My U.S. Open

jay helfert

jay helfert

Shoot Pool, not people
Gold Member
Silver Member
I figured that since everyone else was writing about their U.S. Open experience I would also share mine. Why not, I was there for the whole thing, from beginning to end. I'm not too big on telling secrets. I'd rather say what I have to say to someone either directly or publicly. Anything I say here I would say to someone's face if I had the chance. Just like the things I had to say in Pool Wars. So none of this is meant to be a secret, it's just the way it was for me.

First of all, Mr. Behrman requested that Ken and I come several days early to assist in preparing the various rooms for the event. There were no "ballrooms" per se, with the largest banquet room at the hotel maybe 5,000 square feet. We used four separate rooms for the playing area, with one housing four tables (the TV arena), another one across the hall housing four more tables (the front room), a small room (originally to be called the Jay Helfert room) with two tables in it and finally the back room with six tables in it; sixteen tables total with matches going on most of them six rounds a day! And SOMEONE had to keep an eye on all these tables in the four separate rooms and make sure all was going well and on schedule with no problems. That was fun!

At first I didn't like the set-up with everything all spread out like that, a pretty good walk from the front two "arenas" to the back two. But when I saw the beautiful seating that was being created for this tournament to fit in each of those rooms (except the 'Jay Helfert' room), I began to see the possibilities. The rooms were small and intimate a nice setting for watching pool. The seating would afford everyone a good view of several matches at once. Sounds good so far, but then......the design of the cool looking seating was all done wrong. Whoever laid out the floor plan got the measurements fouled up and there was no room to get in or out from your seat once you were in. They also conveniently forgot to add enough aisles so it was hard to even enter the bleacher areas. It was BAD! And people weren't happy. It never ceases to amaze me how much hard core pool fans will put up with to see great pool being played.

Pt.1
 
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jay helfert said:
I figured that since everyone else was writing about their U.S. Open experience I would also share mine. Why not, I was there for the whole thing, from beginning to end. I'm not too big on telling secrets. I'd rather say what I have to say to someone either directly or publicly. Anything I say here I would say to someone's face if I had the chance. Just like the things I had to say in Pool Wars. So none of this is meant to be a secret, it's just the way it was for me.

First of all, Mr. Behrman requested that Ken and I come several days early to assist in preparing the various rooms for the event. There were no "ballrooms" per se, with the largest banquet room at the hotel maybe 5,000 square feet. We used four separate rooms for the playing area, with one housing four tables (the TV arena), another one across the hall housing four more tables (the front room), a small room (originally to be called the Jay Helfert room) with two tables in it and finally the back room with six tables in it; sixteen tables total with matches going on most of them six rounds a day! And SOMEONE had to keep an eye on all these tables in the four separate rooms and make sure all was going well and on schedule with no problems. That was fun!

At first I didn't like the set-up with everything all spread out like that, a pretty good walk from the front two "arenas" to the back two. But when I saw the beautiful seating that was being created for this tournament to fit in each of those rooms (except the 'Jay Helfert' room), I began to see the possibilities. The rooms were small and intimate a nice setting for watching pool. The seating would afford everyone a good view of several matches at once. Sounds good so far, but then......the design of the cool looking seating was all done wrong. Whoever laid out the floor plan got the measurements fouled up and there was no room to get in or out from your seat once you were in. It was BAD! And people weren't happy. It never ceases to amaze me how much hard core pool fans will put up with the see great pool being played.

Pt.1
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Hey Jay,
Another good story on your part. It all did not go to bad at the US open. You being there made it even better. Thanks for sharing.
Many Regards,
Lock N Load.
 
Pt. 2

I want to give a tip of my hat to Moses (Mo) and his crew who worked tirelessly to build all the seating that filled the three larger rooms. They were working from a floor plan given to them by the architect, who just got it a little wrong. The seating looked beautiful when it was done, except for one thing, it didn't fit! Like I said you had a big problem getting in or out from any seat, other than the end one.

I think Mo first realized the problem when he was over halfway done. There wasn't enough room (depth) allowed for to accommodate the chairs and tables shown in the plan. It was too late then. He did his best to find narrower tables, but there just weren't enough of them available. In hindsight, it may have been better to remove all the tables and just leave chairs only. There would have been lots of room to walk in front of the chairs and get in or out. I raised that idea but it was vetoed quickly by someone in a higher position.

