Made it to Vegas for Mcup 🧡🧡

[Rusty in Montana]

Be careful fat boy this morning when i woke up it was -11 below zero ha ha
Walk a little faster then you won't notice the cold quite as much .

You may see my friend Todd there wearing a Brother's Billiards shirt or hat he's another good guy from Montana .

 

[Fatboy]

 

[Fatboy]

Our bench

SVB won the lag. Broke dry.

 

[Fatboy]

SVB scored first point

Let’s hope he scores the last point

 

[hotelyorba]

View attachment 673353
Our bench

SVB won the lag. Broke dry.

Did Oscar borrow Shane's shoes?

Verstuurd vanaf mijn SM-T860 met Tapatalk

 

[Guy Manges]

You wearing your orange 5 tee s...

 

[telinoz]

It would be cool if Fatboy did some interviews.
Even better if the MIC was a Orange 5 Ball.

 

[Fatboy]

Day 1

Wow was that fun!

Lots has changed with the Mcup. I haven’t been to one since it was at the Trop back in 2017 best I can recall. I could be off on that.

What’s changed?

The most notable change was the rail or the fans. People were fired up in the best way possible. Home court was a huge edge for europe at York Hall. We have that now. The venue was good.

The table is a bit far off and the monitors are way to small and the lag between real time and what was on the screens was bad-that’s about the only complaint I have l-other than the obvious 500 pound elephant in the room. The wrong color balls(which people who don’t know me were complaining about-I observed)

I have a horrible headache-I’m going to make some bullet points here of things I observed and some I spoke to with the guys I was sitting with Billy Thorp was among the guys. Fun times! It was by far the most entertaining Mcup in America I’ve ever been to by a mile. It was just great entertainment.

Earl seemed to be in his best mood I’ve seen in years.

SVB has became the player captain when he’s out there. He hushed up a problem in the audience, he took the bull by the horns and was clearly the alpha.

Sky missed an easy 9 and was able to turn the page and win his match like a champion. None of the ghosts non-sense we have been plagued with for a good while.

I have good things to say about everyone. Tyler Oscar as well.

Biggest credit imo goes to JJ he’s got those guys as a team on the same sheet of music. He gets as much credit as anyone. I’ve always lied his style. In Bonus Ball he was a great captain. He is now. It ain’t easy either.

The whole thing had a bigger budget feel to it and more corporate. But that’s not a knock-it’s organized by smart people who are getting the live venue right(mostly). Emily is the real deal. I didn’t speak with her, possibly I will. She’s done one hell of a job. The wrong color balls are still a blunder but the good she and her crew and who ever else far exceeds the wrong color balls. Which I still believe will be resolved.

The score 3-1 could easily be 1-3 as 2 matches went hill/hill. This is far from over, lots of great pool to come. Will be fun being there. However I was wrong thinking we were 2-1 dogs. After what I saw today-we have a big chance. The music they chose clearly favors USA and that got the crowd and players fired up. The vibe and the tide felt right-Thorp and I were talking about that & he knows pool better than I do.

I’m going back to my headache now.

I never get headaches……wtf!!?!?

Also saw some AZB friends there. Was wonderful! Man I love pool, family

I’ll post a pic or 2 here tmr. I think we have a good chance with the momentum we have now. I didn’t see anything I didn’t like about how our team handled anything. If I did I’d say so. I won’t water down my thoughts here.

On location,
Fatboy

 

[rexus31]

Day 1

Wow was that fun!

Lots has changed with the Mcup. I haven’t been to one since it was at the Trop back in 2017 best I can recall. I could be off on that.

What’s changed?

The most notable change was the rail or the fans. People were fired up in the best way possible. Home court was a huge edge for europe at York Hall. We have that now. The venue was good.

The table is a bit far off and the monitors are way to small and the lag between real time and what was on the screens was bad-that’s about the only complaint I have l-other than the obvious 500 pound elephant in the room. The wrong color balls(which people who don’t know me were complaining about-I observed)

I have a horrible headache-I’m going to make some bullet points here of things I observed and some I spoke to with the guys I was sitting with Billy Thorp was among the guys. Fun times! It was by far the most entertaining Mcup in America I’ve ever been to by a mile. It was just great entertainment.

