Latest News from Deno re:Qualifiers

[rackmsuckr]

IPT Qualification Tournaments

The 2006 International Pool Tour Season is about to start! The first two events of the season are “open” tournaments where players can qualify to participate through the qualification system. There are going to be 150 qualification tournaments played in 2006 (breakdown below) and even non-IPT players can qualify to win their share of well over $8 million in prize money and accrue ranking points making it very possible to qualify for a 2007 Tour Card, which guarantees each IPT player in 2007 a minimum of $100,000 in earnings!

The IPT has hosted five very successful qualification tournaments already in 2006. Four of these events were held in the U.S. and one in The Netherlands. Each of these events drew strong crowds of fans, the best players, and received great coverage in the local media. These tournaments were very high profile and the level of play was said, by many players, to have been stronger than many world championships! Room owners welcomed the crowds, who in turn were delighted to see so many top players competing. In locations where we hosted events, there is still a strong buzz about the IPT events. If you did not follow along on line, you may still view pictures, stories, and results from these events at www.internationalpooltour.com.

If you own or manage a venue in North America, U.K., Mainland Europe, Asia, Australia/New Zealand, or elsewhere and would like to be one of the select rooms in the world to be chosen to host an event (or more), now is the time to contact the IPT. If you know of a room that would like to host an event, please have them contact the IPT immediately. Here is a breakdown of the events to be held in 2006:

The North American Open (July 2006) will host the full 150 IPT player roster plus 50 players who will qualify from 25 qualification tournaments throughout the world. These qualification tournaments will be held between late April-June. Keep in mind, only 25 rooms in the world will be chosen to host qualification tournaments for this round.

The World Open (September 2006) will also host the full 150 IPT player roster plus 50 players who will qualify from 25 qualification tournaments throughout the world. These qualification tournaments will be held between late June-July. Again, only 25 rooms will host this round of qualification tournaments with each continent having only a small number of tournaments.

The 2007 IPT Tour Card Qualification Tournament (December 2006) will include the bottom 50 IPT players who are eliminated from the tour plus 200 players who will qualify from 100 qualification tournaments throughout the world. These events will be taking place between September-early December 2006. One hundred of the best venues around the world will host this final round of qualification events.

This is your chance to be a part of history. If you would like to host one or more events throughout the year, you need to contact the IPT Event Planning Department as soon as possible by emailing Kimberly Spies at:

kspies@internationalpooltour.com

Please include your name, room name, location, all telephone numbers an email addresses at which you can be reached. The IPT will contact you shortly thereafter to discuss the details of the events. Do not hesitate to contact us if you would like to be considered as a host location for these events.

I look forward to seeing your name on the list of host rooms.

Deno

 

[sixpack]

IPT Qualification Tournaments

The 2006 International Pool Tour Season is about to start! The first two events of the season are “open” tournaments where players can qualify to participate through the qualification system. There are going to be 150 qualification tournaments played in 2006 (breakdown below) and even non-IPT players can qualify to win their share of well over $8 million in prize money and accrue ranking points making it very possible to qualify for a 2007 Tour Card, which guarantees each IPT player in 2007 a minimum of $100,000 in earnings!

The IPT has hosted five very successful qualification tournaments already in 2006. Four of these events were held in the U.S. and one in The Netherlands. Each of these events drew strong crowds of fans, the best players, and received great coverage in the local media. These tournaments were very high profile and the level of play was said, by many players, to have been stronger than many world championships! Room owners welcomed the crowds, who in turn were delighted to see so many top players competing. In locations where we hosted events, there is still a strong buzz about the IPT events. If you did not follow along on line, you may still view pictures, stories, and results from these events at www.internationalpooltour.com.

If you own or manage a venue in North America, U.K., Mainland Europe, Asia, Australia/New Zealand, or elsewhere and would like to be one of the select rooms in the world to be chosen to host an event (or more), now is the time to contact the IPT. If you know of a room that would like to host an event, please have them contact the IPT immediately. Here is a breakdown of the events to be held in 2006:

The North American Open (July 2006) will host the full 150 IPT player roster plus 50 players who will qualify from 25 qualification tournaments throughout the world. These qualification tournaments will be held between late April-June. Keep in mind, only 25 rooms in the world will be chosen to host qualification tournaments for this round.

