American Pool vs Snooker

Bob Dixon said:
By the way- you know, I'm sure, a lot more about snooker than I do. Could you explain for me what the Betfred.com World Championship was and who sponsored it?
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Snooker used to be heavily sponsored by tobacco, insurance, banking companies, much like other major competitions such as the Tour de France.

Laws removed tobacco sponsorship, the economy did in others, and snooker had to scrounge for sponsorship, suffering reduced prize money and the deaths of some major tournaments.
Kirk Stevens making a 147 in the 1984 Benson and Hedges Masters
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M5xY8FsM-iQ
Would an American pool player dress like Kirk?

Betfred is a British bookie, started by by brothers Fred and Peter Done. They took bookmaking upmarket, and snooker fit that image. Not to mention that they made money on the betting on snooker.
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2011/jun/03/fred-done-tote-new-owner-profile

Another sponsor was Pukka pies
http://www.pukkapies.co.uk/
When Ding Junhui won, he received his weight in pies. He donated them to a food bank or some such.

Steve Davis won a car from a tournament sponsor - a Lada :grin:
It was the first televised 147
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOG8ikW1Onk
 
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Bob Dixon said:
By the way- you know, I'm sure, a lot more about snooker than I do. Could you explain for me what the Betfred.com World Championship was and who sponsored it?
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Sure, anything for you Bob. The UK government decided gambling was good, and smoking bad. Choose your poison.

:rolleyes:
 
Bob Dixon said:
Your freakish attempts to sow conflict WITHIN cue sports when the popularity of all of them are weakened by the appeal of other mass spectator sports is condemnable. You're a troll.
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Do you mean like branding the Mosconi Cup, the ONLY American pool shown on TV in the entire western world AFAIK, a "dog and pony show"? That type of attempt to sow conflict WITHIN cue sports?

Stay down, man.
 
Bella Don't Cry said:
Another reason is that it has standardised world rules.
Children playing Snooker in the garage are playing the exact same game as professionals at the Crucible - go figure :thumbup:
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If standardization were the key, all olympic sports would be money makers.. the opposite is true. Olympics kills sports and the unified united bureaucracies make entrepreneurial development almost impossible.

The game needs an entertaining product, that players enjoy as much as viewers, not unification and standardization... simply popularity.. something unifiers, committee members, think tanks and politicians are incapable of producing.
 
As an aside... the primary goal of the WPA is to get Olympic status... in order to cement their bureaucracy.
 
Colin Colenso said:
If standardization were the key, all olympic sports would be money makers.. the opposite is true. Olympics kills sports and the unified united bureaucracies make entrepreneurial development almost impossible.

The game needs an entertaining product, that players enjoy as much as viewers, not unification and standardization... simply popularity.. something unifiers, committee members, think tanks and politicians are incapable of producing.
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I have to agree with Bella there. Pool is a fractured mess, with the plethora of nonsensical rules being a primary cause. They act as a barrier to casual players.

The rules in Australia are even worse than they are in England. :eek: And virtually no one who plays pool in the UK knows American 8 ball rules. Without a single, unified set of rules, how are you ever going to define what pool actually is? From chaos comes order.
 
voiceofreason said:
Steve Davis, during his heyday, was actually known as Steve "interesting" Davis due to hs boring persona.

He "lightened up" as his star began to wain..
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It's true he had a quite phenomenal personality transplant when he started to lose. He used to be foul.

Steve 'very windy' Davis was always my favourite nickname for the nugget.

Alex 'Hurricane' Higgins.
Jimmy 'Whirlwind' White.
Steve 'windy' Davis. lol.
 
Pathetic Shark said:
I have to agree with Bella there. Pool is a fractured mess, with the plethora of nonsensical rules being a primary cause. They act as a barrier to casual players.

The rules in Australia are even worse than they are in England. :eek: And virtually no one who plays pool in the UK knows American 8 ball rules. Without a single, unified set of rules, how are you ever going to define what pool actually is? From chaos comes order.
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I agree that the rules here in Oz, which are an attempt to standardize with the Uk, suck. I have more faith in free markets developing standards than I do in privileged / licensed bureaucracies achieving better rules or game type. 9-ball, 10-ball and foul and a miss in snooker confirm this in my mind.

I agree that simplifying rules is very important. Centralized governance has a long history of doing the very opposite. That's why I'm always a contrarian when the buzz words of unification and governing bodies are proposed as a solution to the game's obvious woes.
 
I wonder how much the consistent and highly visible presence of a referee has on adding to the authenticity and appeal of Snooker.

The visible presence of the referee seems to add integrity. When this is coupled with no gambling by the players, and a dress code I think Snooker elevated its own creditability substantially.

I know they had some player gambling issues a little while ago and the punishments are severe (in such a high paying venue). This too adds to the feeling that Snooker is indeed a reputable sport.

I agree that something needs to be done about the apparent lack of difficulty in pool and have thought for some time that 15 ball rotation is the answer because it requires all sorts of skills and the requirement to use them or look like a dork. Simplified rules like one point per ball and ball in hand for all fouls would make it easier to follow.

PS Hi Colin, glad to see you back.
 
