This Derby City Classic was one of the best because I had the chance to get to know some of the AZers whom I had met previously but didn't have a chance to get to know very well because of limited time in the past. I also met many new AZers who were just as cool in person as they are here on AZ.
I probably would not have gone to this year's extravaganza if it had not been for the generosity and friendship of BoraDriver. "Cliff" is a great guy to hang out with and plays a very good game of pool. I call him the invisibile man because he seemed to have the ability to materialize out of thin air. I had a great time and one of the main reasons was BoraDriver; one cool guy.
This year I met so many new faces it was hard to spend large amounts of time with anyone in particular but I put in lots of time at the AZ Room and recommend it to any AZer. You'll have lots of fun.
Easy-e and DeadPoked were a fun couple. I hung out with both of them all over DCC. Deadpoked and I exchanged text messages while I watched the semi-finals and the finals of the 9 ball DCC and DP watched Shane VanBoening and Alex Pagulayan's classic 10 ball match up. That was pretty neat, being able to keep up with what was going on in THE ACTION ROOM and THE TV TABLE ROOM where the finals took place. The Action Room was 24/7. Roadies that I see only once every few years passing through New Orleans could be seen 24/7 in the action room as well as many dollars changing hands. I tried to exchange dollars with Jay Helfert with a money match LIVE on TAR (www.theactionreport.com) but Jay was no where to be found.
Paul Mon, Hondo, Williebetmore, Jeanette Lee, BigDaddyGerald aka: BoomBoom Gerald, Mike Howerton, jerry Forsythe, Jay Helfert and many dozens of others were fun to hang out with at the AZ room. BoraDriver and I shared Yerba Mate fresh brewed tea with Mark Tadd, a very nice guy with a very powerful 9 ball stroke. The Yerba Mate was made possible by an introduction by Bob Basha, father of the young photographer Michael Basha, seen all over the DCC especially in the TV Room. Mark Tadd is a funny guy. Ask Mark to tell you the story we heard about humans being able to re-grow the ends of our fingers and toes. This scientific breakthrough was narrated to us by one of AZ's popular story tellers with Mark Tadd as the " shtick man".
Also, played pool with CurlyCues, saw Fred Agnir, Timberly, "Joey" and his lady. I met Flex who imparted some special pool knowledge to me. I had mixed the screen names Flex and Fleece up in my mind but after meeting Flex I won't have trouble remember who is who. Flex has a special custom cue with a very small diameter shaft (which plays very nicely) with a long pro taper.
Hal and I got a chance to renew old acquaintances but by the time I was ready to toss back a few Coronas, Hal was already on the straight and narrow. Da Poet allowed me to use his Predator Break cue shaft with the phenolic tip. I have "Tal" to thank for helping me to make the decision to purchase the Predator BK2 with the leather tip. Bag of paper said hello and waxed that I looked older than he had pictured in his mind. LOL
There were a few REGULAR players at Chris' Pool Hall in Chicago who said they had never laid eyes on a Patrick Johnson even though they played there for more than a year or two. Finally Flex told me that he had indeed seen the unique personna of the physics pool crowd and that Patrick was indeed a regular at Chris's. I will have to visit Chris's one day to pick a game with Patrick and maybe George Fels who I have yet to meet. I did get a chance to talke briefly with Bob Jewett who was holding vigil at the Straight Pool Challenge for days one end. Maybe if I practice hard enough I will have enough skill to take the challenge one day or at least to donate my fair share to the cause.
I had the proud fortune to meet Semper Fi this trip and it was my honor.
Tony Crosby and I crossed paths but only briefly but he, as always had very kind and pleasant words to share. Tommy Kennedy although not a regular AZ poster, stopped and inquired if I would be playing in his Gulfport, MS tournament next month. I promised to try. Maybe I can get "Doc" to sponsor me. Really, ROTFLMAO.
Kevin and Kevin S were there along with Chopsticks who shoots a nice game. Greg Sullivan came by and played one game of one pocket with me and put one of those Kentucky Racks on me along with sharking me on the break and beat me 8-6, having a big lead the whole time. Greg would only admit to sharking me, whining that he did not give me a bad rack. LOL
I missed Westbank Walt of New Orleans and his side kick. I also missed meeting Collection Guru and a few others I wanted to meet. I don't know it was possible to miss seeing Westbank Walt and Keith. I saw GoneGray after not seeing him for a couple of years. He is now a resident of the great state of Colorado and I won't be seeing much of him any more. NICE guy...
