(part 1 of 2)
Greetings all! I thank each and every one of you for your genuine interest in this thread as it shows your passion and love for the game in which we are all brethren. It also shows that we are ALL fed up with the crooked promoters and players that came before us in the past but also more importantly, it shows we are fed up with the lack of having a large organized professional tour to call our own.
I was hoping this thread would generate more than just 3 pages of interest and response by this time, both positive and negative (I welcome all perceptions) but that’s not the reason I waited to post here. I have a lot of things on my plate currently both personally as well as professionally. That is nobody’s business but mine but I’ll share that there are 4 major personal matters I’m handling right now and henceforth had to prioritize this post full of speculation lower on the list. I have also been organizing and running not only my pool room 15-18 hours a day myself for several months with volunteer help as well, but also scheduling and running several regional tour stops and weekly tournaments GIVING OUT MONEY TO PLAYERS REGULARLY as I have been for OVER 15 YEARS. I will clear up all doubt for you all here.
NO, I haven’t made or taken a single dime.
NO, I don’t plan to anytime soon either.
NO, I haven’t seen any post on Reddit. I don’t live online.
YES, I’ve already spent 10’s of thousands of dollars out of pocket on this project.
YES, I’ve spent thousands and thousands of hours as well.
I’ll get paid with gratification when we have a successful self funded and sustaining pro tour and organization we can all be proud of.
Only when we have a product of true value can we offer sponsorship opportunities to outside companies giving them a return on their investment. Then we can then set our own price on advertising and title sponsor slots ranging from $10-$20k commercials or $500k - $1,000,000 title sponsorships on events. Until then, WE have to do it ourselves and NOT keep going in circles like this this with our hands out begging for money at every step of the way.
If I sound a bit perturbed, please excuse me as I’ve ALREADY dealt with the “similar post on Facebook” which was MUCH more slanderous and inappropriate than how it has been posted here as it listed my name and sited my personal business and livelihood, Sandcastle Billiards in the same mouthful as the terms, “total joke, bullshit, lied to, scammer” and others. As I said on Facebook I will say again here, childish immature rants on public forum are more than just inappropriate and damaging. THAT MUST ALL STOP!
I will NOT reply with professional kindness as such acts and persons don’t deserve that much in return. You get what you dish out and I will not be cyberbullied or tolerate those childish acts of lashing out in the heat of the moment. I’d much rather spend the little free time I haveworking TOWARDS creating something for everyone rather than WASTING it defending myself from outlandish accusations and being called a “scammer” by a disgruntled, uninformed, last minute entry player that DIDN’T EVEN PARTICIPATE to begin with.
I since then have messaged and chatted with the original poster here and we’ve hashed some things out and were able to move on and correspond as mature adults finally. I spent at least three hours explaining everything to him there and have no problem clarifying things here so nobody feels misled.
I assure you, no misrepresentation or misleading was ever intentional in the wording of the website. This is a simple case of lack of information posted or even at worst, a break in communication along the way from the site, myself, local tour directors and the players. That’s all.
I’m not one to throw anyone under the bus, not own up to responsibility or not fess up to imperfection. We are all human and we all make mistakes. Do you all remember a public post I made when I missed a call at the US Open/International Open when officiating a match where Billy Thorpe jumped a 6 ball to play the 2 and it brushed the top of the 6 on the way when making the 2 ball as I was eclipsed by the cue ball from my vantage point? I came online to apologize to Carlo Biado for missing that foul even though it had no bearing on the outcome of the match as they were tied 5-5 in a long race to either 11 or 13. I took it upon myself to do so even after speaking with them both after the match and after video review. Anyhow, I will take ownership of the NBL website being a bit vague on that portion as I was consulted by my NBL board attorney to not mention certain things.
The reason the top 8 payout funding was not broken down to specifics is because it blankets the entire nation. All locations and jurisdictions have different laws allowing or disallowing calcuttas, side pots and other fundraising activities. I cannot simply post the term “Calcutta” online on the site and possibly cause trouble for participating venues that are gracious enough to provide a venue for players to have access to the opportunity we are diligently working to offer players nor do I want to bring that same type of heat to a local tour director that is graciously putting in hours upon hours of sweat equity to advertise and round up players and then run the event for a full day or two.
The overall math and plan to how WE together could create a self funded and sustaining series of QUALIFIERS and quarterly tournaments (thus forming a pro league) is clearly on the site. The SPECIFICS were further explained FOR ALMOST A FULL YEAR over and over again. But before we get into that, please refer to the images below that clearly state, “WITH FULL FIELDS OF 32” NOT WEAK FIELDS OF JUST 15 PLAYERS which is a much bigger issue to address - THE LACK OF PLAYER PARTICIPATION which has been an Achilles heel to American pool for decades.
When you READ FURTHER on the site and NOT just take what you want from one small portion, it’s also stated that the “TOP 8 OUT OF 32 PLAYERS (25%) OF THE FIELD” would be paid that day. In SEVERAL podcasts, interviews and articles over the past 11 MONTHS of advertising I discussed HOW the top 8 was going to get paid. When is the ownership of DUE DILIGENCE going to be put on the player getting involved? Why NOT simply ask your local tour director for details before entering the competition? When I buy a car, I ask questions because not everything can be stated on a flyer, in a commercial OR even on a website for various reasons.
You can watch and listen to those articles, podcasts and interviews below as well. I hope I’m not asking you to do too much to be better informed. From my experience, many people don’t even read past the first sentence on a flyer for a tournament and ask for the exact info that’s stated on such. This is why I figured I’d put out some videos to explain things as well.
I’m already tired of typing on my phone with my thumbs and I’m sure many of you are tired of reading this far already. Haha I don’t blame you. In a nutshell, the top 8 places are self funded through calcuttas where allowed, side pots where allowed, or through preliminary satellite events or minis preceding the actual qualifier. The states in question could not hold such and had NO TIME to run mini satellites DUE TO COVID SHUTDOWNS. We we happy to finally be able to have SOMETHING to play in after all that time. I’m sure many understand that COVID has prevented a lot of things from happening.
SINCE the satellites were not held, money from the entries originally slated to fund the top prize package and main event prize fund was used to award 2nd - 8th in California where they had a full field of 32 players but may not host calcuttas. In ADDITION to that, I awarded $800 cash to the winner on top of the $2500 value prize package. I always make sure the right thing is done as adjustments had to be made due to circumstances beyond our control.
A side pot was held at the 15 player qualifier in Texas awarding the top 4 finishers AND I also wound up adding another $400 to that as well.
At my event in NJ, $2300 was raised in the Calcutta and I then added $500 on top to award the top 8 there.
THESE ARE FACTS OF WHAT ACTUALLY DID HAPPEN AND GOT PAID OUT.
NBL PODCASTS & INTERVIEWS
NBL PODCASTS & INTERVIEWS
Cue It Up Podcast
https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/podbean-142/cue-it-up-a-billiards-podcast
Sneaky Pete Mafia Interview
https://www.sneakypetemafia.com/post/interview-with-ed-liddawi
TNT Tournaments Interview
https://www.facebook.com/2053467221...-billiards-leaguedont-forge/3492486374142942/
NBL promo video links
Enjoy these 1 - 2 minute videos!
Welcome featured celebrity venues
Progress All Across America
NBL Strucure: How does it work?
We’re Uniting and Organizing
NBL 2021 Season 1st Quarter 10-Ball