Todays Pros....

CJ Wiley said:
I don't think they would falter at all, on the contrary, I believe they would have the chance to truly dominate. If you ask Johnny Archer I believe he will agree with me, we need the game to more difficult, not easier. It's far easier now with the slick equipment, soft break, magic rack, rules, and shorter races than it was when Johnny was in his prime in the early to mid 90s.

We need a player to dominate this game like Tiger Woods dominated golf. Playing one foul races to 7 or 9 breaking soft, with a rack that allows a dead ball every time will never allow that to happen. It's pool's projection of socialism where the main objective is to keep everyone "equal" with a level playing field. The cream must be allowed to rise to the top, just like it is in every other major sport/game. This would still favor Shane, Johnny, Dennis, and the other top players, just in a way that would be clearly visible.
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CJ -

I was interviewing Allen Hopkins once for a magazine article and he said that he thought winner break was a terrible way to play.

He suggested that if you would equate this to football, that after a team scores you give them the ball again...I had never thought about it but after he described this in those terms it did sound silly to have winner break.

He suggested loser break. I have played in tournaments that played that way and it does tighten the scores of the matches.

Most folks on here want to see strings of racks verses close matches. I think Earl was at your poolroom when he ran those 11 racks or so and was supposed to get the $1MM, and didnt get all of his money.

Any thoughts?

Ken
 
The key to pool's popularity will not be the game, it will be with the characters

Ken_4fun said:
CJ -

I was interviewing Allen Hopkins once for a magazine article and he said that he thought winner break was a terrible way to play.

He suggested that if you would equate this to football, that after a team scores you give them the ball again...I had never thought about it but after he described this in those terms it did sound silly to have winner break.

He suggested loser break. I have played in tournaments that played that way and it does tighten the scores of the matches.

Most folks on here want to see strings of racks verses close matches. I think Earl was at your poolroom when he ran those 11 racks or so and was supposed to get the $1MM, and didnt get all of his money.

Any thoughts?

Ken
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My thoughts are "if it's not broke, don't fix it, however, it is is broke, you will probably have to make some noticeable changes to fix it".

There's nothing wrong with running racks, it's exciting. Allen's point was pool's more like tennis, you can't play "winner serve" or at some point it just becomes a "serving game," and everyone just works at having the best serve. This is also true in pool, and racking your own balls makes it even worse, especially with a rack that you can maneuver to an advantage and make dead balls every time. At least with a Referee racking it would be a neutralizer, not unlike having a dealer at a card game. You don't want the deck (rack) in the players hands or there's going to be issues.

I think as long as pool tournaments are on the course they are running nothing's going to matter much. The key to pool's popularity will not be the game, it will be with the characters that play the game. This is why 'The Hustler' and 'The Color of Money' were such huge factors, it was Paul and Tom, not the game that captured the attention of the general public. It's too bad there was no follow up PR Campaign, but that's water under the bridge. The only hope pool has now is a TV SHOW or it's going to continue to plummet in popularity. "Out of sight, out of mind" is the dilemma right now, and without major media coverage Pool's not even in the running with other forms of entertainment.
 
CJ Wiley said:
I don't think they would falter at all, on the contrary, I believe they would have the chance to truly dominate. If you ask Johnny Archer I believe he will agree with me, we need the game to more difficult, not easier. It's far easier now with the slick equipment, soft break, magic rack, rules, and shorter races than it was when Johnny was in his prime in the early to mid 90s.

We need a player to dominate this game like Tiger Woods dominated golf. Playing one foul races to 7 or 9 breaking soft, with a rack that allows a dead ball every time will never allow that to happen. It's pool's projection of socialism where the main objective is to keep everyone "equal" with a level playing field. The cream must be allowed to rise to the top, just like it is in every other major sport/game. This would still favor Shane, Johnny, Dennis, and the other top players, just in a way that would be clearly visible.
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I've played on tables with slow cloth before. I honestly find it easier to control the CB. Sure it's easier to move the CB on today's equipment, but it's also a lot easier to over run shape.

