I went to a concert once with a couple of non-pool playing friends. I had some time before the band I was there to hear took the stage and I noticed a bar table in the corner. To kill some time I invited my friends to play a bit. I was playing scotch doubles with one guy against the other guy. Obviously we're crushing but at least there are multiple innings due to my partner being a noob.
Suddenly this guy comes swaggering over, real smooth, and asks if he can get in. I say 'no problem'. He has his own cue, a sneaky pete obviously. He asks which of us is the worst and says "I should probably play with him". It was crystal clear the guy thought he was a champion, and that he was going to blow us off the table and sign autographs for us.
We switched to regular doubles, and then it happened. I hit dead punch. Something about this guy irritated me and I decided to shut him out. I was playing off the wall but it didn't matter, it was a bar table, and even in bad lighting with dead rails and a concert blaring I can run out, it looked like tic tac toe. I win. I win again. Running out from the break. Or worst case I come up dry, opponent shoots, partner shoots, opponent shoots, I run out again. Etc. I put some TOP SHELF pool on this guy, like no errors for an hour.
The better I played the worse this guy played. In the beginning he made a few decent starts to run outs, but by the end he was totally snake bitten. In fact, after an hour of him not winning a rack I finally fumbled and gave him a winning opportunity, and he chunked the shot horribly.
Finally my band is up and I tell him I have to go. He is somewhat shocked, and now he's acting totally humble compared to the attitude he first had. He asked me if I was a pro, or if I played tournaments, and how I got so good.
Something about his attitude bothered me, I could tell he really thought he was something special, but also that he wanted to wield that against some noobs to try to feel important. So I felt like twisting the needle. My response? I just acted surprised and said "Really, you think I play good? I guess I did spend one week every summer at my grandparents cabin and they had a pool table there so I've played a little bit before, but wow, thanks for the kind words!"
Then I left him with his jaw on the floor, tilted at life that he just lost to a what he thought was a civilian that got 3 balls better than him almost accidentally.
Moral of the story- don't be a d-bag. We're all small fish.
Suddenly this guy comes swaggering over, real smooth, and asks if he can get in. I say 'no problem'. He has his own cue, a sneaky pete obviously. He asks which of us is the worst and says "I should probably play with him". It was crystal clear the guy thought he was a champion, and that he was going to blow us off the table and sign autographs for us.
We switched to regular doubles, and then it happened. I hit dead punch. Something about this guy irritated me and I decided to shut him out. I was playing off the wall but it didn't matter, it was a bar table, and even in bad lighting with dead rails and a concert blaring I can run out, it looked like tic tac toe. I win. I win again. Running out from the break. Or worst case I come up dry, opponent shoots, partner shoots, opponent shoots, I run out again. Etc. I put some TOP SHELF pool on this guy, like no errors for an hour.
The better I played the worse this guy played. In the beginning he made a few decent starts to run outs, but by the end he was totally snake bitten. In fact, after an hour of him not winning a rack I finally fumbled and gave him a winning opportunity, and he chunked the shot horribly.
Finally my band is up and I tell him I have to go. He is somewhat shocked, and now he's acting totally humble compared to the attitude he first had. He asked me if I was a pro, or if I played tournaments, and how I got so good.
Something about his attitude bothered me, I could tell he really thought he was something special, but also that he wanted to wield that against some noobs to try to feel important. So I felt like twisting the needle. My response? I just acted surprised and said "Really, you think I play good? I guess I did spend one week every summer at my grandparents cabin and they had a pool table there so I've played a little bit before, but wow, thanks for the kind words!"
Then I left him with his jaw on the floor, tilted at life that he just lost to a what he thought was a civilian that got 3 balls better than him almost accidentally.
Moral of the story- don't be a d-bag. We're all small fish.