The slew of Louisiana boys were there in even larger numbers than expected. One of them Mike Cummings will be the inspiration for a thread about THE CURSE OF ONE POCKET.
There were many others that I played and came into contact with but my memory is not all that good.
I had many, many thousands of dollars at my disposal due the kindness and faith of a generous backer. My backer had won $40,000 on our way up to DCC and said I could put as much into action as I saw fit. I didn't want to bet it all and only hoped that Harry Platis would HONOR his word to play me and I would have a chance to bet at least five or ten thousand of the forty. For whatever reason, he failed to honor his word to me.
Jay on the other hand would have had to bring Fatboy in to give him resuscitation if he ever even got to the table with me. VBG
Speaking of Fatboy, I know I missed one of those BIG MOMENTS at the Derby City Classic with Fatboy on The Tooth's one foot line as Fatboy broke off Tooth's last remaining tooth. The story was repeated with great fervor over and over. That story undoubtedly brought much mirth and satisfaction to those who have had to stomach the hyperbole of the toothless one. I heard "the tooth" bellowing how he always told the truth because he was in the diamond business and in the diamond business your word is your bond. I was sickened so badly that I had to head for the AZ Room for a breath of fresh air.
I got a chance to say hello to Derek Disco but was expecting he might be a little bit more nimbler than his true self. I didn't get a chance to play a match against him with the stakes of the loser having to dance to The O'Jays - "Love Train". I met Big Nasty and Justin who runs a tight ship on www.theactionreport.com. Justin had given his OK for Jay and I to play our pool match live on the action report.com Internet Live Table but Jay would have no part of that.
I met Brian Saleh who was kind enough to impart some of his knowledge of playing pool to me without hesitation. That's one Brit who gets this Yank's vote for being one fine gentleman. I wish I had more time to pick his brain. While he had the truest Brit voice, my slight hearing impediment caused much trouble with discerning the meaning of his spoken word, he was kind enough to repeat himself until "I got it". BUZZER is his screen name here on AZ and he is a very fine player. I kept thinking he was saying BUZZARD. Finally, still with a bright smile, he spelled it for me, all the while pressing an imaginary "buzzer" in the air.
Russ Chewning made his appearance along with his lovely wife, Juanita. Russ spent many hours in the AZ Room removing some old rust from his game. We had a great time and it was nice putting a face to a screen name and expanding on Russ's special AZ personality. Russ as I recall will be heading back to Iraq soon and was home on holiday and spent many quality days at DCC with me and others. We wish him the very best and pray for his safe return.
This 2008 DCC was made even more special by Easy-e coming home from Iraq and it was simply great to see him again. We had many laughs and good games of partner pool in the AZ Room with Eric, Russ and Roy. We also inhaled a few bottles of beer after I was eliminated from the 9 ball tournament. The beer was a celebration of young men coming home rather than a drowning of my sorrows.
I have vowed to give up one pocket for quite some time and spend my time playing 9 ball and straight pool. I may start a new thread about THE CURSE OF ONE POCKET. My experience at the DCC was the best yet even though I came up short against Shane in the one pocket tournament. Shane doesn't know how fortunate he was that day. Maybe I will get a chance to show him another day. The real reason that my experience at the DCC was the best yet was because of the new friendships formed and the opportunity to expand on previous ones.
I hate to end this post on a negative thought but I can't leave it without mention. The DCC has a terrible reputation for punctuality and they should be ashamed of it and correct this problem immediately. I believe one of the ways they can start correcting it is to remove the buy-back option and make it a double elimination tournament. This re-drawing and buy back is the main culprit in a debacle of otherwise smooth sailing. The personal telephone calls that the professional pool players are honored with is discriminatory and I am envious of it. Every tournament player should be treated the same regardless of ability or reputation. They are not but most importantly the scheduling of matches is a tragedy.
