No, not the Pink Floyd song, but there is a notion that is starting to appear on hear lately. This notion is not good for the long term growth of pool.
The notion is one of that only someone that is a "pro" is capable of playing top level pool and as such are the only ones that know how its done or can understand the ins and outs of the game.
For whatever reasons, there is this idea that what a "non" pro experiences at the table and during a tourney is less of value than that of a pro or pro event. That the effort the "non" pro puts into improving is not the same value as that of a pro's effort.
In other words, there is a air of snobbery occurring on here. Separate class of players as such, us and them.
Not good.
There is a separate class of players. There is the pro level and there is the rest of us.
Until you have actually been around a lot of pros or played them you don't REALLY understand the difference in levels. Of course a person doesn't have to be a "professional" to play world class pool. There are many examples of people with day jobs who are at or near world class level.
But I think what you are referring to is the idea that an amateur can know as much about playing high level pool as a pro and for 99% of amateur players that idea is wrong. The difference in levels between a good APA 7 and a top pro is enormous.
This difference is not only in knowledge but also in execution. So when a professional player tries to describe what they do they are doing from a perspective that most amateurs don't have. How can an amateur who struggles to run three racks tell a pro who regularly runs six anything about how to play pool? (to be clear I am NOT talking about coaches who have made it their career to understand the mechanics of the game).
I am sorry Greg but there is a major difference between you and them. I do understand that you consider yourself to be a student of the game. But you act like you are a master of the game and that's where you are wrong. Many of us have tried to tell you this but you continue to promote the idea that just because you put in a lot of hours you now are qualified to speak with authority on how to play pool. You aren't.
Pros on the other hand have had to put in thousands of hours on the table by themselves and in battle to get where they are. They earn every victory and gain tremendous experience when battling with and training with other pros. In other words they reach levels that most of us only dream about.
Now on a forum it's romantic to think that all people are equal. After all we all have a keyboard and we can say what we want. But while we can all say what we want we don't all have the same experience.
Let me see if I can provide you with an example that makes more sense. Let's say you grow up in a place and know every street, every shop and every body. I have read about your town and visited it for an hour passing through one day.
If we were to have a discussion about your town you might be offended if I acted like an expert by repeating what I had read and amplifying my one hour experience into something that sounded more like I had lived there for a long time. It would be obvious to you that I had no real idea what I was talking about but it wouldn't be so obvious to others. That's what a forum is like. When you talk about pool and try to make it seem as if whatever you say about how to play the game is as valuable as whatever a pro has to say then that's simply not true.
Throughout history knowledge is passed down from masters to novices not from novices to novices. In our sport the pros are the masters. When you use the forum to put them down, to belittle them, to attempt raise yourself to their level you simply create the type of place that they don't want to hang out in. So what you are left with is amateurs teaching amateurs.
And some of the amateurs here are very good. No doubt about it. Some of them are shortstop level and some of them could probably be pros if they wanted to be. But those are very few and most of us are no where near pro class even if we imagine ourselves to be.
So as hard as it to swallow you have to understand that it's not snobbery when people tell you that professionals are in another class. It's reality. That's not to say that every pro is right about the physics of the game. But it is to say that when a pro is here we should spend more time listening for the helpful things that come from their perspective and experience rather than arguing with them and trying to run them off.
Having no pros here is also not good. We have already run most of them off as it is.