The World Open (September 2006) will also host the full 150 IPT player roster plus 50 players who will qualify from 25 qualification tournaments throughout the world. These qualification tournaments will be held between late June-July. Again, only 25 rooms will host this round of qualification tournaments with each continent having only a small number of tournaments.

The 2007 IPT Tour Card Qualification Tournament (December 2006) will include the bottom 50 IPT players who are eliminated from the tour plus 200 players who will qualify from 100 qualification tournaments throughout the world. These events will be taking place between September-early December 2006. One hundred of the best venues around the world will host this final round of qualification events.

This is your chance to be a part of history. If you would like to host one or more events throughout the year, you need to contact the IPT Event Planning Department as soon as possible by emailing Kimberly Spies at:

kspies@internationalpooltour.com

Please include your name, room name, location, all telephone numbers an email addresses at which you can be reached. The IPT will contact you shortly thereafter to discuss the details of the events. Do not hesitate to contact us if you would like to be considered as a host location for these events.

I look forward to seeing your name on the list of host rooms.

Deno

I hope there's one in the Bay Area this time!

RC

 

[TheOne]

Now I know why Deno didn't reply, we now know that the IPT doesn't listen to the players and are only interested in revenue.

I'm totally gobsmacked, what happened to the 50 end of year qualifiers, its now 200 (players)!!!

Interesting that there's one glaring omission - entry fees!!!

If each qualifier for the open events is $1000 then the IPT is effectively nothing more than what we have had throughout history, a tour funded by the players, just on a grander scale.

Hmmm, lets be conservative, 150 tournaments x 32 entries at a $1000 a pop = approx $5million bucks. This is assuming the end of year quals will be 1k, Im guessing given the 100k guaranteed that the end of year quals will be 5k per man.

Great Marketing of course, this is exactly what others have tried to do and failed, million dollar tournaments based on large entry fees. The only difference is the man running the show has the cash and splashed out a few hundred grand to sell the dream. Quite a few players bought the dream for around 10k+, I wonder how many will keep chasing the carrot?

 

[Colin Colenso]

I also noticed that all qualifiers will get ranking points for the 2006 season. This makes it pretty hard for them, but I expect maybe 10-15 of them can sneek into the top 100 for the year based on just 1 good performance.

Therefore, of the 150 current members, probably 60-65 of them will be eliminated. That would require an adjustment in the numbers at the 2007 qualifier field.

As for the 50 qualifying events coming up soon, it's hard to imagine they'll get more than 10 players enter each event. Perhaps if they get the KOTH broadcast widely pretty soon, that will attract a whole new set of wanabees.

The model is looking more like poker, but I'm not so sure thousands will be willing to try their luck at pool, as they have in poker. I guess we'll see.

 

[thebestpoolroom]

Now I know why Deno didn't reply, we now know that the IPT doesn't listen to the players and are only interested in revenue.

I'm totally gobsmacked, what happened to the 50 end of year qualifiers, its now 200 (players)!!!

Interesting that there's one glaring omission - entry fees!!!

If each qualifier for the open events is $1000 then the IPT is effectively nothing more than what we have had throughout history, a tour funded by the players, just on a grander scale.

Hmmm, lets be conservative, 150 tournaments x 32 entries at a $1000 a pop = approx $5million bucks. This is assuming the end of year quals will be 1k, Im guessing given the 100k guaranteed that the end of year quals will be 5k per man.

Great Marketing of course, this is exactly what others have tried to do and failed, million dollar tournaments based on large entry fees. The only difference is the man running the show has the cash and splashed out a few hundred grand to sell the dream. Quite a few players bought the dream for around 10k+, I wonder how many will keep chasing the carrot?

Hummmmm, would Efren agree to this statement?

 

[jay helfert]

Now I know why Deno didn't reply, we now know that the IPT doesn't listen to the players and are only interested in revenue.