My traveling companion, Mark Moore was told that he would not play the first day because his name lay at the bottom of the last bracket and would play the following day. Upon waking me up at 3:00 am, I suggested he go hit some balls since he had already slept several hours and could not sleep any longer. Perhaps he could get into stroke. When he went down to the tournamnet room, he soon found out that the staff had called his name for 39 minutes and they had forfeited his match. This guy would have put lots of money in action at the DCC but even if he would not have he should not have been given such a rude awakening. He came back to the room vowing never to spend another dollar with the DCC. I completely understand his anger and agree that he was but one victim of an ever increasing number of people who are abused by the system in place. I later found out that there was "another" Moore whose name appeared at the bottom of the last bracket and who did not play until the next day. Apparently, the person who told Mark that he would not play until the next day did not hear Mark's first name and did not know what Stevie Moore looked like.
The buy back problem needs to be eliminated so as to speed the tournament on. Too many people are victims of the DCC's current schduling ineptness, including myself. Waiting all day every day, checking back in every hour to see if they have made a draw or if your match time has changed causes unnecessary angst and they lose good participants because of this. I despise having to check in every hour on the hour to see if my match is coming up or if they have made a draw for the next round. I found more than a player or two in the very room where the tournament room was at, sitting there having not heard their name called after repeated trips to the "desk". You get a little numbed after a while and it just isn't fair to any of us. The professional pool players get personal phone calls from the schedulers when their matches are up. We mere mortals have to use our available energy walking back and forth to the desk, scanning the board in the tournament room or straining our eyes at the TERRIBLE resolution of the board on the TV in our room. This over a period of days puts a terrible strain on our energy. We don't know when we should eat. We don't know when we should sleep or nap. Hell, we don't even know when our match will be played and have to keep checking to make sure that our name has not been called or we forfeit our match. The pros are given special considerations and that isn't fair.
These scheduling problems aren't right and the buy back option and the re-drawing is the main problem in my opinion. The buy back option should be changed and the tournament become a standard double elimination tournament.
I forgot to mention two of my favorite players at this year's tournament and that is Emile and Jay from Louisiana who were fixtures in this year's AZ Room. Emile's company was enjoyed by many AZers as they felt his fire.
JoeyA
I probably would not have gone to this year's extravaganza if it had not been for the generosity and friendship of BoraDriver. "Cliff" is a great guy to hang out with and plays a very good game of pool. I call him the invisibile man because he seemed to have the ability to materialize out of thin air. I had a great time and one of the main reasons was BoraDriver; one cool guy.
This year I met so many new faces it was hard to spend large amounts of time with anyone in particular but I put in lots of time at the AZ Room and recommend it to any AZer. You'll have lots of fun.
Easy-e and DeadPoked were a fun couple. I hung out with both of them all over DCC. Deadpoked and I exchanged text messages while I watched the semi-finals and the finals of the 9 ball DCC and DP watched Shane VanBoening and Alex Pagulayan's classic 10 ball match up. That was pretty neat, being able to keep up with what was going on in THE ACTION ROOM and THE TV TABLE ROOM where the finals took place. The Action Room was 24/7. Roadies that I see only once every few years passing through New Orleans could be seen 24/7 in the action room as well as many dollars changing hands. I tried to exchange dollars with Jay Helfert with a money match LIVE on TAR (www.theactionreport.com) but Jay was no where to be found.
Paul Mon, Hondo, Williebetmore, Jeanette Lee, BigDaddyGerald aka: BoomBoom Gerald, Mike Howerton, jerry Forsythe, Jay Helfert and many dozens of others were fun to hang out with at the AZ room. BoraDriver and I shared Yerba Mate fresh brewed tea with Mark Tadd, a very nice guy with a very powerful 9 ball stroke. The Yerba Mate was made possible by an introduction by Bob Basha, father of the young photographer Michael Basha, seen all over the DCC especially in the TV Room. Mark Tadd is a funny guy. Ask Mark to tell you the story we heard about humans being able to re-grow the ends of our fingers and toes. This scientific breakthrough was narrated to us by one of AZ's popular story tellers with Mark Tadd as the " shtick man".
