Tin Man Chalks up Another Big Win
- Thread starter BasementDweller
- Start date
Congratulations, John is a great player, and to beat him is an accomplishment that most all of us will never have.
Looking forward to a writeup if he wants to provide one. Also, after the second loss is it head for home or is there more pool to play one way or another at the venue or nearby? Curious what happens "next".
The next two matches you could kind of keep up with on the video a couple of tables up and then check out the live scoring to see where they were at.
The next two matches you could kind of keep up with on the video a couple of tables up and then check out the live scoring to see where they were at.
update
Well, I really want to thank all of you for the support and kind words. It is an honor to be part of the AZ community.
I didn't get too much further. I won my third match and was playing fairly well, but then I played Fortunski and that guy put the hammer down on me. I remember it was 1-1 and I ran to the 6 ball and played what I thought was a lock up safety. He kicked, hit it, and left me in trouble. I ended up selling out a hard shot and he made it, ran out to go 2-1, then ran the next three to go up 5-1. I got another opportunity at the table and dogged it to go down 6-1, then it only got worse. I believe it was then I got a chance and ran to the 3 which was tied up in a cluster so I played a safe and broke the balls open. Well, the 4 ball ended up banking cross corner putting me in the trap aka Efren at the Sands. Unlike him I blundered my kick and gave up ball in hand and fell behind 7-1, then 8-1, and finally 9-2. It was pretty brutal. I wasn't able to muster much resistance.
My loser's side match was a tough one. I knew it was critical. If I win that match I'm in 13th and playing Gallagher (?) who from what I saw is strong and solid but not out of my league, giving me some chances to attempt a B side run. But things didn't go that way.
To start with I was penalized a game on the wire for not being at my table when the match was called. This was a weird misunderstanding. Mike Zuglan has a no-nonsense approach to running tournaments and one rule is that if a player isn't present at match time when he goes to announce the match it's an immediate one game penalty. I am fine with that rule as I've never missed a match time in my entire life. But where it got weird is that our match didn't start on time. I played the winner of Schneider and Lombardo and was supposed to play at 6PM. At 6 their match was in progress and the score was about 5-5 or 6-5, so I knew I still had a while. I started hitting balls on a table two tables over while looking over my shoulder to see what was happening with their match. Mike Zuglan told me I'd be up against the winner on table 21 and I acknowledged. Finally I see them shake hands and break down their cues so I knew I was up. I ducked into the bathroom for a quick pit stop and hand wash, I was probably in their 90 seconds. As I'm drying my hands I hear an announcement that I've been penalized a game on the wire for not being at table 21.
It's a strange situation. I understand where he's coming from, the matches are running behind and he's trying to protect the player population as a whole. I just felt it was weird to apply a penalty for failure to show for a match when it doesn't go off at the scheduled time and I had been patiently waiting for 45 minutes. In retrospect the right move for me to make would have been to get Mike's attention and let him know I knew my match was up and would be right there. But in the moment I didn't anticipate things would play out that way. I've played hundreds of tournaments and I've never seen a call like that in a situation like that. I really don't feel I was deserving of a penalty but I do understand the reasoning behind it. To be clear there is no bad blood here and I am not upset with Mike or anything like that, just telling the story as to how things got off on the wrong foot in that match.
Anyway, it was a tough set. I think we were tied up all the way to 4-4, then Schneider made some stunning outs and good moves and pulled ahead to 6-4. I got a chance to close the gap but blundered and missed the 9. It was a funny spot. The 8 ball was a foot from the side diagonally, it went in the side but it was thin. The 9 was near the rail on the other side of the table from the 8. I played the cue ball off the end rail towards the rack area for the 8 ball figuring that either angle I could get good on the nine, either float towards middle of the table or follow to the side rail and out. Well, as often happens, I got dead straight in. I ended up basically stopping and accepting a cut on the 9 down the side rail. If I set it up now it would look easy, but in the moment, after watching my opponent run a few tough racks, feeling a little heat, and knowing that the rack would've been over if I'd had any type of angle, well, it looked tough. Also the balls weren't polished and were sticking a little and I was afraid of a skid or thick contact. Bottom line I over-cut it just a hair and it caught the end rail opening point of the pocket. It probably would've fallen on day one but not on day three. So from there I fell behind 7-4, then he ran out to go up 8-4. After that I was kind of cooked and blundered and lost 9-4. Nothing I'm real proud of for sure.
