Thas APA for you.........
APA rant
- Thread starter trustyrusty
- Start date
cuesblues said:
And then, there are the inconsistent players who can't be beat one day and honestly can't hardly hit a ball the next day. How do you rate those? Do their ratings change from one day to the next? Or, does someone get them in trouble for being rated wrong, when the inconsistent player has his best day of the year?
And people wonder why we have so much trouble getting the world to open their hearts to the billiard industry.
Why the surprise?
There's prize money involved and it's pool.........most of which all over the world is organised, participated in or handicapped by...... petty crooks, lowlifes and the workshy.....
Is that or is that not how the sport is perceived by the public?.....I wonder why that could be?
Except for very nominal token amounts, remove the prize money from amateur pool tournaments and leagues; charge the players admin fees to cover the cost of running them; let's see how many players 'just love the game' as much as they say they do
Adjusting handicaps after an event has started is absurd....even golf doesn't do that. If you start a 54 hole event off 2 handicap and shoot 5 under or 10 over in the first round and you will still be off 2 for the last two rounds.
There's prize money involved and it's pool.........most of which all over the world is organised, participated in or handicapped by...... petty crooks, lowlifes and the workshy.....
Is that or is that not how the sport is perceived by the public?.....I wonder why that could be?
Except for very nominal token amounts, remove the prize money from amateur pool tournaments and leagues; charge the players admin fees to cover the cost of running them; let's see how many players 'just love the game' as much as they say they do
Adjusting handicaps after an event has started is absurd....even golf doesn't do that. If you start a 54 hole event off 2 handicap and shoot 5 under or 10 over in the first round and you will still be off 2 for the last two rounds.
You know, that is pretty much it in a nutshell. I like competing and I used to be into the TEAM thing. We had a name and we had matching shirts
How can you keep it together. We were all very good at our assigned number, but when you strive to improve you get bumped up after a while you cant field the same team because the numbers don't fit. What you need to do is get some clueless 45+ yearold woman that no matter what she does she will never-ever go above a 2, and then you need a beligerant drunk that is OK, but he is locked in at a 3+ to a 4-, he can make a fefw, but not going to go anywhere, toss that in with a steady 5 and then add yourself 7, and you can make somewhat of a team just match them up right and most important and pay attention to this because it is what it is really all about.
RELAX AND ENJOY THE TRIP TO VEGAS!!! IT IS ALL ABOUT FUN IN THE END, SO WHAT IF YOU GOT BUMPED UP IN VEGAS WHILE THE REST OF US WERE STILL HERE GRINDING AWAY AT ANOTHER WORK WEEK WITH NO VACATION IN SIGHT AND WHEN WE GET ONE WE CAN'T AFFORD THE TRIP TO VEGAS.
How can you keep it together. We were all very good at our assigned number, but when you strive to improve you get bumped up after a while you cant field the same team because the numbers don't fit. What you need to do is get some clueless 45+ yearold woman that no matter what she does she will never-ever go above a 2, and then you need a beligerant drunk that is OK, but he is locked in at a 3+ to a 4-, he can make a fefw, but not going to go anywhere, toss that in with a steady 5 and then add yourself 7, and you can make somewhat of a team just match them up right and most important and pay attention to this because it is what it is really all about.
RELAX AND ENJOY THE TRIP TO VEGAS!!! IT IS ALL ABOUT FUN IN THE END, SO WHAT IF YOU GOT BUMPED UP IN VEGAS WHILE THE REST OF US WERE STILL HERE GRINDING AWAY AT ANOTHER WORK WEEK WITH NO VACATION IN SIGHT AND WHEN WE GET ONE WE CAN'T AFFORD THE TRIP TO VEGAS.
trustyrusty said:
We weren't that kind of team either, but we made it to the semi's in 2001. Honestly, for us, it was just a week of incredible rolls and lucky breaks. We got a bye and ran into at least two teams that couldn't shoot 5 players because of raises. But we did play well.
Some of the stuff you described has to do with your opponent. We ran into a similar scenario back in 2001. Our first match of the tournament has us down 0-2 to a team from down south. The other captain was all smiles and sunshine until we got it back to 2-2.
In the 5th set, we had a 4 playing their 6. The games went like this:
6 wins in 2 innings,
6 wins in 2 innings,
6 makes 8 on b and scratches,
4 wins in 6 innings,
4 makes 8 on break.
Our 4 won the match 3-2, but only won 1 game on his own. The other captain made a huge stink about him and he ended up on the watch list.
What impressed me was that the two 6's from the other team saw us later that night and apologized for their captain's behavior. They said they had no problem with our team and wished us luck in the tournament.
trustyrusty said:
Yeah I can empathize with the raising thing during the qualifiers.