Earl seemed to be in his best mood I’ve seen in years.

SVB has became the player captain when he’s out there. He hushed up a problem in the audience, he took the bull by the horns and was clearly the alpha.

Sky missed an easy 9 and was able to turn the page and win his match like a champion. None of the ghosts non-sense we have been plagued with for a good while.

I have good things to say about everyone. Tyler Oscar as well.

Biggest credit imo goes to JJ he’s got those guys as a team on the same sheet of music. He gets as much credit as anyone. I’ve always lied his style. In Bonus Ball he was a great captain. He is now. It ain’t easy either.

The whole thing had a bigger budget feel to it and more corporate. But that’s not a knock-it’s organized by smart people who are getting the live venue right(mostly). Emily is the real deal. I didn’t speak with her, possibly I will. She’s done one hell of a job. The wrong color balls are still a blunder but the good she and her crew and who ever else far exceeds the wrong color balls. Which I still believe will be resolved.

The score 3-1 could easily be 1-3 as 2 matches went hill/hill. This is far from over, lots of great pool to come. Will be fun being there. However I was wrong thinking we were 2-1 dogs. After what I saw today-we have a big chance. The music they chose clearly favors USA and that got the crowd and players fired up. The vibe and the tide felt right-Thorp and I were talking about that & he knows pool better than I do.

I’m going back to my headache now.

I never get headaches……wtf!!?!?

Also saw some AZB friends there. Was wonderful! Man I love pool, family

I’ll post a pic or 2 here tmr. I think we have a good chance with the momentum we have now. I didn’t see anything I didn’t like about how our team handled anything. If I did I’d say so. I won’t water down my thoughts here.

On location,
Fatboy

Good write up. I was there in 2019 when it was at The Monte Carlo. It was LOUD.

 

[Fatboy]

Day 2

Wow, this is the most fun I e ever had at a Mcup in America ever. And tops London 2012-that was a fun one we didn’t win.

Saw Jay again today. He’s the other man on the scene taking notes and we had a nice talk about what we saw on day 1. We agreed on everything-not unusual for that to happen. Jay and I usually see the same thing. He’s a better writer than I am and he will be doing updates. Maybe they have been published. I’m not sure when. What ever he writes is going to be top notch and accurate.

We both agreed the crowd this year is the absolute best one for America ever. Billy Thorpe has really done a brilliant job of getting and keeping the crowd fired up. There are other people there doing great work as well. The vibe is just fun!!! Wow. I’ve been to a million pool tourneys and this is mite be the most fun I’ve had at any one of them. It’s not purest pool ever-but the entertainment value is high.

I saw Stu today and didn’t have a chance to go say hello. He’s the all time greatest rail bird and I’m looking forward to his opinion if this event. Hopefully I can see him tmr.

As far as the matches today. I was so happy to see Earl go up 3-0. The place would have exploded had he won. Earl let his stroke out on the 6 and scratched. After that it went bad for him. A few bad rolls and over cutting the 8 twice. Everyone was behind him it seemed and still was a wonderful moment in pool history to see a living legend playing and playing well against a guy who just ran 700 balls a few months ago. Being there for that will be a life long memory for me-no matter the result.

Tyler missed an easy 6 in the side. It happens, he’s played very solid otherwise. I don’t know him, never met him but he’s certainly a monster player and is there to win.

Sky winning the last match was great. Imo he’s MVP at this point should we win. That could change. But he’s solid, focused and ready.

The technical troubles that pushed SVB & Earls double match into tmr didn’t do team USA any favors. If they could have played behind Sky’s tremendous win-imo it would have been perfect as the energy was there and right. Now they have to play it first match tmr. Still a great paring and we have a huge chance to come out strong. Just would have been a better edge if played today.

Europe looks strong. Those guys came to play and it’s still an uphill battle. I’m not gonna make any predictions, I’m just super excited to see the action tmr and good pool from everyone.

My headache is gone. Had a great night after the Mcup hanging with friends, spoke to Oscar for 10 minutes and the energy is good/ again HUGE credit to JJ for getting the most out of our team.

