another apa thread

L

lorider

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
last session was not one of my better sessions so far , especially playing 8 ball. i usually stay around 50 % win loss every session in both 8 and 9 ball.

i was quite supprised when i looked at the scoresheet my 1st night in the new session and found i had been lowered from a 5 to a 4 in 9 ball, still a 6 in 8 ball.

i looked up last sessions stats this morning and it just dont make any sense.

as i stated earlier my 8 ball game went downhill last session. won 11 and lost 20 for a 35 % win record.

in 9 ball i won 11 and lost 12 for a 48% win record. not as good as i usually do but not as bad as my 8 ball game last session.

it just puzzles the heck out of me that i would go down in 9 ball with a 48% win record and stay the same in 8 ball with a 38 % win record.

i am quite embarassed to be lowered but on the bright side it make it a lil easier when i go to singles regionals in 2 months, unless they raise me again right before i go like they have done the last 2 years in a row.

even though last session was a down session for me i still have a lifetime 52% win in 8 ball and 55% in 9 ball.

it seems like i play great one session and suck the next. its been that way every session since i joned apa.
 
lorider said:
last session was not one of my better sessions so far , especially playing 8 ball. i usually stay around 50 % win loss every session in both 8 and 9 ball.

i was quite supprised when i looked at the scoresheet my 1st night in the new session and found i had been lowered from a 5 to a 4 in 9 ball, still a 6 in 8 ball.

i looked up last sessions stats this morning and it just dont make any sense.

as i stated earlier my 8 ball game went downhill last session. won 11 and lost 20 for a 35 % win record.

in 9 ball i won 11 and lost 12 for a 48% win record. not as good as i usually do but not as bad as my 8 ball game last session.

it just puzzles the heck out of me that i would go down in 9 ball with a 48% win record and stay the same in 8 ball with a 38 % win record.

i am quite embarassed to be lowered but on the bright side it make it a lil easier when i go to singles regionals in 2 months, unless they raise me again right before i go like they have done the last 2 years in a row.

even though last session was a down session for me i still have a lifetime 52% win in 8 ball and 55% in 9 ball.

it seems like i play great one session and suck the next. its been that way every session since i joned apa.
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First off, let me say that you are a brave man indeed (starting a new APA thread) :thumbup:.

Secondly, how in the heck do you play 31 8-ball matches in one session???

Lastly, although I am NOT an APA basher, I must say that I have given up all hope of ever trying to figure out how people's skill levels get to where they are. It absolutely never made any sense to me, once I had been in the league a few years and started trying to "give a sh*t". :sorry:

I hope you get your answers.

Maniac
 
Maniac said:
First off, let me say that you are a brave man indeed (starting a new APA thread) :thumbup:.

Secondly, how in the heck do you play 31 8-ball matches in one session???

Lastly, although I am NOT an APA basher, I must say that I have given up all hope of ever trying to figure out how people's skill levels get to where they are. It absolutely never made any sense to me, once I had been in the league a few years and started trying to "give a sh*t". :sorry:

I hope you get your answers.

Maniac
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first off , i aint brave. whats the worst that could happen ? chris banks come on here with his all leagues should be non-handicapped crap? i have yet to respond to his idiotic posts.

second thing. those 31 8 ball matches ? kinda easy to get that number when you play 2 double jeapordy and 1 8 ball travel division every week.

that is just apa. i also play napa and an in house money league once a week. i play pool 5 nights a week and think about pool the other 2 nights:grin:

as much as i play it looks like i would be a lil more consistent at the table than i am. some nights i play like a 7 and other nights like a 3.:(
 
I get where you're coming from, Lorider, and I've had my turn with that stuff too. Especially the consistency issue.

I had a 2 or 3 session period, right after I went up to. 5, where I hovered between 40-45%. Yet there were three or four other guys, roughly the same speed, would go up and back down multiple times, often with similar records. Yet I stayed a 5 the whole time...

I somehow doubt you'll be a 4 for very long. Though in our league that happened to a guy who is clearly better than me and most of the other 5's, and he's stayed a 4 for about a month. Crazy. Beats the hell out of all of us. Him included. And he's just as confused as the rest of us. I sure as hell don't like giving him 7 balls :-) and I tell him so. We all have a good laugh about it.

The computer formula has its glitches, is what it likely is. More often than not, they get it right, or close enough, so we might as well laugh when it gets messed up.
 
I'm guessing that you think your LO is so crooked and twisted that he has to screw his shorts in the morning?
 
most likely a lot of your 8 ball matches were close and your 9 ball matches were not.
 
Celophanewrap said:
I'm guessing that you think your LO is so crooked and twisted that he has to screw his shorts in the morning?
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Who is that directed to?

I certainly don't feel that way, and based on past conversations I don't think lorider does either.

Funny stuff happens with the computer. Strange funny, not crooked funny.
 
To my knowledge, the rank may not even factor win percentage, or may factor it only in a minor way.