Mo and his crew were still working the morning the tournament began, with the first matches at 11 AM on Sunday. Somehow he got through just in time so we would have seating ready in all four rooms. I asked him to build a riser for the "Jay Helfert" room (this room was not in the architect's floor plan, so it was up to me to design it). I was willing to pay him for the riser but it turned out he was too busy to do anything else on the last day, except get the planned for seating finished. I managed to scavenge the last two risers that the hotel had and created some elevated seating in "my" room. It was a cool little room, with seats for maybe fifteen people. But everyone was in close where you could easily watch both tables at the same time. The players that played in there didn't complain about the small crowd. I think they liked the atmosphere of that little room.

Cont.
 
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Keep it coming Jay! On day 2, before I got my VIP pass, and I got over being disappointed, I learned a trick on that squished seating. I was wanting to get to a real good seat at times and asked myself "how bad do you want it?" Self replied "real bad". Sooo... I crawled under the tables. :) I got some funny looks, but WTH? I was ringside at The Open baby!
 
This may turn into a mini novella, or so it seems.

Kenny and I had worked closely for three days with all the various crews assisting them in preparing for the tournament, offering whatever expertise we had. There was the hotel crew, who put all the tables and chairs in place. That was a mammoth undertaking. Plus the crew that took care of all the players and fans needs. Bob Thompson, the GM of the Holiday Inn was there every day doing whatever he could to make things work. His aide Jessica handled all the details and took a real interest in making the rooms look good.

Then there was the Diamond Boys! Ed Hagan, Paul Smith and Josh Ulrich. These guys have their act together! Wherever tables needed to be and in what position, no matter how hard it was to get them in there, they magically appeared. I would leave for a while, wondering how they were going to get four tables in an already packed arena, come back an hour later and the tables were sitting inside, resting sideways on their dollies. I saw them huffing and puffing sometimes (Josh is looking good girls!), but they were always on the move, delivering tables exactly where they needed to be, with no help needed whatsoever. It's a pleasure working with PROS like this, who know their job and do it so well.

Somehow, some way, it all came together in time for the tournament to get underway. We had 220 players, a small field for a U.S. Open. But I daresay it was the strongest field ever for any U.S. Open. Even the so called "weak" players could play. Maybe not like the pros, but well enough to run out with an open rack. Of the 220 players, I would say at least 200 had a realistic chance of finishing in the money. It helps that 96 players made the money, that's well over 40% of the field. Barry likes to pay deep and that does attract a lot of talented amateur players. I'll give him that much.

Our first problem (for Kenny, John Leyman and I) was the fact that about two dozen players were arriving late and wouldn't be able to play the first day. That played havoc with the scheduling but we managed to get through because of the short field. We didn't need to play as many matches on the first two days.

Pt.3
 
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jay helfert said:
This may turn into a mini novella, or so it seems.

Kenny and I had worked closely for three days with all the various crews assisting them in preparing for the tournament, offering whatever expertise we had. There was the hotel crew, who put all the tables and chairs in place. That was a mammoth undertaking. Plus the crew that took care of all the players and fans needs. Bob Thompson, the GM of the Holiday Inn was there every day doing whatever he could to make things work. His aide Jessica handled all the details and took a real interest in making the rooms look good.

Then there was the Diamond Boys! Ed Hagan, Paul Smith and Josh Ulrich. These guys have their act together! Wherever tables needed to be and in what position, no matter how hard it was to get them in there, they magically appeared. I would leave for a while, wondering how they were going to get four tables in an already packed arena, come back an hour later and the tables were sitting inside, resting sideways on their dollies. I saw them huffing and puffing sometimes (Josh is looking good girls!), but they were always on the move, delivering tables exactly where they needed to be, with no help needed whatsoever. It is a pleasure working with PROS like this, who know their job and do it well.

Somehow, some way, it all came together in time for the tournament to get underway. We had 220 players, a small field for a U.S. Open. Bit I daresay it was the strongest field ever for a U.S. Open. Even the so called "weak" players could play. Maybe not like the pros, but well enough to run out with an open rack. Of the 220 players, I would say at least 200 had a realistic chance of finishing in the money. It helps that 96 players made the money, that's well over 40% of the field. Barry likes to pay deep and that does attract a lot of talented amateur players. I'll give him that much.

Our first problem (for Kenny, John Leyman and I) was the fact the about two dozen players were arriving late and wouldn't be able to play the first day. That played havoc with the scheduling but we managed to get through because of the short field. We didn't need to play as many matches on the first two days.

Pt.3
Click to expand...

Come on Man! Get to the meat!!
 
Bill S said:
Come on Man! Get to the meat!!
Click to expand...

For me it's ALL the meat!

Our second scheduling problem was the fact that four of our key players were not going to be available for nearly two days at the start of the tourney. They had to fly to CN to play in the Challenge of Champions (Darren won and I'll bet he already got his 25K). Fortunately all four won their opening two matches and didn't go onto the losers side of the board. If they had, we may have had to forfeit them out, as we had a full schedule of losers side matches to play on the third day. Once again it all worked out.

