It was common knowledge around the northeast in the late ‘90s that a young kid nicknamed Ginky was playing fantastic pool out of Amsterdam Billiards in Manhattan. Together with Tony Robles, they represented a level of the game I had never seen in person, and I knew this was the place I needed to be.
I worked in the city, but my move there had much less to do with a shorter commute than it did with needing to be around a higher level of the game. I found a shoebox-sized apartment near the room. I still remember the very first night I was on my own out there; I felt like an adult as I walked into Amsterdam, ready to introduce myself to the world. There was a big crowd around table 8, the front table. George was playing Tony an exhibition match. I was in heaven. I had never seen Tony in person before. I had seen George a few times out on Long Island. But to see them playing each other… these were the days before youtube and live streaming. It was a luxury to see pool at this level. If I was an adult when I walked in the room, I now knew what I wanted to be when I grew up.
When I finally met George about a week later, the standard game with us became a hundred fifty points or a race to 9 for twenty bucks. I’d play him and I was so nervous I couldn’t even see straight. Literally – I was running 4s, 7s, jesus sometimes 0s. It didn’t matter. I wasn’t there to beat him. I did all I could to learn, but what I remember most about those first games is watching his eyes. You could see in those eyes that you were never getting to the table. I watched his patterns and positional routes, in both 9 ball and straight pool. His decisions were flawless and, matched with his effortless execution, represented the deadliest combination of skills I’d ever seen.
We started becoming friends. One day, after playing particularly poorly against him, I tried to quit in the middle of the game. He asked why. I told him, sincerely, that he had a big tournament coming up and I didn’t want to bring his game down by playing so badly with him.
I will never, ever forget what happened next. He stopped, thought for a second, and said, “Steve, from now on, you and me don’t gamble. I’m going to help you with your game.” I remember calling my parents that night and telling them what happened. They knew how much pool meant to me, and I had told them of George and how great it was to be exposed to such a talent. What George told me that day, that he was willing to take a chance on me, meant so much to me partially because it made me proud in front of my parents.
Around this time, George was one of the people who recommended me to Greg Hunt, the owner of Amsterdam, to be placed on the comp list. This changed everything. I could now practice as much as I wanted. I knew George at this point only a couple months I would say, and he was already sticking his neck out for me. I never forgot that either.
The next several years were a whirlwind of the heydays of Amsterdam East and NYC pool in general. There was never a poolroom or a time like it. If you weren’t a part of NYC pool from about 1998 to 2004 or so, you missed an unbelievably joyous time in the game. The level of play was skyrocketing by the day… everyone was getting better. And we were all led by George.
Anyone who saw him practice during that period knows how hard he worked. He’d throw out all the balls and play straight or rotation until he missed. And once he missed… that’s when the work started. He’d take out all fifteen balls and shoot the shot over. Then he’d take the fifteen balls again and shoot it with left English. Another fifteen, right English. Top… bottom. Hard… soft. The guy was a machine. Here was a 200-ball runner who’d shoot a hanger 60 times if he missed it even once.
He was a terror on the regional tours. He wouldn’t make grown men cry… he’d make them fall apart. He’d take other northeast champions and just dismantle them. 9-2. 9-1. 9-3. If you got to five against George in those days you probably played perfectly. (For the record, Tony was the only one I saw consistently stand up to him in those days. I don’t know who got the best of who, but it was damned close and I can truthfully not say that about anyone else in the region during that period.)
I remember all the 9-ball we played. Set after set after set, back in those glorious east side days. I learned so much. That thunderous break where he’d swing his hip at the last second. The way he’d play safe. He’d lock you up and cut off your rails. This was all new in the late 90s. He became an expert at making you fight with your last ounce of strength for every single opportunity you got. Unforced errors? Forget about it. You’d have more luck praying for a rain delay.