I'm totally gobsmacked, what happened to the 50 end of year qualifiers, its now 200 (players)!!!

Interesting that there's one glaring omission - entry fees!!!

If each qualifier for the open events is $1000 then the IPT is effectively nothing more than what we have had throughout history, a tour funded by the players, just on a grander scale.

Hmmm, lets be conservative, 150 tournaments x 32 entries at a $1000 a pop = approx $5million bucks. This is assuming the end of year quals will be 1k, Im guessing given the 100k guaranteed that the end of year quals will be 5k per man.

Great Marketing of course, this is exactly what others have tried to do and failed, million dollar tournaments based on large entry fees. The only difference is the man running the show has the cash and splashed out a few hundred grand to sell the dream. Quite a few players bought the dream for around 10k+, I wonder how many will keep chasing the carrot?

Tap Tap Tap

 

[TheOne]

Hummmmm, would Efren agree to this statement?

I suspect he might if he wasn't handpicked and was on the outside looking in? I bet the current DOUBLE WORLD CHAMPION Mr Wu isn't exectly excited by the whole thing now is he? Oh wait silly me, Wu didn't fill in a nicely worded application did he so its his own the fault Just because he's currently one of the greatest players on the planet and IS NOT on the International Pool Tour playing Real Pool for Real Money is his own fault!

I said it before and I'll say it again, is there any doubt that the IPT qualification system has been a spectacular failure?

 

[Jimmy M.]

As for the 50 qualifying events coming up soon, it's hard to imagine they'll get more than 10 players enter each event.

Huh?? 10 players per qualifier? What makes you estimate so low? They just got around 80 players in two of the qualifiers here and that was at $2000 a whack. I've spoke to quite a few players who, while they weren't willing to put up $2000, are already planning on putting up $1000 per qualifier.

 

[Colin Colenso]

Huh?? 10 players per qualifier? What makes you estimate so low? They just got around 80 players in two of the qualifiers here and that was at $2000 a whack. I've spoke to quite a few players who, while they weren't willing to put up $2000, are already planning on putting up $1000 per qualifier.

Each of those other qualifiers had a week or so to promote, had a much bigger reward (IPT2006 member card) and it comprised many of the same people. With 50 events they'll be going every day or 10 around the world on a single weekend. Unless they can really pick up the marketing to attract a lot of new people, it will be hard to get large fields.

I'll be surprised if they get 30+ average per qualifier, but if they do, it will be significant revenue and probably good news for the future of the IPT.

 

[jjinfla]

I
I said it before and I'll say it again, is there any doubt that the IPT qualification system has been a spectacular failure?

A failure? In your dreams.

How the IPT was able to pull off these 5 qualifiers and get 40+ players to cough up $2,000 each is amazing. In fact I think it was a well executed advertising strategy. Well, KT did hire the best, and it shows.

And yes, selecting players that everyone can point to and say, "I am way better than him/her" is a masterful strategy to entice players to want to qualify. And of course the money is nice too. Even if Mike Sigel said he didn't care about the money, he just "wanted the trophy".

So now we will have something to look forward to during April-June.

As far as only 10 players showing up? Bunk. There will be more than 10 "B" players chomping at the bit to try and qualify at each event.

As far as the IPT, KT and Natural Cures, making money on this tour. Well, Duh, tell me what enterprise out there doesn't want to make money? KT has publicly stated at the onset that he hopes to make a lot of money with the tour. But, the more he makes, the more the players make.

Like Nick Varner has stated, this tour is what professional pool players have been hoping for ever since they first picked up a cue stick.

Name one Tour that is operating right now that is not trying to make money.

Jake

 

[TheOne]

A failure? In your dreams.

How the IPT was able to pull off these 5 qualifiers and get 40+ players to cough up $2,000 each is amazing. In fact I think it was a well executed advertising strategy. Well, KT did hire the best, and it shows.

And yes, selecting players that everyone can point to and say, "I am way better than him/her" is a masterful strategy to entice players to want to qualify. And of course the money is nice too. Even if Mike Sigel said he didn't care about the money, he just "wanted the trophy".

So now we will have something to look forward to during April-June.

