I'm 82 and seen 100 champion players come and go. Twenty years at or near the top is a very long and succesful career. Dennis had 15 good years, enough to get him in the HOF.
You are to be envied, my friend. The memories are for keeps! Thinking way back like you, I remember when, in the mid-1970s. Irving Crane told me that Mike Sigel was one to watch ... so I watched him and he became my favorite player in the 1980s.
As you know, Dennis Orcullo was one of my favorites, too. What I liked most about Dennis was that, like Efren and Alex, he managed to excel in every discipline. Dennis was best known for rotation pool, but he was also elite at banks and one pocket, and also very capable at straight pool.
I was delighted to be there for the BCA Hall of Fame dinner in which you introduced Dennis and during which he was inducted. For me, the BCA Hall of Fame dinner encapsulates my life around pool. I cry every year when they show footage of deceased, but not forgotten, legends of the game, and in all but a few cases, they were people I knew and with whom I had spent at least some time.
PS By the way, speaking of having a long run at the top, how cool is it that Niels Feijen, now in his thirtieth year of competition, still carries a Fargo 824 and just beat SVB at the World 10ball.