Old guys at the poolroom

book collector

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Every pool room has them.
How many balls lower than they say their game was do you think it actually was.
In my mind, I played about about 2 balls better than reality.
 
Not sure what you're asking...I usually read old players through their hands. You can really tell what kind of speed they were once capable of by how they handle a cue. They might stand a little straighter, walk a little stiffer and stroke a little softer, but hit or miss they still control whitey really well and you can tell they still feel the cue in ways you may never achieve. I can watch guys like that all day long.:)
 
Every pool room has them.
How many balls lower than they say their game was do you think it actually was.
In my mind, I played about about 2 balls better than reality.

same as in golf....don't worry about the ones that tell you how GREAT they once were; worry about the ones that downplay how good they are now.

there are guys in golf who have a "vanity" handicap that they will never really play to, and there are guys who somehow always shoot a few strokes better than their handicap when needed :eek: :p :cool: It's the latter that you need be wary of....
 
We can only hope that we will all get there to that age and still enjoy what we do now. The many days at the pool table, the many years of this active meditation is not about how many balls went into the pockets, but how many memories and feelings they kept as they pick up their cue and feel the felt of the table under their hand.

I liked the other poster's comment about the feeling through the cue and the mystery of experience that can only be understood with age. Children and old people play different games then most in the age between. They have the most to remind us...

This is not a link to a pool player although he enjoyed pool and fine cigars - this is an old man that can play and tell a story like few others. It is music at the age of 90 as fresh and yet as lived in as it gets. Hope you will enjoy it while spending time on AZ:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hE5IEo_5SMk
 
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we have two of them in our Poolhall

we actually have two older men in out poolhall.
The older one, at the age of 82, comes twice a week to shoot some balls and to get his share of our weekly guided pratice session that we set up a year ago. This man still shouts and argues with himself when the Balls don't do what he wants them to do.
He once told me that shooting pool keeps him mentally fresh and physically healthy (with respect to his age). On some occasions you can see him playing with one of our youngest, aged 17. Iimagine, two men with more than two generations between them, having fun thgether on the same subject. Thats what I love wiht our sport.

The other one, aged 78, comes with his grilfriend, sometimes accompanied with another couple, to play, talk and have fun.

Beeing 56 myself, I love those scenes, they make me hope that I could do it too. I'm still looking for my alltime highrun in straightpool.
 
We have a couple of older men in the pool hall I frequent. The best of them is about 69 or 70 but I tell you he can still run a rack at will and leave his opponents wondering how he did it.

I remember when I first started playing pool and I was shooting with him( and by shooting I mean being his personal rack boy) He did not mind teaching me and even now he comes and plays and have fun with us.
 
same as in golf....don't worry about the ones that tell you how GREAT they once were; worry about the ones that downplay how good they are now.

Cool post... I like it. I've run into a lot of older guys who say they aren't so great, they can't see, etc... but they still shoot better than 90% of the other guys in the room.
 
This is not a link to a pool player although he enjoyed pool and fine cigars - this is an old man that can play and tell a story like few others. It is music at the age of 90 as fresh and yet as lived in as it gets. Hope you will enjoy it while spending time on AZ:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hE5IEo_5SMk

Thanks for the link. I watched it with my 10 year old daughter and she said "words can't describe that". She is right. Having played classical piano, I can tell you that he is in the same "zone" that we at speak about when playing pool. Great musicians do it all the time. You leave the world behind and enter a place that words can't describe.
 
I used to spend a lot of time in the late 80's in a pool room frequented by Norman Hitchcock - an "old guy" for sure. Norman never said much, but took a LOT of young bucks down a notch or two. I really liked watching him play! I wasn't real smart, but watching him hit balls for 30 seconds was enough to know I wasn't, nor ever would be, in his class.

Sure miss him!
 
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