They understand that win percentage will kind of even out over time and take care of itself, but in the meantime there will be flukes... it's a bell curve. Within all the 5's in the universe... most fall in the middle with 50ish win rate, a few lucky souls are higher, and a few are lower. But they all should be fives.

So they try to determine that number by innings, safeties, etc. instead of win rate which can be deceptive. After all, even between two perfectly even opponents, there still has to be one winner and one loser.

Basically you probably had tons of innings and took more turns to clear the table than an average 5. Which doesn't mean you shot bad... you may play more safeties than a 5. Safeties are notoriously overlooked in APA scoring so all those extra innings look like misses rather than smart defensive plays.

It may also have to do with who you play against. I don't think players can go up (easily) when they face equal or lower-ranked opponents. But you can go down if most of your losses are to equal or worse players. I know one guy who stayed a 7 for 1.5 years despite a 100% win rate. But he never had to play any 8's or 9's and rarely other 7's.

A lot of people gripe about "The Equalizer" but I find it's usually pretty correct after enough matches have been played.
 
The ranking system (currently) does factor in win percentage, but what I'm having trouble trying to understand is why some of you all worry about it. Sure I'd love to be a 3 or 4 again and at my current level of skill at the table, but usually week to week I'll just and play until they tell me to stop. Be a 3, be a 4 or 5 or 6 or whatever, just play and let the cyber end of things take care of itself. Not one of us is important enough for our LO to devote his or her time to making our lives miserable by what? - raising our skill level? just play and let everything else take care of itself.
 
Right now my team has nobody above a 3... I was a 4 at the start of last session but having to play mostly 5s and 6s and the occasional 7 I won all of 2 matches. It does take the fun out of it all a little to pay every week to get your ass handed to you individually and as a team, but such is life. I guess an eaiser time at singles nationals would be a bright side to it but I don't even understand how a 3-4 is supposed to get past the qualifier when it's not handicapped and all skill levels play each other?
 
justadub said:
Funny stuff happens with the computer. Strange funny, not crooked funny.
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if you think that here in Maine your handicap is based on the equalizer system you don't see what goes on. John raises and lowers (mostly raising) handicaps manually ALL THE TIME. It is so absurd, it's the reason why I quit the APA. There are people in my area who hardly every run a rack but, they are ranked as 7's. The last three high level tournaments that I played in we had people manually raised the day before or during the tourney, and yes he admitted he did it manually. APA is a business for the LO's and if they don't get more people they don't make money. Easiest way to get more players... adjust people up so they need to find new people and mo $ mo$ mo$.
 
Celophanewrap said:
The ranking system (currently) does factor in win percentage, but what I'm having trouble trying to understand is why some of you all worry about it. Sure I'd love to be a 3 or 4 again and at my current level of skill at the table, but usually week to week I'll just and play until they tell me to stop. Be a 3, be a 4 or 5 or 6 or whatever, just play and let the cyber end of things take care of itself. Not one of us is important enough for our LO to devote his or her time to making our lives miserable by what? - raising our skill level? just play and let everything else take care of itself.
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I believe that you mistake my comments here, as well as loriders. We (or at least "I", though I firmly believe lorider feels as I do) both are interested in "going up", and had a race between us to see who would get to 6 first. (He won, darn it!).

Just because we wonder openly about the system doesn't mean we want to take advantage of it, in such a way as to want to be rated lower than we play. In my case, I am simply curious why people who are clearly my ability have gone up and down in skill level, while I have remained the same. All while we have had similar winning percentages.

I'm not *****ing about it. Actually, I get a lot of mileage out of it, in terms of ribbing my buddies. But I still am curious as to how it occurs.

I play to win every time, and I don't let the other stuff bother me. I do have an active mind, though, and I can't stop from being curious.

Sorry if that bothers you.
 
tablerunna said:
if you think that here in Maine your handicap is based on the equalizer system you don't see what goes on. John raises and lowers (mostly raising) handicaps manually ALL THE TIME. It is so absurd, it's the reason why I quit the APA. There are people in my area who hardly every run a rack but, they are ranked as 7's. The last three high level tournaments that I played in we had people manually raised the day before or during the tourney, and yes he admitted he did it manually. APA is a business for the LO's and if they don't get more people they don't make money. Easiest way to get more players... adjust people up so they need to find new people and mo $ mo$ mo$.
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I have not seen evidence of that happening in my experience, and John has been pretty fair to my teams these past three years.

That doesn't mean stuff hasn't happened. But I have no evidence in my experience.
 
Also, if that were the case, there would be a lot more 6's and 7's than there are now. In my limited three year experience, I've seen one new 7, and three or four new 6's in our 8-ball division.

That doesn't indicated that John is trying to drive up the skill levels, at least in our division.
 
lorider said he had a bad session but, his lifetime is still 55% in 9-ball. If he has been playing for at least a couple years one bad session should not lower his handicap. A handicap system works with averages and his win percentage was not far below his lifetime so it should not have changed without significant change in his play. If the Equalizer system changed him it is seriously flawed.
 