As his game took off, we became better and better friends. We went to Atlantic City a lot in those days, Gina and me, George and his then-girlfriend Casey. It was like a double-date for degenerates. He would drive us all down, and Gina and I would say silent prayers in the backseat that cops would shoot the tires out so he’d have to stop. It was that scary driving with him, lol. I remember hitting over 100mph when there were lots of other cars on the highway. I’d get out of the car finally and want to kiss the ground, but I didn’t want to show weakness in front of my hero.
You’d see him do things from time to time which were puzzling. Here was a guy who could be cut-your-throat-ruthless on the table. Then, sometimes, he’d take the hundred bucks or whatever that he scuffled up in the room, and just give it to a homeless guy. There was a guy in the poolroom who used to argue with George all the time. He wasn’t even a pool player. He played Megatouch, of all things, and sometimes he and George would match up at some royal flash. He had lost his job a while back and was living with his parents. He wore the same clothes, over and over, until they kind of stunk. I found out one day that George brought in a bag full of clothes to give to the guy. They weren’t new, but they were nice. And he didn’t do it in a way that would embarrass the guy; he did it privately. He was so kind to the unfortunate. I always wondered where that sensitivity came from, that unbelievable sense of empathy, and I never felt right asking him. I wish I had.
He was one of only two players who I would ever let scold me, if I did something wrong or thought a wrong way about something. He was only a few years older than I but in some ways he was like a parent to me about the game. I remember in Valley Forge, the year I came in 2nd in the huge amateur tournament, I spoke with him before the finals. He asked me how I felt. I knew that he wanted me to be confident, so I said “I feel like I’m going to win.” He stopped me and sternly said “Steve, I don’t wanna ever hear you tell me you’re going to win. I want to hear that you’re going to play well. That is all you can control. If you play well, the rest will come.” He was right. In pool, he was always right.
I will never forget all our talks about my game. He did all he could to convince me I could play, and I kept trying to convince him I couldn’t. It’d be funny if it weren’t sad. I honestly think I had him pulling his hair out. The perseverance he showed, in never giving up on me, will stay with me forever.
I remember around that time I came home from being out one night, and there on our answering machine was a call from George. “Hey Lip Rogers, Miss Kim… I finally did it. I snapped it off! I won the tournament!” He was talking about his first ever pro victory, in Olathe Kansas I believe. He didn’t even try to hide his giddiness. That’s what I loved about him. He drank in all of life’s joys. He was so proud of what he had accomplished.
9/11 affected him deeply. He was at the US Open, and it was the first year I didn’t go in a while. I was in constant contact with Nicky, who he was rooming with, and he told me that George watched all the coverage silently in his hotel room. They had tried to tear his city apart, this city he loved so much, and he wanted to help in any way he could. So he started a donation fund right there at the convention center. I believe he collected about $6,000 in cash and as soon as he got back to NYC he just walked into the local firehouse and quietly gave them the money. He didn’t want any fanfare for it, or even thanks. In his mind, he was saying thanks.
A few years later, I remember being somewhere with George, in a room with a piano and someone playing it. George sidled right up to the guy and just watched. He watched a master, as only another master could. He had such a deep understanding of what it took to be an expert at something, that even though he didn't know how to play the piano, he now knew what it took to play the piano. How many of us can truly understand something so foreign, like he did that day? He was so gifted, so talented.
In the end, I realize only now how much more I could have done for him. Not just towards the end but throughout our time together. He gave me so much, he gave us all so much back in those celebrated care-free days of NYC pool.
This last Monday night, he was in the room and it was mobbed. I was playing my straight pool league match on one of the front tables, and he grabbed one of the chairs and just watched. I loved when he watched me play. Earlier in the game, I had run exactly 100 and he found out and told me nice shooting. And he just sat and watched the rest. When it was over, I packed up and went to the restroom. When i came out, I had two choices - I could fight my way through the mob and say goodbye to him, or I could slink out the other way. I went the other way. I thought there would be other days, other hellos, other goodbyes. In this case, there wasn't, and I hate myself for that selfish choice I made that night. He gave me so much, he deserved a goodbye.
I pray he knows how much he affected me, and all of us in NYC, and all those players in the world he touched. There is a part of him in every ball I’ll ever make.
- Steve