Also, played pool with CurlyCues, saw Fred Agnir, Timberly, "Joey" and his lady. I met Flex who imparted some special pool knowledge to me. I had mixed the screen names Flex and Fleece up in my mind but after meeting Flex I won't have trouble remember who is who. Flex has a special custom cue with a very small diameter shaft (which plays very nicely) with a long pro taper.
Hal and I got a chance to renew old acquaintances but by the time I was ready to toss back a few Coronas, Hal was already on the straight and narrow. Da Poet allowed me to use his Predator Break cue shaft with the phenolic tip. I have "Tal" to thank for helping me to make the decision to purchase the Predator BK2 with the leather tip. Bag of paper said hello and waxed that I looked older than he had pictured in his mind. LOL
There were a few REGULAR players at Chris' Pool Hall in Chicago who said they had never laid eyes on a Patrick Johnson even though they played there for more than a year or two. Finally Flex told me that he had indeed seen the unique personna of the physics pool crowd and that Patrick was indeed a regular at Chris's. I will have to visit Chris's one day to pick a game with Patrick and maybe George Fels who I have yet to meet. I did get a chance to talke briefly with Bob Jewett who was holding vigil at the Straight Pool Challenge for days one end. Maybe if I practice hard enough I will have enough skill to take the challenge one day or at least to donate my fair share to the cause.
I had the proud fortune to meet Semper Fi this trip and it was my honor.
Tony Crosby and I crossed paths but only briefly but he, as always had very kind and pleasant words to share. Tommy Kennedy although not a regular AZ poster, stopped and inquired if I would be playing in his Gulfport, MS tournament next month. I promised to try. Maybe I can get "Doc" to sponsor me. Really, ROTFLMAO.
Kevin and Kevin S were there along with Chopsticks who shoots a nice game. Greg Sullivan came by and played one game of one pocket with me and put one of those Kentucky Racks on me along with sharking me on the break and beat me 8-6, having a big lead the whole time. Greg would only admit to sharking me, whining that he did not give me a bad rack. LOL
I missed Westbank Walt of New Orleans and his side kick. I also missed meeting Collection Guru and a few others I wanted to meet. I don't know it was possible to miss seeing Westbank Walt and Keith. I saw GoneGray after not seeing him for a couple of years. He is now a resident of the great state of Colorado and I won't be seeing much of him any more. NICE guy...
The slew of Louisiana boys were there in even larger numbers than expected. One of them Mike Cummings will be the inspiration for a thread about THE CURSE OF ONE POCKET.
There were many others that I played and came into contact with but my memory is not all that good.
I had many, many thousands of dollars at my disposal due the kindness and faith of a generous backer. My backer had won $40,000 on our way up to DCC and said I could put as much into action as I saw fit. I didn't want to bet it all and only hoped that Harry Platis would HONOR his word to play me and I would have a chance to bet at least five or ten thousand of the forty. For whatever reason, he failed to honor his word to me.
Jay on the other hand would have had to bring Fatboy in to give him resuscitation if he ever even got to the table with me. VBG
Speaking of Fatboy, I know I missed one of those BIG MOMENTS at the Derby City Classic with Fatboy on The Tooth's one foot line as Fatboy broke off Tooth's last remaining tooth. The story was repeated with great fervor over and over. That story undoubtedly brought much mirth and satisfaction to those who have had to stomach the hyperbole of the toothless one. I heard "the tooth" bellowing how he always told the truth because he was in the diamond business and in the diamond business your word is your bond. I was sickened so badly that I had to head for the AZ Room for a breath of fresh air.
I got a chance to say hello to Derek Disco but was expecting he might be a little bit more nimbler than his true self. I didn't get a chance to play a match against him with the stakes of the loser having to dance to The O'Jays - "Love Train". I met Big Nasty and Justin who runs a tight ship on www.theactionreport.com. Justin had given his OK for Jay and I to play our pool match live on the action report.com Internet Live Table but Jay would have no part of that.
I met Brian Saleh who was kind enough to impart some of his knowledge of playing pool to me without hesitation. That's one Brit who gets this Yank's vote for being one fine gentleman. I wish I had more time to pick his brain. While he had the truest Brit voice, my slight hearing impediment caused much trouble with discerning the meaning of his spoken word, he was kind enough to repeat himself until "I got it".
