Recent content by mikemosconi

I recently purchased a vintage Viking Cue here on our For Sale section. The cue struck me for several reasons: I never owned a Viking Cue among 150+ cues over the years, it was a late 80s/ early 90s very nice looking six pointer, the cue looked to be in terrific original condition at a good...

I don’t think that you are missing anything either. Buddy was one of the “prior generation” of players who had the stroke fundamentals that would have translated very effortlessly into this modern pool playing equipment world. I think all the past greats could play great today. The real...

Yea I don’t quite understand the bunting reference either. Most of the great players today exhibit a pool stroke that looks extremely smooth and well timed with a longer draw back and very very complete and even speed all the way through the cue ball with tip going to the cloth. Tight pockets...

The stroke fundamentals that we see in top pros today seem to have mostly originated in European youth pool schools . They reflect an answer to faster cloth and cushions, tighter pockets, and changes to cues themselves. Until the 1980s straight pool still dominated the U.S. pool tournament...

Great exposure for this event to finally get back on ESPN. Disappointing, to say the least, that they would cut off a live event after people watched through 3 hours of commercials after every rack! Somebody at ESPN and the pool world screwed up by thinking that you could run so many...

I own and have owned many brands of cases from low to high in price range. Regarding the JB upright case - yes very well constructed, yes great cue protection , but, for me, with higher end cues- a 3x5 , fully loaded , the fit is too tight- I can’t get the cues in and out without touching each...

The older Excalibur cues from the 90s had designs like these plain Jane’s and I believe that Viking made many of them if not all. Several , though, came with those older thick heavy brass joints. The shafts on the old Excaliburs were often very good quality wood

I find this interesting as I recently bought a Canadian maple shaft with an advertised Tiger Everest medium tip. The hit from that shaft was way too hard for my liking - I had a soft Ultraskin put on it and for me the shaft is now very playable. The Everest tip was new - but it was not a...

Not a Mike Miller cue - he was much later as a maker under the Morgan name. Nameplates like that - often ivory - go way back from early 1900s forward to 40s maybe some in the 50s.

Yea the N line Viking that I just bought on this site has that exact pill bumper. N series for Viking was 89-92 with “Viking” inside an oval on the buttcap - after 1992 they added the word USA . Makes sense that this cue was a derivative of the Viking M line prior and being made for Murrey

I’ll add that Jim was a super nice guy to work with and besides being highly skilled he seemed to be a very honest guy in every way - After meeting him I had no problem leaving my cue with him to take back to his shop and do the work and then mail the cue back to me. Everything was without issues.

My initial thoughts were Viking, Karl Meyer, could be anyone of many others as well including imports.

Along these lines- tip hardness has very much to do with the feel of a cue hitting a cue ball - from my experience. If I change out a very hard cue tip to a soft cue tip - the difference in the “hit” of that cue is most often night and day. I cannot play with tip hardness in the hard to very...

Jim did some cue work for me back in 2004. I believe that he was a one man shop. He was not a very prolific cue maker. His work was known for solid construction and careful choices of woods and materials resulting in very solid hitting cues. Jim was not a “ big name” cue maker as in a...

AI has incorrect information everywhere and info on pool cues is included in its misinformation base. I have found misinformation in any topic that one may choose to research. AI info is only as good as what is input - so no one knows if the input is correct to start - much of it is not...