Oak Cliff Texas Pool Hustkers WAy of Dealing With Fight

Sounds kinda like that scene from My Cousin Vinny

pvc lou said:

Sounds kinda like that scene from My Cousin Vinny

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I was going to say West Side Story..but OK.

Sent from the future.

deanoc said:

Pool hustling was part of growing up in our community

Boys took up pool not so much for the game itself but fot the
culture of gambling,excitement, and just pure fun

Fellas like Little Jackie Potter,Lucky Louie Harper,Tommy
Blanton and a whole host of others took up the game

It became our part time job and recreation.It wasn't really glamorus if
you compare it with something like being a major league baseball player,
or professional golfer,but then again some of us needed eating money or
clothes or tuition or enough money tobuy a car,get a date on Saturday night
and pay for a pizza


Sometime it was danderous out there,playing in bars with the type of people that
took it personal if helost and wanted to fight.You see this type on Az,they get mad easily
and angry words flow

Here is a little story you might enjoy about Lucky Louie and Tony abbott,they went into a bar
a ran into a semi tough guy who wanted to bully our heroes into a pool game for $20 but Tony
and Louie had $20 so they played and won and won again.

Soon, the bully cashed a few checks for $20 each until he had no more checks,he said
I will play one more for $20

Louie said "but how will you pay"

Bully says "then I will fight you for $20"

Tony was a nice looking guy ,like Travolta was in Grease,but he was
a very talented fighter as well,and he enjoyed a good fist fight,so he began
slipping his rings off his hands in peparation for the fight as they headed out side


But here Louie ,a very practical laid back kid says"hold on,how will you pay when you lose?"
c
Cooler heads prevailed one the bully realized that the Oak Cliff boys don't fight without posting the money.

We were just kids

Funny how much you can grow to love each other at that age, we bonded together
,we never played pool against each other.It was us against the world,only Potter and
myself are around anymore ad we don't really play these days.

We talk about it,but we don't actually play,if we did it would have to be for money,
guys like us don't play for fun. People that do are hard forus to understand,
maybe they are the smart ones,Iknow I never wanted my boys to gamble.
Who would want that for their kids?

Maybe this iswhere my hypocrisy reveals itself.

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I was always a loner and even when I was a kid I liked to gamble at just about anything requiring skill, like pitching pennies, nickels, dimes or quarters against a wall. Most of the time I could win against older guys and once in a while they wanted their money back. I was a little guy, smaller than most of them but had a strong right arm (was a star pitcher in Little League and could throw a baseball farther than anyone else). I wasn't a tough guy and didn't like to fight, but sometimes I had to. I discovered early on my best move was to get them down on the ground and wrap my arm around their neck and squeeze. Thirty seconds of that and they were begging me to let them go.

Fast forward to fifteen years later and now I had my own poolroom. I quickly discovered that if there was a problem, like a fight in my poolroom, calling the cops didn't help much. My call was not high on their priority list and it could take 30-45 minutes for anyone to show up. Way to late to help me. So I had to be my own enforcer in the poolroom, breaking up fights right away. I would jump in and grab one guy and pull him off and try to enlist someone to hold back the other guy. Then I would give them my little speech, "If you want to fight take it outside into the alley!" Or, "You can pick on me." Most everyone respected me since I owned the place but not everyone.

I used that line on this tough young Indian kid and he cold cocked me, knocking me out cold. The only time in my life I ever saw stars and the whole world was spinning. I was very careful about using that line in the future. :grin:

Years ago I was gambling low, but fast -- $50 9 ball races to 3 on a Valley barbox. I was playing a big guy named Oscar, spotting him the last 2, or the 8, something like that. Anyhow, I was drinking and running out and just having a hell of a good time. I got up a few hundred dollars in a short time and Oscar quit.

Feeling pretty good and loose, I announced that I'd play anybody that thought they could win. That's when a guy named Greg Taylor walked into the room. He had a few groupies tagging along behind him, so I figured he could play. We played even, same bet at $50 races to 3. I was still playing great, consistent, but also drinking great and consistent.

The matches were first like coin tosses, either he or I would run 3 racks and then move the penny one way or another. But eventually the penny would quit moving my way, and after Greg won the money I had taken from Oscar, after we'd adjusted a bit and I was getting a spot, he got another couple hundred or so from me, whatever I had on me. When I told him I could go get more money, he said he didn't want me to because I was drinking too much and he didn't want to take advantage of me. Classy guy.

I walked over to a friend of mine and asked for $100. He said he wasn't going to give it to me to play anymore pool because I'd been drinking way too much. He made sure to remind me that Greg Taylor was the Virginia Nineball State Champ. I told him I was finished playing pool for the night and just needed to borrow a hundred. He never got up from his chair, but fished 5 twenties out and handed them to me.

I took the $100 and walked straight over to the pool table and laid the bills out, then looked at fat Oscar, who had been quietly watching me lose all my money. I asked if he wanted to fist fight for the hundred. Immediately my friend rose up and started for the table, saying he wanted that hundred dollars back! Lol. Long story short, I couldn't talk Oscar into fighting. I just wanted to win some money back, not in a hardcore redneck fight, but in a gentleman's fist fight, toe to toe until one of us had had enough. Instead, I staggered off to the hotel with that hundred dollars feeling a bit heavy in my pocket.

The next day I got 3rd in the 8ball tournament with well over 100 players. Greg Taylor won. And I got my picture taken with no busted lip or blackeye, so it turned out ok I guess.

jay helfert said:

I was always a loner and even when I was a kid I liked to gamble at just about anything requiring skill, like pitching pennies, nickels, dimes or quarters against a wall. Most of the time I could win against older guys and once in a while they wanted their money back. I was a little guy, smaller than most of them but had a strong right arm (was a star pitcher in Little League and could throw a baseball farther than anyone else). I wasn't a tough guy and didn't like to fight, but sometimes I had to. I discovered early on my best move was to get them down on the ground and wrap my arm around their neck and squeeze. Thirty seconds of that and they were begging me to let them go.

Fast forward to fifteen years later and now I had my own poolroom. I quickly discovered that if there was a problem, like a fight in my poolroom, calling the cops didn't help much. My call was not high on their priority list and it could take 30-45 minutes for anyone to show up. Way to late to help me. So I had to be my own enforcer in the poolroom, breaking up fights right away. I would jump in and grab one guy and pull him off and try to enlist someone to hold back the other guy. Then I would give them my little speech, "If you want to fight take it outside into the alley!" Or, "You can pick on me." Most everyone respected me since I owned the place but not everyone.

I used that line on this tough young Indian kid and he cold cocked me, knocking me out cold. The only time in my life I ever saw stars and the whole world was spinning. I was very careful about using that line in the future. :grin:

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Lmao! That's a great story!

I remember when I was playing TJ Parker in his room and he got angry at me for some smart ass remark. He slapped me and knocked me under the table. He was a Monster.

I stayed there a few minutes with a cut lip and finally
got up and said: "Whose break is it?"

Went to the Hospital afterwards and had it stitched up.

Bill Stroud

I wish I had discovered pool and gambling at a young age. I’m sure I would’ve loved it just as much then and I might’ve gone down a better track. As it is I discovered pool at the tender age of 28. Now I need to hustle someone. Anyone got a sneaky pete?