Ask other people in this area, not many people will tell you different. I'm not saying he's ridiculous about it but, a 7 should be running racks consistently, if not they should not be 7's. When there are7's out there who run sets, somebody who only runs 2 or 3 a session is a 6. He raise our 2 middle of states. She won a match was his reason. She won 2-1, one of those games her opponent scratched the 8. The innings were 11,12,13.
 
Celophanewrap said:
The ranking system (currently) does factor in win percentage, but what I'm having trouble trying to understand is why some of you all worry about it. Sure I'd love to be a 3 or 4 again and at my current level of skill at the table, but usually week to week I'll just and play until they tell me to stop. Be a 3, be a 4 or 5 or 6 or whatever, just play and let the cyber end of things take care of itself. Not one of us is important enough for our LO to devote his or her time to making our lives miserable by what? - raising our skill level? just play and let everything else take care of itself.
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i would like to address a couple of your comments.

i do not really worry about what skill level i am. i just thought it odd that i was lowered in 9 ball and stayed the same in 8 although i had a higher win % in 9 last session.

being somewhat a competitive person i do worry about my win %. i dont worry to the extent i lose sleep or get pissed off win i lose.

i strive to play the best i can every match and actually am somewhat embarrased to have been lowered.

over the 2 1/2 years i have played apa i was always the best player on our team, ( that tells you our team really sucked ) :D my captain always picked me to play the higher handicaps we faced.

i am kinda proud that even though the majority of my matches have been against higher handicaps i have managed to go from a 4 to a 6 in 8 ball and a 3 to a 5 in 9 ball and have a 52 % lifetime win in 8 ball and a 55 % win in 9 ball over a total of 387 matches.

we were able to pick up a 7 last session and now he usually faces the 6s and 7 s leaving me to play equal s/l s . my game seemed to have suffered somewhat. i guess it is because i was always geared up playing higher level opponents and dont get into it as much playing equal or lesser opponents.

i guess it is true what a guy told me a few years ago. he said i was a pretty good player but i always played down to my opponents level.


as for my lo. i think he is a pretty cool dude. he is always at a division every night. he sometimes visits more than 1 place every night. i actually play on a team with him. he is a pretty good player in his own right. a 7 in a and a 7 in 9.
i have also played against him a few times in another division we both play in. won me a pretty cool - i beat the apa lo patch twice. :D

last but not least my op was about being lowered, not raised. :)
 
Kaiser Bob said:
Right now my team has nobody above a 3... I was a 4 at the start of last session but having to play mostly 5s and 6s and the occasional 7 I won all of 2 matches. It does take the fun out of it all a little to pay every week to get your ass handed to you individually and as a team, but such is life. I guess an eaiser time at singles nationals would be a bright side to it but I don't even understand how a 3-4 is supposed to get past the qualifier when it's not handicapped and all skill levels play each other?
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at the end of each session we have a top gun tourny that is a regional qualifier. you play in the bracket that is your s/l.

this past year we also had several open qualifiers that you are talking about. yea, you are right , it is hard for a 3-4 to win one of those. it does happen though. i won a 9 ball qualifier 2 months ago by beating a 6 and a 7 with me playing as a 5.
 
tablerunna said:
lorider said he had a bad session but, his lifetime is still 55% in 9-ball. If he has been playing for at least a couple years one bad session should not lower his handicap. A handicap system works with averages and his win percentage was not far below his lifetime so it should not have changed without significant change in his play. If the Equalizer system changed him it is seriously flawed.
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i have been raised to a 5 twice and now lowered back down to a 4 twice in 9 ball during the 2 1/2 years playing apa.

aint never been lowered in 8 ball though. it may have something to do with i play a lot more safties in 8 ball. i dont really know, just taking a guess.
 
tablerunna said:
Ask other people in this area, not many people will tell you different. I'm not saying he's ridiculous about it but, a 7 should be running racks consistently, if not they should not be 7's. When there are7's out there who run sets, somebody who only runs 2 or 3 a session is a 6. He raise our 2 middle of states. She won a match was his reason. She won 2-1, one of those games her opponent scratched the 8. The innings were 11,12,13.
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I don't have the experience or perspective of playing people "from away", so I have no idea how our 7's stack up against those in other areas. So I can't possibly comment on it.

All I know is that the 7's we have here play better than the 6's, and so on. If the scale is off versus other parts of the country, I couldn't begin to know.

As for players going up in tri cups, and at states, you hear that all the time. The timing sure can suck, but I bet most times that player should be at the new skill level (at least comparing players in our area).

Look, I'm not trying to be a cheerleader for John, but I just don't see the stuff going with him that I read about other LOs. And I don't agree with everything he says or does, either. He has a business to run, and I don't have a problem with that. I respect it. I've run a business for 24 years, and I can tell you that I wouldn't want to put up with some of the crap that he has to deal with.

I enjoy it. I'm sorry that you don't.
 
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