Hypothetical Sponsorship Proposition...WWYD?

K

ktrepal85

Banned
Let say for the sake of conversation, that you won a sweepstakes that entered you into a sponsor funded study to examine your improvement over the course of 3 years.

The sponsor will be paying you $70,000/year plus any tournament entry fees and travel expenses. You must quit your current job to focus on pool.

After 3 years they will enter you into the US Open 9-ball tournament on full size tables and you and will get $500,000 for each match that you win. If you don't win any matches then the study ends and you will no longer be collecting any money. If you win at least 1 match the study will continue under better terms to be determined.

Considering this situation, what would you do to train during these 3 years? Would you hire a trainer? Would you gamble more? Would you do more drills? Would you travel to more tournaments? Would you move to a different area? What would you do to maximize your improvement over 3 years?
 
Well, for starters, I'd record myself playing against the ghost for a long while. See how I play, compare it to the big pros out there, find my flaws. What do they do that I don't?

With that in mind, I'd try to find my biggest areas of possible improvement. Do I bank considerably less well than the other pros? Do I jump too much?

I'd try much harder drills too. 9 ball ghost is too easy if you want to improve a lot. Try 15 balls ghost, 1 to 15, so much traffic that your CB placement has to be inch-perfect everytime. When you switch back to 9 ball, gonna look like child's play.

I guess that's what I would do.
 
SamLambert said:
Well, for starters, I'd record myself playing against the ghost for a long while. See how I play, compare it to the big pros out there, find my flaws. What do they do that I don't?

With that in mind, I'd try to find my biggest areas of possible improvement. Do I bank considerably less well than the other pros? Do I jump too much?

I'd try much harder drills too. 9 ball ghost is too easy if you want to improve a lot. Try 15 balls ghost, 1 to 15, so much traffic that your CB placement has to be inch-perfect everytime. When you switch back to 9 ball, gonna look like child's play.

I guess that's what I would do.
Click to expand...

Why don't you do that now? You don't need a sponsorship to do that...
 
ktrepal85 said:
Why don't you do that now? You don't need a sponsorship to do that...
Click to expand...

I guess what I should have said is : I'd try harder to improve than what I am doing now.

Right now I am mostly playing 9 ball for fun by myself and seriously trying to improve only a few days inbetween.

With a sponsorship on the table, scrap the fooling around and serious practice all year round.

But for sure, trying to participe in more tournaments would be good. Gotta learn to deal with that additional pressure!
 
Interesting exercise. I suspect most anyone who could play pool well enough to have a real shot at making any money long term would almost certainly screw up the deal long before year three came around. There is a weird sort of ratio in effect when it comes to pool skill in relation to good decision making. Generally the more there is of one, the less there is of the other.

See also: Clearys Theory of pool skill to computer literacy ratio.
 
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JCIN said:
Interesting exercise. I suspect most anyone who could play pool well enough to have a real shot at making any money long term would almost certainly screw up the deal long before year three came around. There is a weird sort of ratio in effect when it comes to pool skill in relation to good decision making. Generally the more there is of one, the less there is of the other.

See also: Clearys Theory of pool skill to computer literacy ratio.
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Care to elaborate? I'm curious as to what you mean by this.
 
The thing holding most people back is money. If all my expenses were paid and I didn't have to worry about a job, I'd probably be running every drill known to man plus races against the 15-ball ghost (if I can run all 15, I can run 9 or 10), possibly throw in some light 3-cushion and snooker to exercise other parts of my game, and entering every local tournament I possibly could. I just spent 2 hours yesterday making a google calendar of every tri-state and predator tournament through the end of the year. That's just me, though.
 
ktrepal85 said:
Let say for the sake of conversation, that you won a sweepstakes that entered you into a sponsor funded study to examine your improvement over the course of 3 years.

The sponsor will be paying you $70,000/year plus any tournament entry fees and travel expenses. You must quit your current job to focus on pool.

After 3 years they will enter you into the US Open 9-ball tournament on full size tables and you and will get $500,000 for each match that you win. If you don't win any matches then the study ends and you will no longer be collecting any money. If you win at least 1 match the study will continue under better terms to be determined.

Considering this situation, what would you do to train during these 3 years? Would you hire a trainer? Would you gamble more? Would you do more drills? Would you travel to more tournaments? Would you move to a different area? What would you do to maximize your improvement over 3 years?
Click to expand...

I, and many, many others would do this for less. But you can't look a gift horse in the mouth.
 
Okaaaay...What I would do is spend three years working on getting the US Open to go to races to 1. I would then get them to put no cap on the number of players.