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Seems all of the major popular sports have highly visible referees. Now that is something to think about.
 
I think the real question is not why doesn't the world love 9-ball, but rather why doesn't snooker catch on in the United States?
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That's like asking why don't we (U.S.) like Soccer.
 
Bob Dixon said:
The inability of someone unfamiliar with pool to understand the importance of position play won't be made easier by having more balls. A complete novice can watch snooker with red-black-red-black-red-black-red-blue on one end of the table and understand the concept of the game instantly. They really don't understand what's happening when a pool player executes excellent position play from one end of the table to the other.
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Are you suggesting beginners understand the concept of positional play more readily for snooker than they do for pool?

Extraordinary.
 
Bob Dixon said:
One other thing you haven't done is take up 'Jam' on her challenge. You're running from that like a cockroach fleeing the light. You apparently have a higher regard for girls in the real world than what you express on the pretend world of the internet.
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JAM's challenge? For me to show her pics of my face and body? She's female, so she's obviously going to be curious, but I already have a stalker, Bob. Don't worry mate, I'm all yours. :wub:
 
Chesscat said:
Snooker seems to be very popular over most of the world, including all of Europe, including the former Eastern Block countries and the Balkans, India, SouthEast Asia, Australia, Canada and China. China particularly seems bent on world domination.

China has a population of 1.4 billion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China

India has a population of 1.2 billion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India

I think the real question is not why doesn't the world love 9-ball, but rather why doesn't snooker catch on in the United States?
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Space for tables and who is going to spend the money to re-fit a pool room with a bunch of new tables that will just confuse the yokels when they try to play 8 ball and wonder where the stripes are. Snooker had to have cough on in the US before the regular pool tables became popular. I guess if somehow everyone starts going to the pool rooms and bars and demanding that the owners put in some snooker tables in it would get some notice as a game in the US.

There is a snooker table in the room I play in and people that go in are usually amazed at how big this "pool" table is compared to the rest without realizing what it is.
 
sjm said:
I think its simplicity really helps snooker. Except when all the reds are gone, every turn is the same. If you make a red, you get to shoot a colored ball, and the colored balls have greater value. After making a colored ball, you must shoot a red again, and if you make that, you get to shoot at another colored ball, etc. The game is so simple that my grandmother used to watch it when she was in her late 80's, even when she'd lost control of some of her intellectual faculties.
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I don't see snooker any easier to figure out than any of the pool games. Each colored ball is different points in snooker. There is nothing even that tough in most pool games.

8 ball, you shoot all the stripes/solids then the 8, 9 ball you just shoot the lowest ball, 14.1 you just shoot any ball and count them up, all are 1 point there. There is not even multiple ball positions to rack in pool, you get a triangle of balls in the middle, no setting up other balls in spots around the table.

Once you get into the advanced areas of pool like safety, picking the right shot to take, even things like picking a correct handicap for an even game, then it gets tough, but I'm sure snooker has some of those as well.
 
I think the problem with rotation from the spectator's point of view lies in an inability to distinguish between the balls. Stripes and solids is a good idea but the colors for the four, five, six and seven need to be easily identified. When this is done the stripes will fall in line as any stripe is the value of a solid +8.

I have played snooker off and on for 40 years. As my son-in-law said when playing on those 12 footers in Canada, "It is like playing in another country." However, I often forget the value of pink, blue, brown, etc. when I first start watching, then it comes back. I wonder what it must be like for people who do not play the game.

Rotation games are "good" for spectators because it is obvious what the next few balls will be. With some experience, spectators can learn to appreciate getting position for two or more balls.

I think the real difference is in the credibility that Snooker has earned for itself and that refs and a touch of class are the major contributors.

In American football the spectators quickly learn to appreciate the nuances of play and can argue tactics and strategy for hours. The same could be expected for a credible sport of pool.
 
It's more about the scenarios than can often play out in Snooker.
The long pressure balls the tic tac safety exchanges or the "needs them all to win" thrill such as this classic http://youtu.be/CAO48WSZnRU
It plays out often and is the nature of the game, it's not usually a case of BIH " I coulda run that out" finish. It's a tough game and under pressure it's a really tough game, pool is never going to have that element in it's current format.
 
Bob Dixon said:
You aren't even insightful enough to recognize that position play in snooker is more simple than it is in a game where you DON'T have numerous balls to choose from for your next shot and where a lot of them aren't always in the exact same place. And that's a partial explanation for why snooker players DON'T do that well when they play pool against pro-level pool players.
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Partial, partial, partial...you love your get-out clauses...

Failed snooker pros, like Peach, Appleton, Melling, Drago et al appear to have achieved more in the game of pool than pool legends like Cory D have done in snooker. Why is this difficult for you to understand, Robert?


Bob Dixon said:
So, yes- snooker is easier to understand for someone who would never want to actually play any cue sport. You don't have to be a genius to recognize that.
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The art of picking apart 36 balls in strategic order on a massive table with small pockets is easier to understand than it is to whack-in a maximum of 9 balls on a small table with massive pockets. Gotcha.

With such great CB, someone like Rodney Morris would make a fortune at an easy game like snooker! :rolleyes:
 
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