Even if you went to the push out rule and changed up the equipment, the 3 top players that frequent tournaments in the US would be Francisco, Shane, and Dennis.

As sad as it makes me say, it's unlikely that pool will ever become a huge sport. I think there's definitely a chance that it could get bigger though, but the main audience is always going to be pool players.

On an unrelated note, how long does it generally take to ship a DVD when ordered from your website?
 
CJ Wiley said:
... If there's a tournament with 64 players and $25,000 is added it is not a positive overall effect because the net loss is approximately $71,000.

With entree fees, travel expenses and accommodations the average cost per player (CPP) is $1500. multiply this {Hard Cost} times 64, that's $96,000 minus the added money of $25,000 that's a NET LOSS of $71,000. ...'
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You should compare the expenses ($96,000 in your example) to the total prize money, not just to the added money, because the entry fees (or most of those fees) are also coming back to the players. It would still be a net loss situation, just not $71,000.

But your fundamental point about the horrible economics of it is correct.
 
It's like making golf courses 70% as long to speed up rounds of golf.

BeiberLvr said:
I've played on tables with slow cloth before. I honestly find it easier to control the CB. Sure it's easier to move the CB on today's equipment, but it's also a lot easier to over run shape.

Even if you went to the push out rule and changed up the equipment, the 3 top players that frequent tournaments in the US would be Francisco, Shane, and Dennis.

As sad as it makes me say, it's unlikely that pool will ever become a huge sport. I think there's definitely a chance that it could get bigger though, but the main audience is always going to be pool players.

On an unrelated note, how long does it generally take to ship a DVD when ordered from your website?
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This sounds like a "trick question" ;) When DVD's are in stock it takes 48-72 hours on the average. We try to get them out asap, however, we're not set up for orders over a certain number in a given day, so shipping/labeling can be challenging at times. I'm doing almost half my orders out of this country right now, however, this fluctuates.

The rule changes I'm suggesting are not going to change who's the best players, they're just better rules. One foul was designed to speed up play so tournaments would run faster. It's like making golf courses 70% as long to speed up rounds of golf. This achieves the objective and at the same time dilutes the game, and this has happened in pool it seems.

If things were going well for "The Game" this would be a mute point, however, it's not going well, so why not make the Game the best it can be? 'The Game is the Teacher'
 
If there was a chance to get on ESPN I would go to ALL TELEVISED TOURNAMENTS

AtLarge said:
You should compare the expenses ($96,000 in your example) to the total prize money, not just to the added money, because the entry fees (or most of those fees) are also coming back to the players. It would still be a net loss situation, just not $71,000.

But your fundamental point about the horrible economics of it is correct.
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Yes, that's correct, if the entry fees were 500 the NET LOSS would be 71k minus the 32k which would leave a loss of -$39,000. per tournament.

That's much better. :thumbup: ....just kidding

I stand corrected, and just notice the point, I"m not complaining, although this is the reason I can't get myself to go to tournaments these days.

If there was a chance to get on ESPN I would go to ALL TELEVISED TOURNAMENTS.....because this is a way to build our personal brand. I've done over 600 International Hours on ESPN and quite a few on Prime/Fox Sports as well, this ended up making me much more than any tournament winnings in residual revenue. Today's players are missing out on this and it's a shame because it can be millions of dollars depending on circumstances.

Streaming adds no additional value to the event for the players - they would be good support for televised events, but streaming only applies to hard core fans, no matter what the sport or game.
 
CJ Wiley said:
Yes, that's correct, if the entry fees were 500 the NET LOSS would be 71k minus the 32k which would leave a loss of -$39,000. per tournament.

That's much better. :thumbup: ....
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And it could be worse than the -$39k if some of the entry fees are not put into the prize fund. In some events, some of the entry fees go to administrative expenses. So the prize fund is entry fees minus administrative charges (of several possible types) plus added money.
 
