Hear ye, Hear ye: BCA Takes Over Ranking for American Pros

JAM

JAM

I am the storm
Silver Member
The BCA has announced that they are taking over the ranking system for American professional players from the UPA.

The article is on the main page with the details laid out by Ivan Lee, the BCA president.

AzBilliards was mentioned as having a hand in the new-and-improved ranking system.

What say you all about this latest bit of news?

JAM
 
JAM said:
The BCA has announced that they are taking over the ranking system for American professional players from the UPA.

The article is on the main page with the details laid out by Ivan Lee, the BCA president.

AzBilliards was mentioned as having a hand in the new-and-improved ranking system.

What say you all about this latest bit of news?

JAM
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I'm number one! I'm number one! Just kidding Jam :)
Actually Joey is #1 and I'm #2.
 
jay helfert said:
I'm number one! I'm number one! Just kidding Jam :)
Actually Joey is #1 and I'm #2.
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Y'all are always at the top, but will have a tough time catching up with Smorgie! He's the man to beat! :D

Here's the press release:

The Billiard Congress of America (BCA) today announced it will manage the men?s professional rankings system and player communications duties in its role as the North American representative to the World Pool-Billiard Association (WPA). Most recently these duties were handled by the U.S. Professional Poolplayers Association.

?The tremendous international expansion of men's events in recent years has made it clear that the BCA needs to take steps to solidify the men?s professional ranking system,? said BCA Board President Ivan Lee. ?We have grown from a single World 9-Ball Championship to WPA World Championships in 8-Ball, 9-Ball, 10-Ball and 14.1, and it is imperative that we maintain a ranking system that consistently allows us to send the best players North America has to offer to compete and represent our continent in these events.?

This decision was made after the BCA learned that an American pro event was conducted in direct conflict with the World 8-Ball Championship. The conflict resulted in players being required to choose between competing in the World 8-Ball event and losing ranking points or competing in the American event and sacrificing their opportunity at a world title.

?The BCA believes that the task of communicating with and assigning professional players to compete in international events is now so critical that they must have direct control of the process in order to take responsibility for it,? further stated Lee.

The BCA has requested that AZBilliards, a leading source in pool and billiard news and information, assist with creating and maintaining the new ranking system. ?AZBilliards, in partnership with the BCA, is helping to create a thorough, carefully planned player ranking process that will allow the BCA to provide the best possible representation from North America to the World Championship events,? concluded Lee.

A follow-up announcement detailing the new ranking system will be released in the near future.


My immediate question is what tournament is the BCA referring to that occurred at the same time as the Fujairah event.

Also, what will happen to the future of the UPA organization?

JAM
 
JAM said:
Y'all are always at the top, but will have a tough time catching up with Smorgie! He's the man to beat! :D

Here's the press release:

The Billiard Congress of America (BCA) today announced it will manage the men?s professional rankings system and player communications duties in its role as the North American representative to the World Pool-Billiard Association (WPA). Most recently these duties were handled by the U.S. Professional Poolplayers Association.

?The tremendous international expansion of men's events in recent years has made it clear that the BCA needs to take steps to solidify the men?s professional ranking system,? said BCA Board President Ivan Lee. ?We have grown from a single World 9-Ball Championship to WPA World Championships in 8-Ball, 9-Ball, 10-Ball and 14.1, and it is imperative that we maintain a ranking system that consistently allows us to send the best players North America has to offer to compete and represent our continent in these events.?

This decision was made after the BCA learned that an American pro event was conducted in direct conflict with the World 8-Ball Championship. The conflict resulted in players being required to choose between competing in the World 8-Ball event and losing ranking points or competing in the American event and sacrificing their opportunity at a world title.

?The BCA believes that the task of communicating with and assigning professional players to compete in international events is now so critical that they must have direct control of the process in order to take responsibility for it,? further stated Lee.

The BCA has requested that AZBilliards, a leading source in pool and billiard news and information, assist with creating and maintaining the new ranking system. ?AZBilliards, in partnership with the BCA, is helping to create a thorough, carefully planned player ranking process that will allow the BCA to provide the best possible representation from North America to the World Championship events,? concluded Lee.

A follow-up announcement detailing the new ranking system will be released in the near future.


My immediate question is what tournament is the BCA referring to that occurred at the same time as the Fujairah event.

Also, what will happen to the future of the UPA organization?