Personally, I think winning the trip is great, but having any lofty goals beyond that is a waste of time. If my team ever gets out there, I'm going by the golden rule of league and just recommend everyone to have a good time and don't take things so seriously that you get disappointed by anything that happens in the tournament. After all, odds are that most will get knocked out pretty early. lol
It's a handicapped tournament and anything can happen, good or bad. I hope in spite of your disappointment, in time your team will all feel that you all still had a pretty good time.
You hit the nail on the head when you said "Is the goal to bump up all the players so that the team can't stay intact - hence making 2 or 3 teams out of it?". That's exactly the goal because they get players hooked on playing in the league and having fun and then they start bumping handicaps to force that team to split and make new teams and this creates more money coming into the league.trustyrusty said:Is the goal to bump up all the players so that the team can't stay intact - hence making 2 or 3 teams out of it? SHADY, is all I can say. I have about a billion other gripes too, but I wanna hear others takes on this.
Until this tourney, I wondered why most on here ripped on the APA.....others musta had to go through this very thing too.
This same thing has happened to me so many times and I started playing in the BCA which I enjoyed much more than the APA, but the APA had such a strangle hold on my area that the BCA finally folded and I was forced to go back to the APA or not play in a league at all. The successful teams in my area are the teams who have figured the system out and they know how to manage the handicap system the best. They are experts at matching the players up and taking losses at the right time to keep their lower ranked players down until tournament time. It's a flawed system IMO and there's no way the league operator can catch all of the sand bagging.
ahah I cant even get on an APA team to play it. I've never played before so I'll come in at a 4 but everyone knows I'll be kicked to a 9 really quickly so they wont even let me on a team.
Be happy you can even get on a team and play. I just want to play to have fun and cant. Theres no BCA in this area either so it's just APA.
If I want to play I'd have to create my own team, hold a billiards special olympics for retarded people that want to play pool, then pick the best of those to get the remaining 4 people for the team just to be able to play.
It's quite sad really.
Be happy you can even get on a team and play. I just want to play to have fun and cant. Theres no BCA in this area either so it's just APA.
If I want to play I'd have to create my own team, hold a billiards special olympics for retarded people that want to play pool, then pick the best of those to get the remaining 4 people for the team just to be able to play.
It's quite sad really.
It's very simple - the 23 point rule is very very very low. Any team that wishes to be competitive usually will field teams that come awfully close to the limit and any success is likely going to get people raised.
My APA History
Team 1
1. Win no matter what
2. Get raised to a 7/8
3. Lose in the playoffs
4. Leauge operators home room team goes to nationals
Team 2
1. Pay 7.00 a week or whatever it was
2. Dump all the time
3. Be a 5/6
4. Get raised in playoffs
5. Lose in playoffs
6. League operators home room team goes to nationals
Gotta love the APA!
Team 1
1. Win no matter what
2. Get raised to a 7/8
3. Lose in the playoffs
4. Leauge operators home room team goes to nationals
Team 2
1. Pay 7.00 a week or whatever it was
2. Dump all the time
3. Be a 5/6
4. Get raised in playoffs
5. Lose in playoffs
6. League operators home room team goes to nationals
Gotta love the APA!
Thats why I dont play Apa no more.bomber said:
memikey said:
Bad comparison. I assume by "golf" you mean "professional" golf - which is a far higher-level than APA pool - which is (supposed to be) completely amateur. On top of that, people tend to play one round of golf a day, vs. APA team tournaments where you can play three or four rounds a day. *shrug*
Back to the main subject at hand: here's the text from a posting I made in January in a similar thread...
****************
The big inherent weakness in the APA's handicap system (and in ANY national handicap system) is that your handicap is based on your results on the local level. That's not a problem until you leave the local area and match up with players/teams from other areas.
Let's say in your local league, you're an 5 in 8-ball. You do reasonably decent against the folks in your local league. Then you pick up and you move to another part of the country, and join a league there. Let's say the average level of play in that area is a few notches above the average level of play in your old area. You may be a 5 still, but compared to the folks in your new area, you play like a strong 3 or a weak 4.
Therein lies the issues with nationals - you have teams in areas that are, on average, populated by stronger players. The 3s in that area will be better players than the 3s in other areas, 4s the same, etc. and those teams will generally do better in nationals. Those are the same teams that get on the watch lists, get bumped up in handicap on the spot, and sometimes barred for a year or two. The irony is, when a player from one of these areas gets bumped up at nationals, and then they go home - suddenly they're at a disadvantage, because now they're back with the folks whose handicaps are still the same, and this player now has to give a game or two to other players of similar skill.
I have yet to come up with a way to do a truly national handicap system that is based solely on local results and have it result in fair matchups when players from varying areas match up. There's really no way to do it without taking national stats/averages into account when calculating individual handicaps - and you can't really do that fairly and evenly.
Without some sort of total rework of the APA handicap system, there will always be issues with underranked (and even overranked!) players/teams at nationals.
