Earl vs. JJ..... The BonusBall Blow-up

No, this doesn't happen all the time except in the contact sports.

In the individual sports, and the ones that pool is always compared to on this forum are golf and tennis, this kind of behavior doesn't fly. When you watch on stream/TV, you won't often see physical aggression and vocal profanity in golf or tennis, and that's one of many reasons that major sponsors are willing to tie their names to those sports.

Behavior like this among pool players tends to reinforce the negative image that pro pool is trying so hard to shed, and those that condone and even encourage it are, in a small way, tending to hold our sport back.

You can't have it both ways. Pool can either accept this kind of conduct or chance being taken seriously as a sport.
 
Last edited:
Anybody remember John McEnroe, Agassi, Connors? Read Agassi's book if you want to know how tennis players acted against their rivals in many situations. Golf has a lot more separation between competitors during the matches so you just won't witness this behavior as much.

Yes, the reality is that there will always be great performers in every sport who do not possess a very high degree of emotional intelligence. I would certainly agree that, especially for non contact sports, the sport itself must demonstrate that this conduct will not be tolerated in order for a sport to maintain an image that has the opportunity for mass appeal, acceptance, sponsorship, etc.

However, look at the original post here, this behavior by Earl was labeled as " funny" and I see no less than five "thumbs up" by members here who obviously also think that this behavior by Earl is "funny"

So maybe pool has more than just a problem with some player's insane behavior - you have far too many pool spectators cheering this kind of behavior on- perhaps the WWWF should be where these folks focus their interest and attention and not pool- would probably benefit the sport greatly.

There was a time when many. many colleges and universities supported their own large billiard rooms as an accepted recreational outlet for their students - almost all of these rooms are gone now. Almost every new senior center in the more affluent areas of America no longer are including a billiard room when planning and designing their beautiful new centers - the old centers had full dedicated billiard rooms with three to six tables- NO MORE with the new centers being built.

Pool developed a reputation as a pick pocket sport - the hustle and the "score" are celebrated and honesty, courtesy, respect, humility, intelligence, all took a back seat because the room owners and the tournament directors never had the guts or the motivation to stand up to all that poor behavior. The lack of true beneficial leadership for pool ended up lowering the game's image to a point where it has almost no value at all to those who truly have the money to create mass appeal.

So what we have left now is a video of two pro pool players threatening each others lives and several people here this week , on pool's major spectator site, commenting on how funny this scene is to them- any wonder?
 
Last edited:
mikemosconi said:
Anybody remember John McEnroe, Agassi, Connors? Read Agassi's book if you want to know how tennis players acted against their rivals in many situations. Golf has a lot more separation between competitors during the matches so you just won't witness this behavior as much.

Yes, the reality is that there will always be great performers in every sport who do not possess a very high degree of emotional intelligence. I would certainly agree that, especially for non contact sports, the sport itself must demonstrate that this conduct will not be tolerated in order for a sport to maintain an image that has the opportunity for mass appeal, acceptance, sponsorship, etc.

However, look at the original post here, this behavior by Earl was labeled as " funny" and I see no less than five "thumbs up" by members here who obviously also think that this behavior by Earl is "funny"

So maybe pool has more than just a problem with some player's insane behavior - you have far too many pool spectators cheering this kind of behavior on- perhaps the WWWF should be where these folks focus their interest and attention and not pool- would probably benefit the sport greatly.

There was a time when many. many colleges and universities supported their own large billiard rooms as an accepted recreational outlet for their students - almost all of these rooms are gone now. Almost every new senior center in the more affluent areas of America no longer are including a billiard room when planning and designing their beautiful new centers - the old centers had full dedicated billiard rooms with three to six tables- NO MORE with the new centers being built.

Pool developed a reputation as a pick pocket sport - the hustle and the "score" are celebrated and honesty, courtesy, respect, humility, intelligence, all took a back seat because the room owners and the tournament directors never had the guts or the motivation to stand up to all that poor behavior. The lack of true beneficial leadership for pool ended up lowering the game's image to a point where it has almost no value at all to those who truly have the money to create mass appeal.

So what we have left now is a video of two pro pool players threatening each others lives and several people here this week , on pool's major spectator site, commenting on how funny this scene is to them- any wonder?
Click to expand...
waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa give me break. the connors/mcenroe/nastasi antics in tennis brought in tons of new fans. didn't hurt it in the least. 'emotional intelligence'??? WTF??? get this from some butthurt lib handbook??
 