JAM
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They are talking about the Desert Shootout in Phoenix. Only half a world away from Dubia (?) where the World Eight Ball was going on. This is kind of a joke. What about ALL the Eurotour and Asian pro events that conflict with everything over here and elsewhere for that matter? Leave it to the BCA to bungle this one up.

WHERE WAS THE BCA WHEN THEY WERE ASKED TO HELP FUND A PRO TOUR? AWOL is where! Several times they had an opportunity to do something for professional pool in the USA, and they declined. This is when they were high on the hog too, with billiard sales booming. It would have only helped their various businesses but they were too short sighted to see that. So now they're in charge of the rankings. Give me a break! This should be a fine mess for the American players to deal with.
 
jay helfert said:
They are talking about the Desert Shootout in Phoenix. Only half a world away from Dubia (?) where the World Eight Ball was going on. This is kind of a joke. What about ALL the Eurotour and Asian pro events that conflict with everything over here and elsewhere for that matter? Leave it to the BCA to bungle this one up.

WHERE WAS THE BCA WHEN THEY WERE ASKED TO HELP FUND A PRO TOUR? AWOL is where! Several times they had an opportunity to do something for professional pool in the USA, and they declined. This is when they were high on the hog too, with billiard sales booming. It would have only helped their various businesses but they were too short sighted to see that. So now they're in charge of the rankings. Give me a break! This should be a fine mess for the American players to deal with.
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I agree with you Jay, the hits just keep on coming.
 
Why can they just decide that they will take over ranking?

What if I want to do it? I can even write a fancier news release.
I am also going to annouce I will now be the national ranker of "hotness" in girls. All of you who need to find out if someone is a 7-10 please contact me. Any rankings lower than 7 will be handled by my understudies. All prior rankings are void, you now only "Think" you are dating a hottie unless you get a ranking from me.

Are they planning a nation-wide league, tour or what?
 
Does the BCA even mean anything to anybody? I'm not even sure what they do. As far as I know, they are just a group of profiteers...

Its kind of funny how these organizations think they are "official" :) Like they're the NBA, NFL or some other powerful group...


If I had the money, I'd bury them all...
 
hang-the-9 said:
Why can they just decide that they will take over ranking?

What if I want to do it? I can even write a fancier news release.
I am also going to annouce I will now be the national ranker of "hotness" in girls. All of you who need to find out if someone is a 7-10 please contact me. Any rankings lower than 7 will be handled by my understudies. All prior rankings are void, you now only "Think" you are dating a hottie unless you get a ranking from me.

Are they planning a nation-wide league, tour or what?
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I nominate Hang-the-9 to be the official ranker of international pool players.

Second?

~rc
 
hang-the-9 said:
I am also going to annouce I will now be the national ranker of "hotness" in girls. All of you who need to find out if someone is a 7-10 please contact me. Any rankings lower than 7 will be handled by my understudies. All prior rankings are void, you now only "Think" you are dating a hottie unless you get a ranking from me.
Click to expand...

If you need any outsourcing, second opinions, or any cinematography done, I'm you man! ;)
 
Wait for the facts

Folks,

You might wish to wait until you see the details before making assumptions. AZB, working with the BCA, has devised a points system that you just might like. A lot. For one thing, it includes more events in order to rank the players according to their consistency. And we did not reinvent the wheel. As most points systems do, we studied the ones already out there and took the best of them and tweaked it.

Contrary to the rumor that has already hit my telephone three times today, we did not go back and use events from the past as ranking tournaments that the players would not have had any idea were ranking events. That would be crap and you guys know we would not do that. We used the last five UPA ranking events so that no one would get any nasty surprises. Does this move some folks around on the list? Yes, a little. Because we only go back one year since we feel rankings should reflect current performance and not how you played in your youth.

Any players (or others) who have any questions may call me anytime during business hours at 706-413-1405. I am always available unless on the line with another caller.
 
jay helfert said:
They are talking about the Desert Shootout in Phoenix. Only half a world away from Dubia (?) where the World Eight Ball was going on. This is kind of a joke. What about ALL the Eurotour and Asian pro events that conflict with everything over here and elsewhere for that matter? Leave it to the BCA to bungle this one up.

WHERE WAS THE BCA WHEN THEY WERE ASKED TO HELP FUND A PRO TOUR? AWOL is where! Several times they had an opportunity to do something for professional pool in the USA, and they declined. This is when they were high on the hog too, with billiard sales booming. It would have only helped their various businesses but they were too short sighted to see that. So now they're in charge of the rankings. Give me a break! This should be a fine mess for the American players to deal with.
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As I understand it, the BCA was already "in charge" of the rankings - they simply deferred to other organizations, such as the UPA. In the case of the WPC, the BCA uses the UPA rankings to determine the players invited in lieu of creating their own system. I guess the BCA has finally decided to cut out the middle man and it's time to create their own ranking system.