The actual execution of the event fell to the three of us, ably assisted by Chase and Amber who took care of a lot of the legwork in getting players cards up, and keeping the match schedule and table assignments on a video screen, where the players could see when and where they had to go. Kenny for the most part took care of the tournament charts (two massive 128 player boards), and kept an eye on both front rooms. John and I rotated back and forth between the front and back rooms, doing our best to cover all sixteen tables and keep Kenny free to work the charts. It was a good thing that John and I had walkie-talkies to communicate with each other. We also could relay scores to the tournament desk from the back rooms.

Working this tournament was a test for all of us and I'm proud to say that we did a good job under the circumstances. Things ran relatively smoothly with few real problems to speak of. I want to also thank Craig, Tom, Dan and Todd for the part they played in keeping things under control. Todd especially has the thankless job of being Barry's right hand man, and for that he gets major points with me. Todd is a very bright guy who also happens to be generous (thanks for letting me borrow your monster truck) and soft spoken. His ego does not require too much massaging. He is also cool under fire, a quality he drew on many times during the week.

Pt.4
 
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thommy said:
Don't rush him or he'll put it in a book and sell it to ya:grin:
Click to expand...

This one's free!

We were working with a skeleton crew, considering the size of the event. We needed shot clock workers (always promised but never delivered), at least one more person to assist Chase and Amber so they could take a much needed break once in a while, and maybe one more good assistant for the three of us. Four tourney officials would have been nearly ideal. How I miss Bill Stock!

The good news is that it turned out to be a great pool tournament, with many terrific and memorable matches, and a superb champion crowned at the end. If you missed it on Accu-Stats live stream, then I hope you can see it later on TV or on a DVD. Buying the Accu-Stats live stream is one of the really great bargains in pool. You are watching championship quality pool, played by the best in the world, broadcast by the most knowledgeable crew in the game. You want pool on TV, well then here you are. It won't get any better than this. Buy a big screen, hook it to the net and watch Accu-Stats. You won't regret it. My new flat screen is coming tomorrow (true). And it's full internet ready! Shane played brilliantly to win, reminds me of how he played in 2007 when he won his first Open. Pool played at the highest level is awesome to see up close and personal, and there was a lot of that here.

The fans are also great at the Open. It's a pleasure for me to interact with all the pool crowd and to see all my pool playing buddies. Many of them I only see once a year. What made it not so pleasurable was being heaped with abuse by an often inebriated person who was supposed to be in charge. The disrespectful treatment all the tourney staff received was uncalled for in my book. We all worked hard to make the tourney a success and to be treated so badly was saddening (and sometimes maddening). For this reason it is very doubtful I will return to work on any future U.S. Opens. I left with a very bad taste in my mouth this time.

Pt.5
 
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jay helfert said:
This one's free!

We were working with a skeleton crew, considering the size of the event. We needed shot clock workers (always promised but never delivered), at least one more person to assist Chase and Amber so they could take a much needed break once in a while, and maybe one more good assistant for the three of us. Four tourney officials would have been nearly ideal. How I miss Bill Stock!

The good news is that it turned out to be a great pool tournament, with many terrific and memorable matches, and a superb champion crowned at the end. If you missed it on Accu-Stats live stream, then I hope you can see it later on TV or on a DVD. Buying the Accu-Stats live stream is one of the really great bargains in pool. You are watching championship quality pool, played by the best in the world, broadcast by the most knowledgeable crew in the game. You want pool on TV, well then here you are. It won't get any better than this. Buy a big screen, hook it to the net and watch Accu-Stats. You won't regret it. My new flat screen is coming tomorrow (true). And it's full internet ready! Shane played brilliantly to win, reminds me of how he played in 2007 when he won his first Open. Pool played at the highest level is awesome to see up close and personal, and there was a lot of that here.

The fans are also great at the Open. It's a pleasure for me to interact with all the pool crowd and to see all my pool playing buddies. Many of them I only see once a year. What made it not so pleasurable was being heaped with abuse by an often inebriated person who was supposed to be in charge. The disrespectful treatment all the tourney staff received was uncalled for in my book. We all worked hard to make the tourney a success and to be treated so badly was saddening (and sometimes maddening). For this reason it is very doubtful I will return to work on any future U.S. Opens. I left with a very bad taste in my mouth this time.