I’m off to bed, I’ll have a report again tmr. Maybe I’ll name drop a bit, maybe I’ll talk about matches or both. Who knows? One thing I’ll say again-best production I’ve ever seen from Matchroom.

Your man on location,
Fatboy

Don’t worry I’ve been working on this travesty of a problem the purple 5. I will not rest until it’s resolved!

 

[pwd72s]

Maybe give Emily a "trophy"...a shiny cup holding an Orange 5 ball?

 

[muskyed]

Don't know if actually confronting Emily would be the right way to go, might just make her dig her heels in. Better way, might be to just let her see the fans discontent in the color choices, and hopefully realize on her own that it would be better if changed back.

 

[loggerhead12]

Don't know if actually confronting Emily would be the right way to go, might just make her dig her heels in.

She kind of bit Karl's head off the last time he brought it up in one of the YouTube interviews, and I haven't seen another one since then.

She's feeling the pressure.

 

[MattPoland]

I’m here too. If you see me say hi. You’ll recognize me by the “purple 4”.

 

[David in FL]

Even the announcers are making it a point to identify balls by both color and number. The pink four, the red three, the green six, etc…

Given that the people who are watching this are probably amongst the most knowledgeable pool audience you could possibly have, I think that speaks volumes.

 

[Twocylndr]

Even the announcers are making it a point to identify balls by both color and number. The pink four, the red three, the green six, etc…

Given that the people who are watching this are probably amongst the most knowledgeable pool audience you could possibly have, I think that speaks volumes.

Yeah, I caught that, too.

 

[pwd72s]

Don't know if actually confronting Emily would be the right way to go, might just make her dig her heels in. Better way, might be to just let her see the fans discontent in the color choices, and hopefully realize on her own that it would be better if changed back.

I respect your opinion. Don't know that I agree with it, but I respect it. Of course, Karl can't bring it up again...he wants to keep his Matchroom job.
But Fatboy? HA! No such fear. Besides, who knows? Emily may find such a "trophy" funny...

 

[marini3105]

My favorite crowd participation yesterday was someone yelling "purple 4" while Filler was lining up on the pink 4. Made him step off the shot, laugh, give the crowd a thumbs up, and I think he has to use his extension to refocus.

 

[phreaticus]

I respect your opinion. Don't know that I agree with it, but I respect it. Of course, Karl can't bring it up again...he wants to keep his Matchroom job.
But Fatboy? HA! No such fear. Besides, who knows? Emily may find such a "trophy" funny...

I would think if there really is any way to motivate Emily/MR into restoring sane ball colors, it would be to use the Mosconi Cup as leverage. Maybe if JJ and the USA team at large would raise issues about it, especially during pre cup PRs and offline interviews, it would have an actual impact.

Fatboy, since you apparently rub elbows with these guys can you & Billy take the USA team & Emily all out one evening, get them crippled drunk and raise hell about it all? The beauty of this strategy is that it works whether USA wins or loses MC.

 

[Fatboy]

Day 3

Wow I’m tired tonight. Long day at the office.

Fatigue was clear the first half of the day for the rail. The last half of the day the vibe was strong.

Earl had a difficult day. I’m hoping he has a better day tmr. The fans sure were behind him. Myself included. For me anyways this Mcup will always be one that stands out as a good one no matter the result as we have put forth one hell of an effort.

The goose egg doubles match sure was great. SVB and Sky were brilliant.

I’m pretty tired and the words just aren’t flowing right now.

I didn’t see Jay or Stu today. I spoke to SVB for a few minutes. Was pretty cool watching the fans line up for his autograph and then Earl afterwards. Long lines for pool. Glad to see that.

Same old confusion about the balls on the rail amongst us rail birds. Collectively we have probably 200 years of experience added up and are used to some things NOT changing and this is too complicated. Seriously.


Sorry this isn’t the best end of day summary but it’s the best I can do. Saw lots of great pool today. It’s still not over yet and America isn’t the favorite but we ain’t dead yet and I ain’t giving up on us. I’ll be there tmr.

Best
Fatboy