Lyn I believe its all done by statistics. Won/loss record, number of innings in those games and matches, etc. There are a number of stats they keep including break and runs, 8 on the break, scratch on 8, 8 out of turn, safeties, etc. You toss all that into the apa computer genie and you get a rating. Then they rank the players with worst rating being on top, best on the bottom. There are a number of intangibles of course. The obvious being sandbagging. Some less obvious ones are difficulty of the division you play in. Some divisions around the country have divisions that have quite a few "super sevens", basically guys that play regional pro speed. You get into a soft division and your record is artificially pumped up bc you might get a whole year without being beat. Maybe even not beat a single game. Esp someone who plays your speed. Some of things too is that if you dont play alot the statistics are easier to move. A guy who plays 20 times, stalling the whole time can manipulate his record vs a guy who plays 50 times a year or more. I know many APA guys who play two to three times a week on a bunch of different teams.
It is a bit discouraging to get to vegas after spending all year playing and then you see your in a bracket with Gabe Apollos, Ernesto Bayau, Steve Knoll etc. What is also more interesting is the way they do the losers bracket. Unlike most tournaments, the APA keeps all the players in a group together. So for example in your bracket of 16, if you lose you go across, staying within your bracket of 16. In the end, its like APA Highlander...There can be only ONE! and only one player emerges from that 16 and eventually from 32 and eventually from the top 64 players in the event. Meanwhile over in Greenacres on the other three brackets of 64 you have guys getting to the finals who the guys in the bottom would love to try some giving up the 6 ball.
It is what it is. I think if the APA truly allowed it to be random draw, there would be a much higher influx of lurking in the weeds pro speed players. As it is, you pretty much know that all the guys who can run racks will be cutting each others throats. If you manage to do the Highlander routine successfully, the bonus is that when you get to the final 4 its pretty much a joke stealing. Or at least from what I saw at the nineball event. Alex Olinger out of Ohio won the 9ball event. In the bottom 64 bracket he beat guys who were putting 30-50 balls on him in an inning or two. Then he gets to the semi finals/finals and hes playing guys who wont put any packages at all on him. It was stealing, I think he won like 75-15 or something.
