you have to recruit one new player, if your team starts to get too top heavy. It's not like starting all over again. Usually, someone gets done for one reason or another, and that gives you the opportunity to add a lower level player....sometimes people decide to form their own teams, and that prompts change as well.

If anyone thinks that they should be able to out four to six great playing buddies together as a team, APA isn't for you. It's not that kind of league.
 
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