Next I would recruit players to play. They would be promised $100,000 for losing a match to me.

The people running the tourney would be promised $150,000 for every match I won.

Making sure it is double elimination, I would lose my first match so I would have to play and be payed for twice as many matches.

So, the organizer and I would become multimillionaires and half the people in the tourney would walk away with $100k.

I would also ask that about $150million be put in escrow and a contract written.
 
what would you do to train during these 3 years?
Drills, tournaments, maybe some light gambling.

Would you hire a trainer?
a coach for periodic checkups, but not a full-time trainer.

Would you gamble more?
maybe. undecided.

Would you do more drills?
I would find every bit of drills and instructional material I could and practice them relentlessly.

Would you travel to more tournaments?
absolutely. I live in NYC, always a predator or tri-state on the weekend.

Would you move to a different area?
Nope. definitely no shortage of competition in NYC.


What would you do to maximize your improvement over 3 years?
On top of practicing every waking hour, entering every tournament I could and occasional gambling? Maybe some 3-cushion (or a variant with pool balls) and snooker to round it out. Maybe seek out a sports psychologist for mental game conditioning.



Is that more what you were looking for?
 
Keith Jawahir said:
The thing holding most people back is money. If all my expenses were paid and I didn't have to worry about a job, I'd probably be running every drill known to man plus races against the 15-ball ghost (if I can run all 15, I can run 9 or 10), possibly throw in some light 3-cushion and snooker to exercise other parts of my game, and entering every local tournament I possibly could. I just spent 2 hours yesterday making a google calendar of every tri-state and predator tournament through the end of the year. That's just me, though.
Click to expand...

I really wonder if that first sentence is true. I think what is holding most people back (including myself) is lack of proper fundamentals and lack of disciplined practice. How many of us, when we got a table in our place, said "I'm going to do drills all the time" (I know I did). How many of us actually did it for more than the honeymoon period and still do it?

I agree that there are some players who WOULD put in the practice time but can't because of money (they have to work etc.), but I think far more don't do it because it is hard and not fun.

Gideon<------Hates to practice, loves to play; knows he needs to practice, but rarely does.
 
Keith Jawahir said:
The thing holding most people back is money.
Click to expand...

The things holding most people back are:

-Lack of talent (there are a lot of people who can't learn).

-Lack of desire (most people don't want to put in the time)

-Abundance of common sense--which isn't saying they have much common sense, just enough to realize how stupid it is to pursue a career in any sport...unless they are extremely talented.

I know some extremely poor pool players...not having money isn't holding them back from wasting a lot of time on the tables. On the contrary, I think some of the best I know need to play so much to try to make a bit of cash.
 
GideonF said:
I really wonder if that first sentence is true. I think what is holding most people back (including myself) is lack of proper fundamentals and lack of disciplined practice. How many of us, when we got a table in our place, said "I'm going to do drills all the time" (I know I did). How many of us actually did it for more than the honeymoon period and still do it?

I agree that there are some players who WOULD put in the practice time but can't because of money (they have to work etc.), but I think far more don't do it because it is hard and not fun.

Gideon<------Hates to practice, loves to play; knows he needs to practice, but rarely does.
Click to expand...

Drilling is one of my favorite things to do. I've easily spent 8 hours putting in solid work on drills many times. The thing that helps me the most is music. Plus seeing results.

When I was first shown straight-in shots, I'd shoot about 3 racks, make about 4/15 each rack(if I was lucky), get bored and start chasing balls around the table until my buddy had to refocus me. once I started seeing how quickly I was improving, I was hooked. Just like any pool player, I hate missing. And focusing on good fundamentals has helped me miss less more than anything else I've done.
 
ElCorazonFrio said:
Okaaaay...What I would do is spend three years working on getting the US Open to go to races to 1. I would then get them to put no cap on the number of players.

Next I would recruit players to play. They would be promised $100,000 for losing a match to me.

The people running the tourney would be promised $150,000 for every match I won.

Making sure it is double elimination, I would lose my first match so I would have to play and be payed for twice as many matches.

So, the organizer and I would become multimillionaires and half the people in the tourney would walk away with $100k.

I would also ask that about $150million be put in escrow and a contract written.
Click to expand...

This guy knows wsup.
 
I'd sell my soul to the devil and ask for an eye-hand genetics transplant from Efren.

If someone has been playing for more than 5 years, and has not achieved "A" player status on their own by that time, then they simply do not have the genetic potential. No amount of training will get them there. This is my opinion, and the opinion of anyone else who favors nature over nurture:) Carry on the age old debate:)
 
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