2010 Midyear Review

[Renegade]

We're already 6 months into this new year of this new decade. Lots of companies do a mid-year review to see if the goals they set for themselves at the start of the year still jibes with the reality on the ground. They then reset goals, if needed, or stay the course if they are on track. Time to look back at the previous 6 months of pool and see what went wrong, what went right, who's doing well, and who needs to pick up the speed.

So far, looks like Efren's still doing great, money-wise. Reyes was part of the winning Asia team in the Asia vs. Europe challenge. He followed this up by winning the Derby Master of the Table for the 5th time (by placing 1st in the 9ball competition and 2nd in the Banks event) and was off to a great start to the year. He followed this up with a 2nd place finish in the Japan Open (losing to buddy Django Bustamante). Not bad for the Player of the Decade (2000-2009).

Bustamante, who was also part of the winning Asia team in the Asia vs Europe challenge match, followed up his win in the Japan Open by winning the 1st WPBL Bonus Ball event.

Shane Van Boening scored numerous wins during the 1st half of the year as well, annexing the Players Championship crown as well as the Ultimate 10Ball event in Aruba.

Jasmin Ouschan perhaps demonstrated the most dominating performance by any pool player of the year so far with a sweep of the European Championships, winning the 9Ball, 8Ball, 10Ball, and 14.1 events! For this feat, she was rightly recognized by the Republic of Austria with the Carinthian "Golden Medal for Services". Not bad for the AZ Billiards' 2009 Player of the Year.

Ralf Souquet also did very well in the European Championships, as expected, with wins in the 9Ball and 10Ball competitions. (Stepanov won the 8Ball event).

Great Britain won the World Team Championships over Team Philippines. Karl Boyes won the Fujairah World 8Ball; Yu Ram Cha won the Amway Cup, Williams won the Super Billiards Expo 14.1, Dennis Orcullo finally wins a big one in the World Pool Masters, and Lee Van Corteza won the Mezz Cues 10Ball Open, and most recently, the US Open 10Ball!

Who will dominate in the 2nd half of the year?

 

[dedstroke38]

We're already 6 months into this new year of this new decade. Lots of companies do a mid-year review to see if the goals they set for themselves at the start of the year still jibes with the reality on the ground. They then reset goals, if needed, or stay the course if they are on track. Time to look back at the previous 6 months of pool and see what went wrong, what went right, who's doing well, and who needs to pick up the speed.

So far, looks like Efren's still doing great, money-wise. Reyes was part of the winning Asia team in the Asia vs. Europe challenge. He followed this up by winning the Derby Master of the Table for the 5th time (by placing 1st in the 9ball competition and 2nd in the Banks event) and was off to a great start to the year. He followed this up with a 2nd place finish in the Japan Open (losing to buddy Django Bustamante). Not bad for the Player of the Decade (2000-2009).

Bustamante, who was also part of the winning Asia team in the Asia vs Europe challenge match, followed up his win in the Japan Open by winning the 1st WPBL Bonus Ball event.

Shane Van Boening scored numerous wins during the 1st half of the year as well, annexing the Players Championship crown as well as the Ultimate 10Ball event in Aruba.

Jasmin Ouschan perhaps demonstrated the most dominating performance by any pool player of the year so far with a sweep of the European Championships, winning the 9Ball, 8Ball, 10Ball, and 14.1 events! For this feat, she was rightly recognized by the Republic of Austria with the Carinthian "Golden Medal for Services". Not bad for the AZ Billiards' 2009 Player of the Year.

Ralf Souquet also did very well in the European Championships, as expected, with wins in the 9Ball and 10Ball competitions. (Stepanov won the 8Ball event).

Great Britain won the World Team Championships over Team Philippines. Karl Boyes won the Fujairah World 8Ball; Yu Ram Cha won the Amway Cup, Williams won the Super Billiards Expo 14.1, Lee Van Corteza won the Mezz Cues 10Ball Open, and Dennis Orcullo finally wins a big one in the World Pool Masters.

Who will dominate in the 2nd half of the year?

It's been a very balanced year so far which IMO is great. It's good to see a bunch of players playing well though I do love when one player catches fire. Who is most prone to do that? IMO probably my boy SVB especially in 10 ball, his break is just so perfect isn't it? I have been a bit disappointed in his lack of consistency though. Orcullo could get hot. Mika seems to be struggling a bit the last couple months but we'll see how things shake out and we know what he's capable of

And by the way we are almost TO the 6th month not THROUGH the 6th month. So once June ends then we can have a more proper first half of the year recap :grin:

 

[Renegade]

And by the way we are almost TO the 6th month not THROUGH the 6th month. So once June ends then we can have a more proper first half of the year recap :grin:

Haha! You're right! I thought it was already June....Seems like a lot has already happened so far.

How many majors competitions do we have left? What events have been the most well-managed? The worst? What could be done about it?

I think the new pool players' association is a good development for the sport. Congrats to Johnny Archer and the rest of the crew! Good luck!

 

[CreeDo]

I've been loving this US Open 10b event and I think it will gradually evolve to become THE major of majors. At least I hope it does. Somehow every break and runout seems like so much more of an accomplishment and that in turn really separates the men from the boys. You hear a player had 5 runouts in the race to 9, it's like "holy crap, he was on fire... playing perfect"... whereas a 5-pack in 9ball? Some dude at the bar did that last week.