Looking back there are so many things I could talk about as take-aways. I almost didn't want to post because either I say one sentence or I end up writing a book. So from here I'll try to keep it brief. What I'll say is I can see a ton of opportunity for me to improve physically and mentally. Not that it's easy by any stretch, but competition against strong players shows you the holes in your game for sure.
Physically I need to do better generating opportunities with the break and tightening up some safeties. 10 ball came out in the 2000's and I spent so much time trying to chase SVB's 10 ball break that I fell behind in putting in the work on my 9 ball cut break. Well, 10 ball seems to be a novelty these days and it's back to 9 ball, so I have no excuse not to have this skill better developed. I did ok pocketing balls on day 1 when they were slick and slidy, but when they got gritty I was really struggling and not nearly as effective as my opponents. I can't let these guys to the table every rack and expect to do well. So the break is number one. And safeties, I just wasn't tight enough. Too often I'd create distance but miss the hook and allow my opponent to return a better safe. Against local competition I can get away with that, but not against top players. So I'm going to be working on this a bit both in practice and with my best friend and sparring partner Josh Burbul.
Mental game is a more complex topic and not something I'm going to get into at 2:30AM after a day's worth of travel. Suffice to say I want to respond better to the heat my opponent's put on me. Now part of this is physical, because if I'm breaking better and generating more scoring opportunities, then maybe I'll be the one putting heat on them so it will be a moot point. But in reality there will always be spots where I'm really up against it and struggling, and I want to do better keeping calm, steady, and focused at the task at hand to give myself the best chance of turning those sets around. I have always been a good come from behind player so this isn't a recurring problem for me, but something I want to improve on nonetheless.
As for what's next, ha, I have to work at 9AM, so there's that. But then I'll be going with Josh to Derby for all 3 events. That will be a lot of fun and I hope to meet some of you there. After that I don't have anything serious lined up because I have a few boot camps in February and with work and family I can only play 4-5 bigger tournaments a year. I'll probably find some regional bar table tournaments like Beloit WI or something similar. But I'm not really looking past DCC just yet, taking them one at a time. Someday I hope to have a more official travel schedule but like most of you I have to build pool around my life and not the other way around.
OK, thanks again for all the good words and support, and feel free to PM me if you'll be at DCC and want to sweat a big foot match or something!
Well, I really want to thank all of you for the support and kind words. It is an honor to be part of the AZ community.
I didn't get too much further. I won my third match and was playing fairly well, but then I played Fortunski and that guy put the hammer down on me. I remember it was 1-1 and I ran to the 6 ball and played what I thought was a lock up safety. He kicked, hit it, and left me in trouble. I ended up selling out a hard shot and he made it, ran out to go 2-1, then ran the next three to go up 5-1. I got another opportunity at the table and dogged it to go down 6-1, then it only got worse. I believe it was then I got a chance and ran to the 3 which was tied up in a cluster so I played a safe and broke the balls open. Well, the 4 ball ended up banking cross corner putting me in the trap aka Efren at the Sands. Unlike him I blundered my kick and gave up ball in hand and fell behind 7-1, then 8-1, and finally 9-2. It was pretty brutal. I wasn't able to muster much resistance.
My loser's side match was a tough one. I knew it was critical. If I win that match I'm in 13th and playing Gallagher (?) who from what I saw is strong and solid but not out of my league, giving me some chances to attempt a B side run. But things didn't go that way.
To start with I was penalized a game on the wire for not being at my table when the match was called. This was a weird misunderstanding. Mike Zuglan has a no-nonsense approach to running tournaments and one rule is that if a player isn't present at match time when he goes to announce the match it's an immediate one game penalty. I am fine with that rule as I've never missed a match time in my entire life. But where it got weird is that our match didn't start on time. I played the winner of Schneider and Lombardo and was supposed to play at 6PM. At 6 their match was in progress and the score was about 5-5 or 6-5, so I knew I still had a while. I started hitting balls on a table two tables over while looking over my shoulder to see what was happening with their match. Mike Zuglan told me I'd be up against the winner on table 21 and I acknowledged. Finally I see them shake hands and break down their cues so I knew I was up. I ducked into the bathroom for a quick pit stop and hand wash, I was probably in their 90 seconds. As I'm drying my hands I hear an announcement that I've been penalized a game on the wire for not being at table 21.