I tried to create a ranking system on my own a few years ago, using a four major tournament system based on the system used by the WTA and ATP tennis organizations. Unfortunately, with all of the minor tours and haphazard organization, it was almost impossible to get clear statistics, so I gave up on it. In theory, the ranking system wasn't hard to devise - it was getting the data that was hard. I hope organizations like the BCA and AZBilliards can get access to better information than I can :D .

-djb
 
jay helfert said:
WHERE WAS THE BCA WHEN THEY WERE ASKED TO HELP FUND A PRO TOUR? AWOL is where! Several times they had an opportunity to do something for professional pool in the USA, and they declined. This is when they were high on the hog too, with billiard sales booming. It would have only helped their various businesses but they were too short sighted to see that. So now they're in charge of the rankings. Give me a break! This should be a fine mess for the American players to deal with.
Click to expand...

I agree, and I am unanimous in that!!!
 
Just so that everyone is aware, the UPA does NOT support this decision by the WPA to turn the rankings over to the BCA. That little fact has been left out of their nicely worded press release.
 
I say if they are taking over the rankings they better start holding tournaments. If I owned UPA I would not allow them to use any of my events for rankings. Make them start holding their own events for the players, get the sponsor money and grow like the UPA did over the last year or so. I have been watching pool from north of the border for a few years now and it seems that the U.S pool organizers love shooting them self in the foot. Too much politics and not enough pool. I like the structure of the Viking tour and love playing the Joss events. Might be time to combine some tours and get a proper system in place Screw the BCA unless they are waiting to release their big tournament plans that justify their hijacking of the player ranking.
 
A long time ago, I was curious why Earl Strickland was not inducted into the BCA's Hall of Fame. I noticed at that time, the voting members of the BCA Hall of Fame Committee consisted mainly of pool print media industry members.

In this instance, the BCA seems to be seeking out the consultation and/or advice of AzBilliards, the largest pool website on the net. It is only in an advisory capacity that the BCA is consulting with AzBilliards, at least the way I read it.

IMHO, the BCA should be faulted for handing over the authority to be the governing body of professional pool to an unknown entity. The organization suffered horrible growing pains, and some players were injured professionally because of it. However, a small minute number of American player(s) benefitted from the BCA's decision.

Frank Alvarez is left holding the bag with the UPA, trying to keep it strong. This is a major blow to the UPA, but maybe, just maybe, the BCA will listen to others in the pool industry and make the right decision.

I am not a fan of the WPA, based on a track record that seems to exclude the United States players. Yet, they hold their hand out and want to be greased by way of a sanctioning fee.

Lots of politics here. I hope it will all be sorted out, and that everyone in the end will be happy with the results. I will take a wait-and-see stance at this juncture.

JAM
 
Bca

I believe that the professional poolplayers should be the deceiding factor who has control over thier ranking system, they are the organization putting in the necessary work and money to provide tournaments for the players not the BCA. The BCA is a trade organization, not a players association.
 
The President of the UPA, Frank Alvarez, commented...I sit on the BCA/WPA committee and this topic somehow was not presented to the very player's association that is directly involved...The BCA is a trade organization and not a player's association so this not only undermines, but underestimates the wishes of our Touring Professionals. It is apparent that the UPA membership as a whole is not being treated equally or with the same respect as its counter part the Women's Professional Billiard Association (WPBA)...."

Frank Alvarez is right. If he sits on the committee of the BCA/WPA, he should have been included in the decision-making process. His voice needs to be heard.

Something is rotten in Denmark! :mad:

JAM
 
JAM said:
The BCA has announced that they are taking over the ranking system for American professional players from the UPA.

The article is on the main page with the details laid out by Ivan Lee, the BCA president.

AzBilliards was mentioned as having a hand in the new-and-improved ranking system.

What say you all about this latest bit of news?

JAM
Click to expand...

JAM,
Hmmmmmm....

Is this the same BCA that totally abdicated it's responsibility over the past 60 years to grow the game??? Let's see....no straight pool championships, no men's pro tour, no varsity sports programs at any level, little if any televised men's pool, sold off the amateur leagues. My initial thought is they are doing it out of self-interest; but I hope I'm wrong.
 
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