Funny Things Said to You at the Pool Room

[gregcantrall]

One Saturday early, I was getting my morning practice and the youngster wanted to challenge my table as all the rest were empty. I tried to be gentle and explain that, "I am a money player." He puffed right up and replied, "I Am a Money player too!" Oh and as he racked for 9 ball Freebird came on the jukebox. "He looks up and says, "I never lose to Freebird." .....His allowance was gone before the tune was over. Shrug . At the pay and surrender, I said "I never lose to Freebird either. " true story.

 

[HawaiianEye]

I was home on leave getting ready to be stationed in Taipei, Taiwan and I was in the old pool hall where I worked as a kid when an old guy who fixed the tables saw me playing pool.

He came up and asked me if I was still in the Army and I said, "Bruce, I ain't in the Army, I am in the Air Force."

Bruce had drank about a dozen or more beers by this time and he just smiled and asked, "where you going to be stationed now?" and I said, "Taiwan."

He laughed and said, "Taiwan! I'm gonna tie one on right now."

Bruce was good for "tying one on" pretty much every day. He would come in the first thing in the morning and sip Budwiesers with a shaker of salt all day until he was buzzed really good and then he would call a cab and go home.

 

[Inaction]

I played in a tournament in my home town and several of my college friends came to play also. Many of the locals didn't care for out of towners coming in to play, especially if they were good. At the time, the opponent racked for the breaker. Before Troy broke, he checked the rack. A guy says out loud "he must have seen that on ESPN". Later in the game, Troy makes a fantastic safety shot, caroming off a ball midtable and sending the cueball three rails to rest behind another ball on the rail. Troy comes up to me and whispers "I saw that on ESPN too".

 

[Taxi]

Two guys were woofing one day when one guy offered the other guy the 8. The other guy replied
“I’ll get down on my hands and knees and crawl naked all the way to your place for that game”. It was about 50 miles away

In Maryland there was a local trick shot artist named Chester Morris who once got quoted in a local newspaper as saying he'd "swim a sea of sewage to play Minnesota Fats." When I saw that article, I got a girl I knew at the pool room, Jenny Gale, to draw a picture of Chester swimming across the sea, complete with a snorkel, while on the other side a terrified Minnesota Fats was sitting on his throne with a king's robe, sweating bullets. I wish I still had that picture.

 

[gregcantrall]

Many of the locals didn't care for out of towners coming in to play,

Uh oh that brings a favorite memory. I was passing back through Weaverville the town I was born in and graduated high school from. It was kinda fun beating the local champion as he bragged of deflowering the girl that I had a crush on in high school and oh yeah he was allstar at baseball and football too. So naturally he was the best pool player in town. So as I was enjoying the beer I was winning, a transplant siddled up alongside me at the bar and uttered, "WE don't take kindly to hustlers beating on the locals."
I got a good chuckle and pointed in the direction of the hospital and explained that's the hospital that I was born in. The old high school the other way is the one I graduated from. You Can't get any more local than that." His threatening posture kind ah just melted away. Shirley it dawned on him that the local champion and I were friends. Well both very competitive towards each other in sports but on the same team when it came to locals vs transplants. .

 

[gregcantrall]

The old high school

And oh yeah I helped build the new high-school he might have graduated from.

 

[Buckzapper]

A new player in town asked me if I wanted to play him some 9 ball sets. I said sure. He asked how much did I want to bet. I told him I didn't ever ask anyone to bet. The poolroom got quiet as many eyeballers wanted to know the game. The new guy said quite loudly "Well, you're not going to play me for free." at that, laughter broke out and he asked why they were laughing. I told him "Let's find out." We settled on a nominal bet and I steamrolled him 2 sets before he quit. As he paid me he said "I never thought an old man could play 9 ball like that."

 

[gregcantrall]

He asked how much

Back in the day, When the conversation got to them asking, "how much?" My answer was always, "Whatever is comfortable for you." If they were confident enough to play for more than a beer...... well a number bigger than 5 a game, would get a raise. If they were comfortable with 10, I would counter offer 20.

 

[gregcantrall]

If they asked, How Good Do You Play? My standard answer was, "Better than You."

 

[gregcantrall]

Back in the day

There were only 2 players on the East side of Seattle that offered me weight. I busted them both playing off handed though. One of them that had beat me out of 20 playing off handed at 5 and could spot me the 8 ball playing right, asked me for a game. I knew I liked the off handed game as the night he beat me was real close to closing time when we started. So I asked, "how about left handed?" His reply was, "Well Greg, if we are going to play left handed its Gotta be for 10." My reply was quick and confident, "Well if it's Gotta be 10 then it's Gotta be 20." Fortunately he had won a couple hundred at the track that day.