As far as only 10 players showing up? Bunk. There will be more than 10 "B" players chomping at the bit to try and qualify at each event.

As far as the IPT, KT and Natural Cures, making money on this tour. Well, Duh, tell me what enterprise out there doesn't want to make money? KT has publicly stated at the onset that he hopes to make a lot of money with the tour. But, the more he makes, the more the players make.

Like Nick Varner has stated, this tour is what professional pool players have been hoping for ever since they first picked up a cue stick.

Name one Tour that is operating right now that is not trying to make money.

Jake

Hi Jake, nice to see you're still wearing those glasses

I guess it depends on your definition on failure, for me I want to see the best players in the world on the IPT. If somebody sat down and said right I'm going to start a new tour in whatever sport. There are currently world champions and various ranking lists around the world but no world tour as such. We've got 6 months to select the players and we can use whatever format we want.

If after all this effort the current world champion, and a host of other world class players where not on the list I seriously doubt it could be called anything else but a failure, oh ok you win, a spectacular cockup maybe?

 

[thewolfman]

A failure? In your dreams.

How the IPT was able to pull off these 5 qualifiers and get 40+ players to cough up $2,000 each is amazing. In fact I think it was a well executed advertising strategy. Well, KT did hire the best, and it shows.

I hate to disagree but I think a close look at the qualifiers shows anything but a well executed advertising strategy. A high percentage of players played in more than one qualifier. Considering the prize for winning these qualifiers was a place on a tour promising more prize money than any other before it, any moderately successful advertising plan should have resulted in more interest than was shown.

And yes, selecting players that everyone can point to and say, "I am way better than him/her" is a masterful strategy to entice players to want to qualify. And of course the money is nice too. Even if Mike Sigel said he didn't care about the money, he just "wanted the trophy".

An interesting use of the word "Masterful", surely, it is in KT interest to have the best players in the tour rather than selecting players who are not of the highest standard. In fact, the only reason I can see for enticing players to attempt to qualify in the way you state above would be to fleese some players, who are not good enough to complete with the best in the world, of their $2000.

As far as only 10 players showing up? Bunk. There will be more than 10 "B" players chomping at the bit to try and qualify at each event.

How many "B" players turned up to the tour qualifiers? Unless the entry fee is proportionatly less for the upcoming qualifiers I cant see the number of participants being that high.

As far as the IPT, KT and Natural Cures, making money on this tour. Well, Duh, tell me what enterprise out there doesn't want to make money? KT has publicly stated at the onset that he hopes to make a lot of money with the tour. But, the more he makes, the more the players make.

On a venture like the IPT a large proportion of income will come from TV income and product sponsorship. Considering it seems that the main sponsor seems to be KT's own Natural Cures. is it unreasonable to hope that the cost of the qualifers will be reduced in the future and that reduction to be subsidised by the extra income Natural Cures accrues due to it's advertising on the IPT brand?

 

[onepocketchump]

I suspect he might if he wasn't handpicked and was on the outside looking in? I bet the current DOUBLE WORLD CHAMPION Mr Wu isn't exectly excited by the whole thing now is he? Oh wait silly me, Wu didn't fill in a nicely worded application did he so its his own the fault Just because he's currently one of the greatest players on the planet and IS NOT on the International Pool Tour playing Real Pool for Real Money is his own fault!

I said it before and I'll say it again, is there any doubt that the IPT qualification system has been a spectacular failure?

That's exactly right. The fact that WU is not on the IPT is solely due to the FACT that an application was submitted for him coupled with his inability to win a qualifier.

I disagree with you that the qualifier system is a failure as it has been played to date. The tournaments will go as planned even if only two people show up to each qualifier.

Trudeau has done something that NO OTHER PROMOTER has done with a tour, at least to my knowledge. He put the money up front and paid out up front. The tournament in July will happen whether any more money comes in via the qualifiers or not. The 150 players who are on tour this year will share in the prize money regardless of whether another player makes it or not.

Sorry you don't liek the system. It is what it is. Like Alex Pagulayan said, "if I am not good enough to win a qualifier then maybe I don't deserve to be on the IPT anyway."

