APA policies in your area...help me understand

[justadub]

I respectfully disagree...

Standard APA - rule dispute almost every match
APA Masters - rule dispute once a season, but very rare...
BCA - I can remember 1 rule dispute, but I'm sure there are a couple more....and that is over 2 years....

Mark the pocket
Approved pocket markers
Approved cue balls
Number of timeouts
Length of timeouts
People actually yelling when you hit the ball to shark you
Extreme sandbagging
Scorekeeping
Safeties
and the list goes on

I actually enjoyed APA Masters, lot of fun, no issues.....for some reason, people just go rule crazy and actually try to find a crazy rule to win in Standard APA....it was really wierd....played a buddy of mine from Masters, we both agreed we didn't have to mark the pocket.....after I made the first 8, his teammate tried to argue with him for like 5 minutes that I should have lost the game, regardless of our agreement.....just didn't fit the spirit of pool for me.....but to each their own.....I still think with some improvements, it's a great concept...

Surely you realize that not all of these issues happen all the time, in every franchise, right? I won't sit here and try to say that none of this stuff happens, becuase I'm sure it does. But all of it, all the time, everywhere? Slight exagerration, maybe? :embarrassed2:

The one that baffles me the most is why such a big deal is made of having to mark the pocket. Yeah, I guess it is a silly rule, but is it really such a burden that it creates such a hue and cry here? How difficult is it to walk over to the pocket, set something down on the rail, and go shoot? I mean, really?
(To me, the act of having to go mark the pocket is actually a benefit, cuz it makes me take my time. But that's just me.)

I think I've seen a real dispute once or twice in the last year and a half, and heard about a couple more. Thats over the last 4 sessions, with 12-14 teams playing. To me, that isn't a major batch of complaining, crying and whining.

 

[desmocourtney]

This has been EXACTLY my experience, except the regular APA rule disputes were every OTHER match. Petty BS mostly.

I travel 30 miles one way to play APA Masters and love it.

The person at the national office must get some real doosies, let it go.

I miss playing in the BCA.:thumbup2:

I respectfully disagree...

Standard APA - rule dispute almost every match
APA Masters - rule dispute once a season, but very rare...
BCA - I can remember 1 rule dispute, but I'm sure there are a couple more....and that is over 2 years....

Mark the pocket
Approved pocket markers
Approved cue balls
Number of timeouts
Length of timeouts
People actually yelling when you hit the ball to shark you
Extreme sandbagging
Scorekeeping
Safeties
and the list goes on

I actually enjoyed APA Masters, lot of fun, no issues.....for some reason, people just go rule crazy and actually try to find a crazy rule to win in Standard APA....it was really wierd....played a buddy of mine from Masters, we both agreed we didn't have to mark the pocket.....after I made the first 8, his teammate tried to argue with him for like 5 minutes that I should have lost the game, regardless of our agreement.....just didn't fit the spirit of pool for me.....but to each their own.....I still think with some improvements, it's a great concept...

 

[desmocourtney]

Because a game should NEVER be decided because someone forgot to mark a pocket on an obvious shot. Mark your pocket is like grade school or playing at Chuckie Cheese. Don't get me started!

 

[KMRUNOUT]

I'm a bit confused. You know what the by-law states, but you call the national office to ask about it? No offense, but that doesn't make much sense. The last thing the national office wants to deal with is somebody calling up and questioning a local by-law. It sounds like the team you played is just a bunch of jerkoffs if that's the kind of crap that they pull. Either that, or somebody doesn't know a straight-in shot from slop and thinks that a crappy cue ball gives them some kind of dumb advantage.

Our area is pretty well taken care of. The table's equipment is the basic standard, but we can use the good CBs if both teams agree (and all do). Every once in a while some jackass will come along and say we have to use the table ball, but that usually doesn't last long when they start noticing it doesn't do what they want. In our area, if you aren't packing a CB, you probably have a new team.

I should have clarified. We have a local bylaw about the cue ball only. My question was regarding the rack used. Also, I must say that the team we played is *not* a bunch of jerkoffs. In fact quite the opposite...they are a nice bunch of people. The exception is the captain of the team, who is a total jerk. His teammates apologized to me afterwards. My opponent and myself were all ready to begin our match using the magic rack. I showed it to him and how to use it. His attitude was "cool. lets play." But that wasn't good enough for the captain. He really needed there to be a problem.

*Most* teams in my area appreciate the difference in cue balls, and generally prefer the standard cue ball. There are some who believe the beachball or the 82 lb. cue ball gives them some advantage. While I get a certain satisfaction *drilling* their top player with his heavy ball, I still wouldn't consider it enjoyable to play with that chunk of crap (the cue ball that is lol).

Hope this helps you make more sense of the situation.

KMRUNOUT

 

[KMRUNOUT]

I think there's nothing wrong with contacting the national office about a local law. I mean, what if the local law is so ridiculous, it must be wrong? The National Office might not know anything about it without these complaints and once the complaint is made, they can steer the LO back on the right path.

Very good observation, and definitely not something that wasn't at least partly in play in my mind when I called them.

KMRUNOUT

 

[KMRUNOUT]

My understanding is that when you purchase the local franchise, you basically have full reign over whatever you want for rules... I've seen some CRAZY ones! For example, my current APA league lets you play two "ghost" players per session. A ghost player is someone who already played that night who will be playing in place of someone who isn't there. You tell the other team you want to play a ghost player, and they pick who they want to play from your team that is present and then pick who they are going to play against them.... Crazy crazy rule!

There definitely are guidelines as to what bylaws can be enacted. They must be approved by the main office. I strongly doubt this one is approved.

 

[KMRUNOUT]

In our area the BB CB is usually replaced with a ball that is not a mud ball. The away team has the table 30 minutes before the match starts. They get a chance to practice with the playing conditions.

It would be unsportsmanlike to change something during a match.

The issue with the main office happens everywhere and every business. There are a few that think they are so high and mighty that they are working there. Usually is someone in a peon job that likes to feel important by being a a$$hole and treating everyone on the outside like $hit.

I hear ya! I agree changing the ball mid match is silly. I doubt anywhere allows you to change it in the middle of an individual match, but I still think you should begin and end the whole night with the same equipment.

As for the woman I dealt with in the office: I don't think she was trying to act all high and mighty with me. I think rather that one of two things was going on. Either she was just plain having a bad day and lost her cool with me, or she is the type of person who confuses conversation with argument. (Probably a combination of the two). I told her it sounded like she was getting upset and that I wasn't sure why. She said she told me the answer and I was arguing with her about it. I guess for her asking questions to gain further clarification is "arguing". I may have asked if she knew the reasoning behind some of the rules, so as to try and understand the spirit of the rule. This would help in applying the rule to situations that are perhaps a bit outside the norm. Likewise, if I politely say that "I don't think that is a very good rule, because it prevents the home team from being able to rely on any consistent expectation of equipment in their home location, which is something most teams count on", this to me is not argument, simply observation. Some people, however, become defensive easily. She was getting increasingly more angry. When she told me that the visiting team can essentially call the shots about equipment if they feel like using a bar ball, I very politely said that I was beginning to understand some of the talk on the internet about the APA not being good for pool. At this point she hung up on me. So I think it was more a combination of defensiveness and (I'm giving the benefit of the doubt here) a bad day. Everyone else I've talked to at corporate has been quite pleasant. In fact, I specifically remember dealing with Pam in "tournament productions", and she couldn't have been more helpful!

Oh well, I still hold out hope that the APA will give more serious consideration to things like equipment and rules about the game, so that they can begin helping restore pool's popularity and help more serious players take *them* more seriously.

KMRUNOUT