ScottW said:
Bad and incorrect assumption. There is no such thing as a handicap in professional golf Furthermore, as it happens amateur golf is far more "completely" amateur than amateur pool in respect of prize money as there are strict limits on prize amounts you can win prior to automatically losing your right to compete as an amateur.
It will cost me more than $15,000/- in total to compete in the British and American Seniors Amateur Opens next year. The prize for the winner (which won't be me
) in both cases, is a trophy.
memikey said:
Ah, true. Fair 'nuff.
memikey said:Furthermore, as it happens amateur golf is far more "completely" amateur than amateur pool in respect of prize money as there are strict limits on prize amounts you can win prior to automatically losing your right to compete as an amateur.
It will cost me more than $15,000/- in total to compete in the British and American Seniors Amateur Opens next year. The prize for the winner (which won't be me
Yah, but still, comparing golf and pool is still a bad idea IMHO. The structures behind the scenes are quite different. Golf *has* to be more organized/structured.
$15k eh? Nice hobby!
Seriously though - how much of that is fees for the tournament, and how much is related expenses (travel/lodging/etc)?
I'm a SL9 in APA 9-ball, and I manage to field a team and even play most weeks w/o resorting to recruiting the mentally impaired. Also, you dont have to come in as a SL4 - just have your LO put you in as an 8 or 9.cubc said:
There is some talk about APA changing the SL cap system so that 7's 8's and 9's all count as 7's for cap purposes which would be a great move IMHO.
ScottW said:Ah, true. Fair 'nuff.
Yah, but still, comparing golf and pool is still a bad idea IMHO. The structures behind the scenes are quite different. Golf *has* to be more organized/structured.
$15k eh? Nice hobby!
Seriously though - how much of that is fees for the tournament, and how much is related expenses (travel/lodging/etc)?
A bad idea and a bad comparison are of course two different things
Can't disagree that it's probably generally a bad idea in this case, I only threw it in way back in the thread as a mention of a sport which doesn't adjust handicaps during a weekend tournament Out of the $15k less than $500 constitutes the entry fees, the other
14.5k will be the travel etc. My general point was that amateur golfers of all levels will expend a helluva lot of money knowing that there is no prospect whatsoever of any prize money. Several of us scratch and lower handicap golfers have also qualified for and played as amateurs in European PGA or US PGA Tour and Seniors PGA Tour Events knowing that we cannot collect any prize money at all were we to win. That to me is "completely amateur". Not all do so just for experience with the future intention of turning Pro.
A pool player who enters tournaments with prizes sometimes in excess of a few thousand dollars is not to me "completely amateur". The dividing line between amateur and pro in pool (in USA and elsewhere) has always seemed to be geared solely towards some kind of validation of a level of ability achieved and totally ignores other financial aspects of being genuinely "amateur". The UK 8 ball scene for example is choc-a-bloc full of "amateur" pool players who decline elevation to Pro status and remain amateur for the primary purpose of winning more prize money than they would as a Pro.
The cynical amongst us would indeed question how many amateur pool players would enter amateur tournaments if there was no prize money at all or enter events open to both pros and amateurs if as amateurs they were excuded from any eligibility for the cash prizes on offer. I'm not even sure if I myself would
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We had a similar City Tournament experience with the APA;
A guy on our team who was a SL2 playing well gets moved up to a SL3 a couple weeks before we go to Atlantic City, NJ for our City Tournament...
He shoots, and also has a "spotter" watching him, who them moves him up to a SL4, meaning that we could not shoot our SL7s (we had two who would alternate matches). Reality was, the SL2 who went to a SL4 was as much a SL4 as our SL7s. It was ridiculous. He moved two SLs, and had to play at cities like that! On top of that, he was moved to a SL4 at the money tournament, based on his cities rating!@# He NEVER played a reg. league night as anything higher than a SL3, before or after the cities. It was a frigging joke.
No wonder people sandbag, and play as other players or under different names (happens A LOT more than you would think) to stay in the league.
A guy on our team who was a SL2 playing well gets moved up to a SL3 a couple weeks before we go to Atlantic City, NJ for our City Tournament...
He shoots, and also has a "spotter" watching him, who them moves him up to a SL4, meaning that we could not shoot our SL7s (we had two who would alternate matches). Reality was, the SL2 who went to a SL4 was as much a SL4 as our SL7s. It was ridiculous. He moved two SLs, and had to play at cities like that! On top of that, he was moved to a SL4 at the money tournament, based on his cities rating!@# He NEVER played a reg. league night as anything higher than a SL3, before or after the cities. It was a frigging joke.
No wonder people sandbag, and play as other players or under different names (happens A LOT more than you would think) to stay in the league.
I played in the APA for about 5 years when I first got into pool. Its a sad fact that teams have to "sandbag" in order to survive. The team I was on had to rebuild about every other session b/c we refused to "sandbag". I joined the APA to get better, not to learn how to cheat (so to speak). JMO.
Southpaw
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