John

 

[onepocketchump]

Hi Jake, nice to see you're still wearing those glasses

I guess it depends on your definition on failure, for me I want to see the best players in the world on the IPT. If somebody sat down and said right I'm going to start a new tour in whatever sport. There are currently world champions and various ranking lists around the world but no world tour as such. We've got 6 months to select the players and we can use whatever format we want.

If after all this effort the current world champion, and a host of other world class players where not on the list I seriously doubt it could be called anything else but a failure, oh ok you win, a spectacular cockup maybe?

And, if Kevin had come out six months ago and said he was going to start a tour with 8 million in prize money and to select the players he was going to host 75 qualifiers where 2 each got a tour card then you would have lambasted him for that.

The truth is that you are on the outside looking in and you probably doubt your own ability to qualify.

It is possible that Wu wouldn't make it on tour if he had to qualify in 75 qualifiers. In Diving I can name several world class divers who won a title or two in their career but never lived up to the promise they showed.

Had Kevin announced grand plans with nothing to show but promises then he wouldn't have had ten people in the qualifiers so far. As it is there are plenty of people who are willing to mix it up. Myself included. I can throw away $1000 to see if I can make it to the big show. Hopefully there will be a lot of smaller events with qualifier entries as prizes. I will probably try to organize a few myself.

And Craig, please don't cry for all the "broke" pool players. Pool players have more money flow through their hands in the space of a few years than most people earn in a lifetime. Any good player can find backers for these events if they haven't screwed everybody around them already.

Wu can afford to play his way onto the IPT and THEN he will show us that, like ALEX, he deserves it.

John

 

[ScottW]

Linda -

Where'd that text in your original post come from? I'm not finding it on the IPT site. I'd like to forward a link to a couple of local rooms, to see if they're interested...

 

[thebestpoolroom]

I suspect he might if he wasn't handpicked and was on the outside looking in? I bet the current DOUBLE WORLD CHAMPION Mr Wu isn't exectly excited by the whole thing now is he? Oh wait silly me, Wu didn't fill in a nicely worded application did he so its his own the fault Just because he's currently one of the greatest players on the planet and IS NOT on the International Pool Tour playing Real Pool for Real Money is his own fault!

I said it before and I'll say it again, is there any doubt that the IPT qualification system has been a spectacular failure?

It's not KT's fault if someone didn't fill out an application. If you didn't apply, that means that you don't want to be on the tour. Wu and some other world champions did not apply! If they had applied, they would have been selected without a doubt.

It is now much tougher to be qualified to play in the tour. Look at Wu, he tried 2 times and didn't do too well in either one. On the other hand, any thing can happen in these qualifiers. For example, say Wu wins a qualifier to play in the $3 million event, if he happens to win that tournament, he will be in the top 50 money earner; thus, be a tour member in 07.

The money is there. If you think you are a great pool player, prove to everyone that you belong there. Live your dream!

 

[Snapshot9]

Didn't Wu

already lose in 2 of the qualifiers already? If, in fact, he is the real deal,
he will rise to the top.

Fact is, in the WPC, he probably played the best of his life and had a good run, and in the world 8 ball, it was a soft field because of location of the event.

And I don't care who you are, at 16, 17 now, you do not know all there is
to know about the game.

 

[Timberly]

Linda -

Where'd that text in your original post come from? I'm not finding it on the IPT site. I'd like to forward a link to a couple of local rooms, to see if they're interested...

It's probably an email. IPT members get the low down before the rest of the world.

 

[rackmsuckr]

It's probably an email. IPT members get the low down before the rest of the world.

Yes, it was a copy and paste from an email. I was assuming that it was a general email sent to their general mailing list, as it has nothing pertinent only to members. Scott, you can sign up for informational emails such as these on their website, www.internationalpooltour.com. Please feel free to spread it to other poolrooms so they can contact the IPT to host a qualifying tournament.

Thanks,

Linda

 

[jjinfla]

It's probably an email. IPT members get the low down before the rest of the world.

I received one too.

Did you sign up with them to receive info? It is right there on their home page.

Jake