BUZZER is his screen name here on AZ and he is a very fine player. I kept thinking he was saying BUZZARD. Finally, still with a bright smile, he spelled it for me, all the while pressing an imaginary "buzzer" in the air. Russ Chewning made his appearance along with his lovely wife, Juanita. Russ spent many hours in the AZ Room removing some old rust from his game. We had a great time and it was nice putting a face to a screen name and expanding on Russ's special AZ personality. Russ as I recall will be heading back to Iraq soon and was home on holiday and spent many quality days at DCC with me and others. We wish him the very best and pray for his safe return.
This 2008 DCC was made even more special by Easy-e coming home from Iraq and it was simply great to see him again. We had many laughs and good games of partner pool in the AZ Room with Eric, Russ and Roy. We also inhaled a few bottles of beer after I was eliminated from the 9 ball tournament. The beer was a celebration of young men coming home rather than a drowning of my sorrows.
I have vowed to give up one pocket for quite some time and spend my time playing 9 ball and straight pool. I may start a new thread about THE CURSE OF ONE POCKET. My experience at the DCC was the best yet even though I came up short against Shane in the one pocket tournament. Shane doesn't know how fortunate he was that day.
Maybe I will get a chance to show him another day. The real reason that my experience at the DCC was the best yet was because of the new friendships formed and the opportunity to expand on previous ones.I hate to end this post on a negative thought but I can't leave it without mention. The DCC has a terrible reputation for punctuality and they should be ashamed of it and correct this problem immediately. I believe one of the ways they can start correcting it is to remove the buy-back option and make it a double elimination tournament. This re-drawing and buy back is the main culprit in a debacle of otherwise smooth sailing. The personal telephone calls that the professional pool players are honored with is discriminatory and I am envious of it. Every tournament player should be treated the same regardless of ability or reputation. They are not but most importantly the scheduling of matches is a tragedy.
My traveling companion, Mark Moore was told that he would not play the first day because his name lay at the bottom of the last bracket and would play the following day. Upon waking me up at 3:00 am, I suggested he go hit some balls since he had already slept several hours and could not sleep any longer. Perhaps he could get into stroke. When he went down to the tournamnet room, he soon found out that the staff had called his name for 39 minutes and they had forfeited his match. This guy would have put lots of money in action at the DCC but even if he would not have he should not have been given such a rude awakening. He came back to the room vowing never to spend another dollar with the DCC. I completely understand his anger and agree that he was but one victim of an ever increasing number of people who are abused by the system in place. I later found out that there was "another" Moore whose name appeared at the bottom of the last bracket and who did not play until the next day. Apparently, the person who told Mark that he would not play until the next day did not hear Mark's first name and did not know what Stevie Moore looked like.
The buy back problem needs to be eliminated so as to speed the tournament on. Too many people are victims of the DCC's current schduling ineptness, including myself. Waiting all day every day, checking back in every hour to see if they have made a draw or if your match time has changed causes unnecessary angst and they lose good participants because of this. I despise having to check in every hour on the hour to see if my match is coming up or if they have made a draw for the next round. I found more than a player or two in the very room where the tournament room was at, sitting there having not heard their name called after repeated trips to the "desk". You get a little numbed after a while and it just isn't fair to any of us. The professional pool players get personal phone calls from the schedulers when their matches are up. We mere mortals have to use our available energy walking back and forth to the desk, scanning the board in the tournament room or straining our eyes at the TERRIBLE resolution of the board on the TV in our room. This over a period of days puts a terrible strain on our energy. We don't know when we should eat. We don't know when we should sleep or nap. Hell, we don't even know when our match will be played and have to keep checking to make sure that our name has not been called or we forfeit our match. The pros are given special considerations and that isn't fair.
These scheduling problems aren't right and the buy back option and the re-drawing is the main problem in my opinion. The buy back option should be changed and the tournament become a standard double elimination tournament.
I forgot to mention two of my favorite players at this year's tournament and that is Emile and Jay from Louisiana who were fixtures in this year's AZ Room.
Emile's company was enjoyed by many AZers as they felt his fire. JoeyA
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