I figured it was my fault.
Pool's "image" has nothing to do with it's lack of popularity - Science
- Thread starter ShortBusRuss
- Start date
I figured it was my fault.
As long as you only enjoy the game if the cost of a Starbucks coffee is on the line, it isn't likely to get better for you. It's a horrible foundation to try to build a sport on. Golf didn't need it, nor did video games.
I agree that a key is new young blood in the game, but how to make that happen is complicated. It won't be because a player can make $100 in an evening. It will be when someone not playing (a promoter, a sponsor, a TV exec, etc.) finds a way to make millions.
Tapity tap TAP
Or maybe they don't want to invest $500 on a cue, $200 on a break cue, $100 on a case and then other countless thousands over multiple years to enter a tournament and break even at best.
Meanwhile, Brooks Koepka just did the same thing in golf and made $2.1 million just in tournament prize money.
I've seen the kind of people that hang around the poolroom and watched their conduct that drives paying customers away. One exchange of extremely loud shouting of profanities, left one woman and her two teenage sons scrambling to return the balls and leave.....never to return...as the room owner simply smiled. Others are like vultures, ready to pounce on the next beginner for $5.00 a game, using intimidating verbal challenges. Lastly are the tattooed drug thugs with the baggy shorts, oversized hat and very limited vocabulary. When you own a business and you allow a selective few to destroy it one day at a time, don't complain when you can't pay the rent.
What he said..^ :thumbup2:
And Golf, of course, is a dignified, bonafide, athletic SPORT. Not a game masquerading as a sport.
The golfers and spectators may leave the golf course and get falling down drunk, vomit all over themselves, make a pig pen out of their bathrooms, use dope, shoot dice, use the filthiest loud vulgar "sailor" language on earth........BUT they don't do it out there on the course in public. (there are exceptions, but it's rare).
And if it's a country club, they will be ostracized for acting like donkeys and sent packing.
Pool history in the USA has always been low class except for a token minority of individuals. I do hope it's getting better. It is such a wonderful game!
:thumbup:
:thumbup2: Bingo!
Who's she?
Could you imagine showing up at the local golf course to play a quick nine after work and having some guy fall out of the bushes on the first tee asking if you wanna gamble some? Then, after telling him to buzz off, you play three holes and encounter another guy leaning on the ball washer at the fourth tee asking if you wanna' play $5 a hole. You tell him to pound sand and smash your ball into the fairway, where two guys are yelling at each other over who is spotting who a stroke a hole.
Golf courses would be as valuable as Pokémon cards if this happened.
Here is what happens if you intentionally foul in Golf :
https://www.usatoday.com/story/spor...ht-one-thing-he-should-embarrassed/718846002/
I think pool should be as straight up as Golf concerning the rules.
Trent from Toledo
P.s. Yes, when a guy walks into a pool room with a lady, or a group of ladies comes in on their own(rarely happens) and 20 sets of eyes, that you most likely don't want directed at you are staring at you, it tends to make new people uncomfortable. Let alone the behavior that ensues if you decide to stay! Pool is a hard sell as a professional sport. I see a lot of posts on here "why is pool not where it should be"???!!! It is obvious to anyone who is looking at it with open eyes what is wrong.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/spor...ht-one-thing-he-should-embarrassed/718846002/
I think pool should be as straight up as Golf concerning the rules.
Trent from Toledo
P.s. Yes, when a guy walks into a pool room with a lady, or a group of ladies comes in on their own(rarely happens) and 20 sets of eyes, that you most likely don't want directed at you are staring at you, it tends to make new people uncomfortable. Let alone the behavior that ensues if you decide to stay! Pool is a hard sell as a professional sport. I see a lot of posts on here "why is pool not where it should be"???!!! It is obvious to anyone who is looking at it with open eyes what is wrong.
Look Again
Mark Williams made 900,00 pounds this year. Ronnie's net worth was announced several months ago at 12,000,000. Many, many snooker players have lived great lives , without having to do anything else .
Snooker is light years ahead of American pool, but there is hope . Barry Hearn is on the way . If this guy cannot bring american pool to a higher level, it's a lost cause .
BTW........It's supposed to be brutally competitive..........that's what makes champions .
ther is no hope
Mark Williams made 900,00 pounds this year. Ronnie's net worth was announced several months ago at 12,000,000. Many, many snooker players have lived great lives , without having to do anything else .
Snooker is light years ahead of American pool, but there is hope . Barry Hearn is on the way . If this guy cannot bring american pool to a higher level, it's a lost cause .
BTW........It's supposed to be brutally competitive..........that's what makes champions .
ther is no hope
Look Again
Mark Williams made 900,00 pounds this year. Ronnie's net worth was announced several months ago at 12,000,000. Many, many snooker players have lived great lives , without having to do anything else .
Snooker is light years ahead of American pool, but there is hope . Barry Hearn is on the way . If this guy cannot bring american pool to a higher level, it's a lost cause .
BTW........It's supposed to be brutally competitive..........that's what makes champions .
ther is no hope
Mark Williams made 900,00 pounds this year. Ronnie's net worth was announced several months ago at 12,000,000. Many, many snooker players have lived great lives , without having to do anything else .