 

[jeephawk]

Way, way, way back my buddy and me, just out of HS and in Seattle from the midwest for an event wandered off from the downtown hotel on a break and headed down towards the water - found a little pool room and we played a lot of pool in those days. We were there in three piece suits and rented a table for a little over an hour. Let's just say we were out of place for many demographic reasons other than our age/formal attire. One guy, who really was funny, but kind of thought he was Jimmie Walker and may have earned income in the room other than pool, decided I was "white boy" and my buddy got "brother" and just a running stream of commentary and we had a good time. I'd been putting some quarters in the jukebox but on a trip back I noticed, shockingly, it had some Barry Manilow - put on "Mandy", haha. Even triggered the regulars and man, I wish I could remember the comments - priceless.

 

[Biloxi Boy]

Several old boys playing in Wednesday afternoon ring game had been sitting way too long, watching as one player steadily raked in the cheese. Finally, after the player made a particularly impressive out, punctuated by a very strong final shot, and collected, one of the old boys was breaking down his cue and the following exchange occurred:
"I'm gone."
"Why's that?"
"This guy's game is like a burnt weenie."
"How's that?"
"You can't beat it."

 

[Ken_4fun]

As all of us has met a ton of characters over the years. These two one-liners came from my cousin who was a solid pool player but wasnt near shortstop level.

It didnt matter what tournament he played in, even if he went 2 and out, when asked how he finished, he would always reply, "I was one out of the money!". Everyone in the pool hall cracked up, and used that line often.

Same cousin, who liked to act like he would gamble big (I never seen it other that mostly cheap sets), asked another local player if, "You wanna play some $100 sets for $20?" Again one of my favorite lines.

Ken

 

[gregcantrall]

One guy, who really was funny, but kind of thought he was Jimmie Walker and may have earned income in the room other than pool,

Sounds like Race Track Rick....well back in the '80s. He hustled all over the Seattle Tacoma area. He did go "on the road" once. (When he had a car. )

 

[Taxi]

The Brass Rail in Durham BITD was full of characters. Most of them were just cushion beaters, but the room was air conditioned and it was a good place for the "Students of Life" to hang out and avoid real work. There was an old shoeshine chair right near the entrance where a guy named Wayne Dixon used to hold court and make comments about everyone who walked through the door.

One afternoon a road player walked in with his cue, a rarity in that room where most everyone played with house cues. That caught Wayne's attention, and he shouted out "Hey, buddy, you like to gamble?" And the guy says "Yeah, maybe. What game and for how much?"

Wayne then says "a hundred dollars", and that got the road player even more interested. "What's your game?" he asks.

Wayne just gave him a hard stare and replied, "I'll bet you a hundred dollars that my d*ck is littler than yours."

Funny, but nobody ever took him up on his bet.

 

[Black-Balled]

I go to a kinda sketchy place, they have snooker tables and there was a snooker tournament, guys in and out of the back door over and over again.

Crazys started screaming at each other about how the other's people were poor...one dude hollered that his family had a bus in 1994.

You ever have a bus?

 

[Black-Balled]

In Maryland there was a local trick shot artist named Chester Morris who once got quoted in a local newspaper as saying he'd "swim a sea of sewage to play Minnesota Fats." When I saw that article, I got a girl I knew at the pool room, Jenny Gale, to draw a picture of Chester swimming across the sea, complete with a snorkel, while on the other side a terrified Minnesota Fats was sitting on his throne with a king's robe, sweating bullets. I wish I still had that picture.

We do too

 

[Mensabum]

I was playing pool with a visitor to New York City who had grown up on a farm in the Midwest USA. The table we played on had very loose pockets, and he looked at me and said "man, these pockets are like bushel baskets." I'd never heard loose pockets described that way before and I laughed and laughed.

I got lucky and was playing this kid, 550 on his best day, when I heard one of the old guys who were watching say "Kid's a lost ball in the high weeds." Had to stop shooting for that one.

 

[dquarasr]

(I've shared this here before so apologies if you've seen it before.)

A (large) number of years ago I was playing a friend at a nearby hall. Next to us was a couple of very early-twenty-somethings. They were having a great time, drinking beer, playing casually, really cutting each other up with pretty funny banter.

One is taking a swig of beer when the other says something particularly funny. Dude makes all these contortions trying not to have beer come out his nose trying not to laugh. Guy struggles with it for a good number of seconds, finally gathers himself up, swallows his beer and says (with PERFECT timing):

"Dude...you almost made me spit out my beer. Then I remembered <pause> ... It's beer!"