Last edited:
So does anyone know what actually kicked off that JJ/Earl spat? Seen that vid a few times, but it cuts in late & I never knew what started it all.
 
phreaticus said:
So does anyone know what actually kicked off that JJ/Earl spat? Seen that vid a few times, but it cuts in late & I never knew what started it all.
Click to expand...
earl accused jj's team of sharking him while he was shooting. it just went sideways from there. whole match:
the blow-up is at the very end.
 
Last edited:
garczar said:
waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa give me break. the connors/mcenroe/nastasi antics in tennis brought in tons of new fans. didn't hurt it in the least. 'emotional intelligence'??? WTF??? get this from some butthurt lib handbook??
Click to expand...
HA HA- truth be told I am very far from a liberal- quite conservative to be exact. Relax, not arguing with you, I know that controversy in any sport or public display creates public interest. My point was that, for pool, the image itself has too much tarnish, unlike tennis or golf, and outbursts from Earl, etc. during competition only serve to keep the real money folks away from the game.

As for the term emotional intelligence, yes, there are many books on the subject. The crux of the affects result actually from how someone's mind works- we all encounter confrontational situations, and, in our mind, we can either move our response to that situation to our part of the brain that is able to assess and then respond in the present based on a logical and rational approach; or, as Earl demonstrates far too often, he just impulsively resorts to a fight or flight response- his response is usually to strike out verbally in an out of control fashion.

Earl is not in a boxing ring, he is not on Omaha beach ( WWII) , yet he responds to perceived "threats " during pool matches as if someone was pointing a loaded revolver at his head- I saw him do this in person last year at the American 14.1 in Virginia for no good reason-- THAT, my friend, is a lack of emotional intelligence.
 
I witnessed some interesting antics by Earl When he played Efren in the finals at The Sands in Reno. Probably '85. At the start Efren broke and ran 3. Then playing a beautiful safety that left the one ball middle of foot rail and cue ball married to the back of the ball closest to the head rail. With ball in hand Efren ran 3 more and put him locked to the ball closest to the head rail, Again!
Earls antics including a threat to his own cue! The gallery broke into the chant.......Break it, break it, break it. Too 🤣.
 
mikemosconi said:
HA HA- truth be told I am very far from a liberal- quite conservative to be exact. Relax, not arguing with you, I know that controversy in any sport or public display creates public interest. My point was that, for pool, the image itself has too much tarnish, unlike tennis or golf, and outbursts from Earl, etc. during competition only serve to keep the real money folks away from the game.

As for the term emotional intelligence, yes, there are many books on the subject. The crux of the affects result actually from how someone's mind works- we all encounter confrontational situations, and, in our mind, we can either move our response to that situation to our part of the brain that is able to assess and then respond in the present based on a logical and rational approach; or, as Earl demonstrates far too often, he just impulsively resorts to a fight or flight response- his response is usually to strike out verbally in an out of control fashion.

Earl is not in a boxing ring, he is not on Omaha beach ( WWII) , yet he responds to perceived "threats " during pool matches as if someone was pointing a loaded revolver at his head- I saw him do this in person last year at the American 14.1 in Virginia for no good reason-- THAT, my friend, is a lack of emotional intelligence.
Click to expand...
Yes, we all know that on a few occasions, tennis players have gotten a little out of line, but bursts of extreme profanity during streamed/televised action, physical threats of violence toward an opponent during streamed/televised action or invitations to meet opponents in the parking lot to settle a score during streamed/televised action is not something I've ever seen in tennis or, for that matter, golf.

Competitive tension and bad blood are part of every individual sport, and yes, they can build up rivalries, but to suggest that other mainstream individual sports have the behavioral indecencies found so often in pool so often encounters inside the playing venue during streamed/televised events is to engage in revisionist history, and I won't jump on the apologist bandwagon.

Pool's seedy reputation has been hard-earned, and a few too many players still behave in a way that tends to ensure that, in the short-term, this reputation will be sustained. Contrastingly, tennis and golf have earned their reputations as classy, decent sports the hard way, too, and the pros in those sports have worked hard to successfully reinforce their positive image.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top