Snooker is light years ahead of American pool, but there is hope . Barry Hearn is on the way . If this guy cannot bring american pool to a higher level, it's a lost cause .
BTW........It's supposed to be brutally competitive..........that's what makes champions .
ther is no hope
But are outliers like mark and Ronnie really examples of what 'the sport pays' ? I don't think so.
They are the top of the top and the average pro likely makes a small to moderate % of their earnings.
Browsing in the history of cue sports largely in Brunswick related archives and mentions, it actually seems like pool & billiards were pretty high end/respectable before 1930. Lincoln, Mark Twain, a number of "mega-church" & abolitionist preachers of the 1800's proselytized on the values and benefits of playing the games. The equipment was expensive and the target audience had wealth, taste, and education. Whatever their personal foibles and failures, they also were the arbiters of moral and cultural values of the times.
In 1929 the stock market crashed. As the 30's advanced pool halls became the default home for a jobless crowd of transients, often homeless & in fairly desperate circumstances. Family type people stayed away & lectures about pool halls being evil became more common. The war revived Brunswick's fortunes (pool tables for the troops), and afterwards they tried to revive the family consciousness aspects. But even for Brunswick, it was a hard uphill struggle, and they made more money from their other sports equipment conglomerates, and especially bowling.
With Brunswick's efforts, movies, TV (Mosconi & other pros and shows, etc) pool improved its interest through the 60's to become a relatively familiar/common & somewhat family related passtime and skill again. By the 70's there was so much drug money sloshing through the lower economy that almost non-stop action began to occur anywhere there was a pool table. Pools image began to drop, and the early late 70's/early 80's were a depression again. The few pool halls that had sprung up started to close again.
I don't think pool's image overall is that bad, and may depend where you live/shoot. When i started up again after a 25 year lapse, the regional VP of my local bank asked me for a regular Tuesday game. Then Wed. we'd both play in a regular tournament at a decent local bar that also held couples dance classes at the other end. From those beginnings, the pool scene grew to be pretty large in a town with 2 universities. Lot's of grad students & professionals play in the leagues. Still not large enough to support a pool hall (periodically the now retired banker considers it, but the metrics don't come close to working out).
Basically i agree with the OP's premise: seediness (or lack) does not have much to do with current cue sports popularity. Choices by the current demographic tiers, and hence economics do. Cost of real estate in popular areas probably makes a pool hall without a liquor license un-viable in just the areas that would have the best demographics. The pool halls that still exist tend to have a bunch of retired guys who "own" them and the tables. Have kids ever thought an enterprise populated with doddering old geezers was a cool activity?
smt
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Not unless Mommy and Daddy paid for it, along with free rent, meals, and unlimited
internet and cel, on the family plan of course.
Not unless Mommy and Daddy paid for it, along with free rent, meals, and unlimited
internet and cel, on the family plan of course.
You didn't address one aspect of my point.
Me feel is pool is cyclical, and at some point will become very popular again and more people will be brought to the game. The professional ranks are a complete mess. Professional pool needs to be handled more like bowling, with an actual tour and then a 3 or 4 match televised finals.
Absolutely...(concerning what's in blue)
When we were young, many many of us guys just couldn't hardly wait to dress up in a suit and tie and ride the bus downtown to the poolroom where all the big time men were hanging out....lawyers, police detectives, judges, stock brokers, bankers, gamblers, bookmakers, professional baseball players,...all impeccably dressed and wearing hats.
I just LOVED wearing a man's hat. And being around those old pool room generals watching and learning.
This was in 1953-1957.
And the players were all dressed well too.....Handsome Danny Jones in a suit with white shirt and tie, Joe Cosgrove also in suit and tie, Railroad John and Slim Burrell the same way. When Eddie Taylor came through he always dressed to the nines.
I see it's all different now, of course.
You make good points about the history of the game.....I think that's all done for and gone with the wind however.
Too much loud hip-hop rap music(?)....caps on backwards, pants riding low, shirts with "eat me" on the front, drugs, and all the rest.
I am very old....just ignore me. I miss the days of opening the door for ladies and saying "yessir" and being polite to strangers.
That's a good posting of yours, by the way.
:thumbup:
That is true, but with sponsorship many can earn more than they would in 'normal' jobs, so its still worth their while (and I'm sure they'd rather play professionally than sit at a desk all day
Some interesting related sites, firstly a career prize money tracker (some of the top names are from the 80's, which shows how the prizes took a dip until recently):
https://cuetracker.net/statistics/prize-money/won/all-time
This year's money list (down to 66 made >USD 100k this year in prize money):
http://www.worldsnooker.com/rankings/
Most interesting is this, that I found on referees...I'm slightly dubious tbh, I didn't think they'd earn close to this, even at the top:
https://bizfluent.com/info-8774222-average-salary-snooker-referee.html
vjmehra;6172091... This year's money list (down to 66 made >USD 100k this year in prize money): [url said:
Snooker world rankings are based on performance over a 2-year period. So that snooker world rankings list is for two years combined. You can see the 1-year list by clicking the relevant box at the top.