Pt.5
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What a shame!
 
jay helfert said:
... What made it not so pleasurable was being heaped with abuse by an often inebriated person who was supposed to be in charge. The disrespectful treatment all the tourney staff received was uncalled for in my book. We all worked hard to make the tourney a success and to be treated so badly was saddening (and sometimes maddening). For this reason it is very doubtful I will return to work on any future U.S. Opens. I left with a very bad taste in my mouth this time.

Pt.5
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Remarkable.
 
jay helfert said:
For me it's ALL the meat!

Our second scheduling problem was the fact that four of our key players were not going to be available for nearly two days at the start of the tourney. They had to fly to CN to play in the Challenge of Champions (Darren won and I'll bet he already got his 25K). Fortunately all four won their opening two matches and didn't go onto the losers side of the board. If they had, we may have had to forfeit them out, as we had a full schedule of losers side matches to play on the third day. Once again it all worked out.

The actual execution of the event fell to the three of us, ably assisted by Chase and Amber who took care of a lot of the legwork in getting players cards up, and keeping the match schedule and table assignments on a video screen, where the players could see when and where they had to go. Kenny for the most part took care of the tournament charts (two massive 128 player boards), and kept an eye on both front rooms. John and I rotated back and forth between the front and back rooms, doing our best to cover all sixteen tables and keep Kenny free to work the charts. It was a good thing that John and I had walkie-talkies to communicate with each other. We also could relay scores to the tournament desk from the back rooms.

Working this tournament was a test for all of us and I'm proud to say that we did a good job under the circumstances. Things ran relatively smoothly with few real problems to speak of. I want to also thank Craig, Tom and Todd for the part they played in keeping things under control. Todd especially has the thankless job of being Barry's right hand man, and for that he gets major points with me. Todd is a very bright guy who also happens to be generous (thanks for letting me borrow your monster truck) and soft spoken. His ego does not require too much massaging. He is also cool under fire, a quality he drew on many times during the week.

Pt.4
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the scheduling was very bad.
my first match i played on day 2 at 11 am.
i won that match then played at 11 pm on the same day.
 
Good read so far Jay.... I'm still recovering from the mini hurricane that was the 2012 Open... Glad you made it home safe and sound.....
 
Jay,
That sux! but I guess if you don't have the $ for the payout, maybe ya gotta get drunk to deal????

Oh, and thanx for the freebie:thumbup2:
 
jay helfert said:
For me it's ALL the meat!

Our second scheduling problem was the fact that four of our key players were not going to be available for nearly two days at the start of the tourney. They had to fly to CN to play in the Challenge of Champions (Darren won and I'll bet he already got his 25K). Fortunately all four won their opening two matches and didn't go onto the losers side of the board. If they had, we may have had to forfeit them out, as we had a full schedule of losers side matches to play on the third day. Once again it all worked out.

The actual execution of the event fell to the three of us, ably assisted by Chase and Amber who took care of a lot of the legwork in getting players cards up, and keeping the match schedule and table assignments on a video screen, where the players could see when and where they had to go. Kenny for the most part took care of the tournament charts (two massive 128 player boards), and kept an eye on both front rooms. John and I rotated back and forth between the front and back rooms, doing our best to cover all sixteen tables and keep Kenny free to work the charts. It was a good thing that John and I had walkie-talkies to communicate with each other. We also could relay scores to the tournament desk from the back rooms.

Working this tournament was a test for all of us and I'm proud to say that we did a good job under the circumstances. Things ran relatively smoothly with few real problems to speak of. I want to also thank Craig, Tom and Todd for the part they played in keeping things under control. Todd especially has the thankless job of being Barry's right hand man, and for that he gets major points with me. Todd is a very bright guy who also happens to be generous (thanks for letting me borrow your monster truck) and soft spoken. His ego does not require too much massaging. He is also cool under fire, a quality he drew on many times during the week.

Pt.4
Click to expand...

Alcohol abuse and being in charge of the US Open doesn't seem like it works well. We all appreciate everything you do for pool Jay and sorry you had to go through all that brother. Also I appreciate you telling it like it is and not accepting this kind of treatment. All the best to you!!!
 
jay helfert said:
What made it not so pleasurable was being heaped with abuse by an often inebriated person who was supposed to be in charge. The disrespectful treatment all the tourney staff received was uncalled for in my book. We all worked hard to make the tourney a success and to be treated so badly was saddening (and sometimes maddening). For this reason it is very doubtful I will return to work on any future U.S. Opens. I left with a very bad taste in my mouth this time.

Pt.5
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I'm not surprised, you have been a institution there forever and its sad to see it end like this. I know it aint you. Thanks for all your good work over the years Jay, pool wouldnt be as good if it was not for you. His loss not yours.

I'm not sure there will be a US Open again, at least with the current "Brass"....

Best
Eric:)
 
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