I understand Earl. I have hung out with him a little bit between matches and got to know another side of his personality. He's actually a very sweet Southern gentleman when you get to know him. Really very polite and treats women with respect in the traditional old-school Southern culture kind of way.
Like Keith, Earl has very strong feelings about professional pool tournaments in USA. It hurts to see the hometeam crowd rooting for a non-American on American soil. I guess it's like me going to the Washington Nationals game and being surrounded by a bunch of Yankee fans.:grin:
The Filipino invasion, the European invasion, and now the Asian invasion is hard to swallow for some American players from pool's golden years. Back then, the majority on the tournament player list was American players. But things change, of course, and thanks to the internet, people from around the world have connected in more ways than just pool. And the technology is continuing to evolve. This is good for pool but not good for some who want fans to root for the home team.
I used to go out with a strong one-pocket player named Geese. He was a road agent more so than a tournament player, and he made huge scores around the country because most people didn't know who he was. They had only heard the name "Geese" but had never seen him. This was before the days of internet and cell phones and Google.
Geese suffered from schizophrenia. He couldn't take losing, and when he did, everyone around him better watch out. I saw him throw an 8-ball across the room as hard as he could when he was losing in the Maryland State Tournament in Baltimore. Thank goodness the 8-ball didn't hit a person because it would have caused physical damage. He cursed out his mother and me both on the rail. Cigar Tom's wife came up to me and said if Tom ever treated her like that, she'd whip him with his pool cue.
Then there was the time that we were in Pittsburgh getting backed by a local stakehorse in a bar called Good and Plenty. Geese was losing against a local pro, and he came over to the stakehorse and cursed him out, threatening him. The stakehorse looked at me and said, "What's wrong with this guy? I'm backing him, and he's cussing me out. I'm on his team." It was embarrassing.
Then there was the time that Geese and I were on the road and getting staked and steered by a meat thief (long story). We were at a joint in Huntsville, Alabama, and I saw Geese losing big time on this bar table. I was green back then, real green, and I said, "What is wrong? I've never seen you play this poorly." Geese's opponent pulled up immediately after hearing me speak and unscrewed his cue, realizing Geese was laying down the lemon. Chaos ensued, and I ended up getting escorted to a bus station by a local sheriff. It was a 25-hour multiple-bus ride back to D.C. with only $5 in my pocket.
When Geese got his meds, he was a different person. He was joyful and fun to be around. Man, his laugh was infectious. Everybody loved hanging with Geese. Keith said one of the best times of his life was with Geese, laughing the whole day long. But when Geese didn't have his medicine, he was s different person, actually dangerous in some scenarios.
Geese self-medicated with pot. Now, personally, I don't see anything wrong with marijuana, but I don't smoke pot today, just to get it out there, even though I am Woodstock alumni. :wink:
But people like Geese with medical conditions sometimes self-medicate with pot, which alters their state of consciousness at will. If you have a medical condition and you do this, it can send your emotional scale up and down with huge spikes, much more so than someone without a medical condition. It causes outbursts and unusual behavior. Geese couldn't play pool without pot, but pot is what kept his condition on full tilt his entire life.
I had a lot of fun with Geese. We traveled the East Coast many times, and I used to think his behavior was B.S., that he was faking it, just acting like a spoiled brat, much like some accuse Earl of doing today. I was wrong. Geese was ill, and he dealt with it the best way he knew how. He was a good guy, truly, but he suffered from a medical condition.
Some say Earl should hang up his cue, that he's over the hill, his outbursts are too much, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Earl is a thoroughbred champion, like Alex Higgins, Willie Mosconi, Ronnie O'Sullivan, and Minnesota Fats. He will go down in the history books as an American pool phenom. Some folks cannot tolerate his behavior in competition when he goes off, and I get that. But I will always respect Earl Strickland. He's the greatest American pool player of my lifetime, and it's a damn shame that this stinking sport/game doesn't seem to bring the rewards that other sports/games do. But I digress. :sorry:
