I am about to mention two aspects of billiards and pool which I have never seen mentioned before because I think dealing with them may gain a wider public for pool.
Pool is not a manly game.
There. I’ve said it. Pool doesn’t require muscle strength or physical contact. You don’t get to crash into your opponent. Nobody goes to the ER after the match. Putting pool before the public is like trying to turn an international piano competition into mass entertainment. The only really manly thing pool players do is, after winning a tournament, sometimes jump on the table and laughably pretend to be a great ape. “Here, hold my beer“ is secretly written on the heart of every man. There is, however, no need for anyone to hold your beer when you shoot pool. You can just set it on the rail.
We think of pool as being masculine because of its historical associations. But only the competitiveness and the risk taking of the associated gambling were really manly. Manliness is about speed and force and danger. Pool is about small muscles and eye hand coordination. One of the thrills of pre-league pool was the demi monde flavor. There was a reason “The Hustler” was in black and white and not color. But none of that was part of the substance of the game. It was all extraneous.
Consider for a second how you would react if someone came to you and said he had two business propositions. One is investing in a network series about men who quilt. The other is for a series about a group of men who have no common language trying to build a cottage. I think you would leap on the second, precisely because there is a chance someone could go to the ER.
So, to get to the second point, how to account for the immense popularity of snooker in Britain. ( I have to confess that I could have never imagined anyone could make such a repetitive game popular. Anyone for popularizing balkline billiards? ) I think personalities made the game, and the broadcasting included interviews with the competitors, who turned out to have remarkable personalities. There were the good, the bad, and the ugly. There was Jimmy “The Whirlwind” White and Alex “Hurricane” Higgins. They lived up to their names. There was Dennis Taylor, the Welshman who survived having a coal mine cave in on him and then worked as a physically imposing figure after that as a policeman. And he, like the first two, could tell a story and hold an audience. Think Ronnie Allen grafted onto Willy Mosconi. Then Barry Hearn got lucky with the “good,” the nice young men you wouldn’t mind your daughter bringing home to Thanksgiving dinner. Paul Jones and Stephen Hendry. And it turned out they could both talk. Pool is going to have to have some spice added to the actual game itself, because the game itself is like watching pianists practise scales. Joshua Filler and Lee Van Corteza won’t make pool fly no matter how well they play. Dennis Hatch, Alex Pagulayan, and Fedor Gorst just might.
