Warning --- this post is long. No offense will be taken if you hit the brakes now.
Yeah, it was pretty cool when Sigel walked in with Ortmann, with whom he had just dined. It reminded me of the good old days at the Golden Q twenty five years ago when it was not a rare occurrence that two pros walked in unexpectedly to shoot some. Hohmann and several other stars of the game followed shortly.
Still, the gallery belonged to Sigel. Nostroke and I were quick to find a couple of good seats to watch Sigel. Craig Riley (TheOne) and Zion Zvi stopped practicing together to watch, too.
I was somewhat amused by the fact that Sigel, whom I've never known well, but who knows me as an old friend of Irving Crane and as one of the game's most enduring fans, took the trouble to tell me before he began his practice that he'd had a drink or two over dinner, and that he hadn't been overly keen on coming by Amsterdam for a practice but that dinner buddy Ortmann talked him into it. Still, Mike hit them pretty sporty in his practice, which was not one in which he really tried to run balls, as he moved balls around from time to time. His mechanics looked much more solid than in the televised match against Loree Jon.
Mike probably practiced for about 45 minutes, and when he finished, he and I had a long chat.
Mike, who seemed to be in a really good mood, conversed with a lot of energy and enthusiasm.
For about ten minutes, Mike and I reflected on some of the more memorable matches I'd seen him play in his prime, even on specific shots at times.
Subsequently, the subject turned, for a few minutes, to the IPT King of the Hill event in Orlando. Mike confessed he'd been rooting for Manalo to beat Efren to make it to the finals, but then gave Manalo a rave review as a "guy who will be very tough to beat" in future IPT events. He also spoke of how tough it was to play Efren "cold," meaning without having played a single match up to that point. Finally, he spoke quite highly of Karen Corr's effort in the King of the Hill event, which I thought was very classy.
Then, what I found to be the most interesting part of our chat, followed. Mike was eager to compare the playing conditions of today to those of yesteryear, especially in the presence of somebody he knew remembered the good old days well. I found we were on the exact same page on this subject. We agreed that with slower cloth and tighter pockets, straight pool is a completely different game, most notably when it came to breaking the pack at the beginning of each rack. We reflected on how much harder the break shot had to be hit back then and how, even then, only a few balls might come into play. We agreed that this made it critical to get tight shape on the break shots, and that the only way to do so was through exceptional pattern play. We also agreed that those having a more powerful stroke had a bigger edge back then relative to others, and that the switch to Simonis cloth greatly devalued this advantage. In fact, he made the truly memorable remark that once Simonis became the standard, "all of a sudden, there were a lot of guys who played like me."
Most of all, Mike was very friendly and seemed very excited to be here for the tournament. I wish him every success and appreciate that he spent over twenty minutes conversing with me.
Where has the time gone? It was just twenty eight years ago that my friend Irving Crane introduced me to Mike, calling him a "player to watch.' Turned out to be a major understatement!
~~~~~~~~ Take that.