CJ Wiley said:
This sounds like a "trick question" ;) When DVD's are in stock it takes 48-72 hours on the average. We try to get them out asap, however, we're not set up for orders over a certain number in a given day, so shipping/labeling can be challenging at times. I'm doing almost half my orders out of this country right now, however, this fluctuates.
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No trick. I just ordered it last Friday, and when I checked my mail on Wednesday, I hadn't received it yet.

I'll check tomorrow, it's possible it was delivered by now.
 
Touch of Inside Pivot System (TIPS)

BeiberLvr said:
No trick. I just ordered it last Friday, and when I checked my mail on Wednesday, I hadn't received it yet.

I'll check tomorrow, it's possible it was delivered by now.
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Your DVD was sent out on Tuesday with the Friday orders so it should take 3-4 days, the only issue may be the Easter weekend, holidays tend to slow the mail a day or two. I should have sent you the tracking info. from PayPal in an email that you can use to track it on line if you want to find out for sure.

I'm filming my Touch of Inside Pivot System (TIPS Banking) right now, and it just started raining so hard we had to pull up for awhile. It sounds like it's hailing outside here in Texas......we have some crazy weather here at times.
 
CJ Wiley said:
Your DVD was sent out on Tuesday with the Friday orders so it should take 3-4 days, the only issue may be the Easter weekend, holidays tend to slow the mail a day or two. I should have sent you the tracking info. from PayPal in an email that you can use to track it on line if you want to find out for sure.

I'm filming my Touch of Inside Pivot System (TIPS Banking) right now, and it just started raining so hard we had to pull up for awhile. It sounds like it's hailing outside here in Texas......we have some crazy weather here at times.
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It's all good, sir. Thank you.
 
Ken_4fun said:
CJ -

I was interviewing Allen Hopkins once for a magazine article and he said that he thought winner break was a terrible way to play.

He suggested that if you would equate this to football, that after a team scores you give them the ball again...I had never thought about it but after he described this in those terms it did sound silly to have winner break.

He suggested loser break. I have played in tournaments that played that way and it does tighten the scores of the matches.

Most folks on here want to see strings of racks verses close matches. I think Earl was at your poolroom when he ran those 11 racks or so and was supposed to get the $1MM, and didnt get all of his money.

Any thoughts?

Ken
Click to expand...

Buddy Hall said the same thing. He said loser breaks is the way to go, and it would also put a stop to all of these rack riggers.

Pool is so poor as a sport. You don't see bowlers racking their own pins. Well, in an ideal world, there would be designated neutral rackers in pool, but this usually only happens in the finals. :o
 
JAM said:
Buddy Hall said the same thing. He said loser breaks is the way to go, and it would also put a stop to all of these rack riggers.
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If a player already rigs the rack on their breaks when running a package, wouldn't they be more inclined to rig the rack when they are behind?
 
BeiberLvr said:
If a player already rigs the rack on their breaks when running a package, wouldn't they be more inclined to rig the rack when they are behind?
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What's funny about that is I have seen this happen, two rack riggers in a match. Each one knew how to rack to break and rack for somebody else breaking. It was so funny to see them against each other in a match at the Super Billiards Expo. One of them was b*tching about the other one outside smoking and said he was going to give him a bad rack every time because he recognized that his opponent was giving him a bad rack. :grin-square:

Takes one to know one, I guess. :wink:
 
JAM said:
What's funny about that is I have seen this happen, two rack riggers in a match. Each one knew how to rack to break and rack for somebody else breaking. It was so funny to see them against each other in a match at the Super Billiards Expo. One of them was b*tching about the other one outside smoking and said he was going to give him a bad rack every time because he recognized that his opponent was giving him a bad rack. :grin-square:

Takes one to know one, I guess. :wink:
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Riggers gonna rig.
 
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