It's a strange situation. I understand where he's coming from, the matches are running behind and he's trying to protect the player population as a whole. I just felt it was weird to apply a penalty for failure to show for a match when it doesn't go off at the scheduled time and I had been patiently waiting for 45 minutes. In retrospect the right move for me to make would have been to get Mike's attention and let him know I knew my match was up and would be right there. But in the moment I didn't anticipate things would play out that way. I've played hundreds of tournaments and I've never seen a call like that in a situation like that. I really don't feel I was deserving of a penalty but I do understand the reasoning behind it. To be clear there is no bad blood here and I am not upset with Mike or anything like that, just telling the story as to how things got off on the wrong foot in that match.
Anyway, it was a tough set. I think we were tied up all the way to 4-4, then Schneider made some stunning outs and good moves and pulled ahead to 6-4. I got a chance to close the gap but blundered and missed the 9. It was a funny spot. The 8 ball was a foot from the side diagonally, it went in the side but it was thin. The 9 was near the rail on the other side of the table from the 8. I played the cue ball off the end rail towards the rack area for the 8 ball figuring that either angle I could get good on the nine, either float towards middle of the table or follow to the side rail and out. Well, as often happens, I got dead straight in. I ended up basically stopping and accepting a cut on the 9 down the side rail. If I set it up now it would look easy, but in the moment, after watching my opponent run a few tough racks, feeling a little heat, and knowing that the rack would've been over if I'd had any type of angle, well, it looked tough. Also the balls weren't polished and were sticking a little and I was afraid of a skid or thick contact. Bottom line I over-cut it just a hair and it caught the end rail opening point of the pocket. It probably would've fallen on day one but not on day three. So from there I fell behind 7-4, then he ran out to go up 8-4. After that I was kind of cooked and blundered and lost 9-4. Nothing I'm real proud of for sure.
Looking back there are so many things I could talk about as take-aways. I almost didn't want to post because either I say one sentence or I end up writing a book. So from here I'll try to keep it brief. What I'll say is I can see a ton of opportunity for me to improve physically and mentally. Not that it's easy by any stretch, but competition against strong players shows you the holes in your game for sure.
Physically I need to do better generating opportunities with the break and tightening up some safeties. 10 ball came out in the 2000's and I spent so much time trying to chase SVB's 10 ball break that I fell behind in putting in the work on my 9 ball cut break. Well, 10 ball seems to be a novelty these days and it's back to 9 ball, so I have no excuse not to have this skill better developed. I did ok pocketing balls on day 1 when they were slick and slidy, but when they got gritty I was really struggling and not nearly as effective as my opponents. I can't let these guys to the table every rack and expect to do well. So the break is number one. And safeties, I just wasn't tight enough. Too often I'd create distance but miss the hook and allow my opponent to return a better safe. Against local competition I can get away with that, but not against top players. So I'm going to be working on this a bit both in practice and with my best friend and sparring partner Josh Burbul.
Mental game is a more complex topic and not something I'm going to get into at 2:30AM after a day's worth of travel. Suffice to say I want to respond better to the heat my opponent's put on me. Now part of this is physical, because if I'm breaking better and generating more scoring opportunities, then maybe I'll be the one putting heat on them so it will be a moot point. But in reality there will always be spots where I'm really up against it and struggling, and I want to do better keeping calm, steady, and focused at the task at hand to give myself the best chance of turning those sets around. I have always been a good come from behind player so this isn't a recurring problem for me, but something I want to improve on nonetheless.
As for what's next, ha, I have to work at 9AM, so there's that. But then I'll be going with Josh to Derby for all 3 events. That will be a lot of fun and I hope to meet some of you there. After that I don't have anything serious lined up because I have a few boot camps in February and with work and family I can only play 4-5 bigger tournaments a year. I'll probably find some regional bar table tournaments like Beloit WI or something similar. But I'm not really looking past DCC just yet, taking them one at a time. Someday I hope to have a more official travel schedule but like most of you I have to build pool around my life and not the other way around.
OK, thanks again for all the good words and support, and feel free to PM me if you'll be at DCC and want to sweat a big foot match or something!
