A recent thread about a "hustle" made me really think about what even constitutes a hustle, and even more about me always wanting to shout at the TV screen every time Vincent veers away from Eddie's 'teachings' in TCOM. In the movie I want him to learn the art of the hustle which he eventually does, and it comes back to bite Eddie.
Back in real life, the poster on the recent thread pulled almost exactly one of the hustles from the movie, only instead of the poster walking in as an unknown and the bartender watching him play for a few hours, it sounds like the bartender had seen the poster play before, just on a different day(s). So in the thread the bartender tells the poster he is 'covered', while in the movie the bartender makes the bet directly with Eddie. Pretty much everyone came down on the poster, which I immediately agreed with. It was a sucky thing to take the bartenders money by dumping.
That being said, at what point is it the better's responsibility? Was this bartender actually the posters 'backer'? When I used to gamble on pool a lot (20 years ago) I always considered a backer to be someone you had a relationship with, and an understanding for splitting up wins. It sounds like this bartender had seen the kid play a bit before and wanted some action. What if the bartender had told the posters friend, "I'll bet you $100 you lose" rather than telling the poster he is covered and then the poster dumps (which is much closer to the movie situation), is this more acceptable? Let's go to the extreme and say that you are playing and some guy has seen you play a few racks with your friend and he is a betting lunatic and he says he will bet your friend $10k that he loses the next rack against you. Putting aside any fear for bodily harm, what would you do? Now lets say that you know that this guy is filthy rich and for him money grows on trees and he ups it to $50k. Does this change anything?
I guess it comes down to "is it always wrong to dump" and is dumping even a hustle? Is there a big difference between a 'hustle' where you trick someone into losing money by using skill they didn't know you had, and 'dumping', or tricking someone into losing money by not using skill that they think you have?
This also got me thinking about TCOM. I'm the kind of person where I always root for the good guys to win. It occured to me that I should be rooting for Vincent to have kept fighting Eddie every step of the way and always show his true speed, kick butt all the way to the tourney and then win the big cup. But then he gives up the opportunity to make 10 times that much if he just follows Eddie's instructions. I have to give Scorsese credit, he made me root for something that pretty much goes against my core values without me even realizing it. It certianly has made me analyze the 'fine line' a lot more closely than I ever had before.
Back in real life, the poster on the recent thread pulled almost exactly one of the hustles from the movie, only instead of the poster walking in as an unknown and the bartender watching him play for a few hours, it sounds like the bartender had seen the poster play before, just on a different day(s). So in the thread the bartender tells the poster he is 'covered', while in the movie the bartender makes the bet directly with Eddie. Pretty much everyone came down on the poster, which I immediately agreed with. It was a sucky thing to take the bartenders money by dumping.
That being said, at what point is it the better's responsibility? Was this bartender actually the posters 'backer'? When I used to gamble on pool a lot (20 years ago) I always considered a backer to be someone you had a relationship with, and an understanding for splitting up wins. It sounds like this bartender had seen the kid play a bit before and wanted some action. What if the bartender had told the posters friend, "I'll bet you $100 you lose" rather than telling the poster he is covered and then the poster dumps (which is much closer to the movie situation), is this more acceptable? Let's go to the extreme and say that you are playing and some guy has seen you play a few racks with your friend and he is a betting lunatic and he says he will bet your friend $10k that he loses the next rack against you. Putting aside any fear for bodily harm, what would you do? Now lets say that you know that this guy is filthy rich and for him money grows on trees and he ups it to $50k. Does this change anything?
I guess it comes down to "is it always wrong to dump" and is dumping even a hustle? Is there a big difference between a 'hustle' where you trick someone into losing money by using skill they didn't know you had, and 'dumping', or tricking someone into losing money by not using skill that they think you have?
This also got me thinking about TCOM. I'm the kind of person where I always root for the good guys to win. It occured to me that I should be rooting for Vincent to have kept fighting Eddie every step of the way and always show his true speed, kick butt all the way to the tourney and then win the big cup. But then he gives up the opportunity to make 10 times that much if he just follows Eddie's instructions. I have to give Scorsese credit, he made me root for something that pretty much goes against my core values without me even realizing it. It certianly has made me analyze the 'fine line' a lot more closely than I ever had before.
