Olympic Outrage and BCA let downs!

Kid Dynomite

Kid Dynomite

Dennis (Michael) Wilson
Silver Member
I was checking on cue sports being included in the Olympics here on the forum. A search resulted in 20 threads! One thread was of great interest to me and here is a link to it below. Based on this post and other BCA drama. I had to ask myself WHO is CURRENTLY leading the push for cue sports in the Olympics??? Short answer seems to be no one based on my assessment. To be so close based on the post and walk away from inclusion in the Olympics due to a refusal to add 2 players to the board is more than an OUTRAGE!!! I put a copy of the post below for anyone interested. Seems the BCA dissolved when it sold the league and dropped the Olympic campaign. How does the INDUSTRY pick up the pieces is the whole point of my post and the question I have for those in the industry? Form another BCA? Reform the BCA? Please note the date of this post below is 5/11/2004 and 10 years of inaction is 10 years too many in my opinion.

The BCA really hurt the pro players who would have benefited from the inclusion of cue sports by the United States Olympic Committee. Upon inclusion then pro players would have been eligible for Olympic funding! Funding to train and funding to attend international events. Not to mention the boost in exposure of cue sports world wide. Seems to me greed and dollar signs from the sale of the league, lead to abandoning the non-profit origins and adopting a for profit posture based on the economic success of the league. Pro pool players and Olympic dreams be damned.

Sincerely,
KD

http://forums.azbilliards.com/showpost.php?p=44731&postcount=8

Craig Arnold said:
For a number of years the BCA has worked to get the U. S. Olympic Committe to recognize them as the sanctioning body for pool players in the US. The WPA achieved OAC recognition of pool as a sport about 5 years ago.

For the BCA to be recognized by the USOC they would be required to put two professional player on the BCA Board of Directors. Thought the BCA made moves to do that they failed to enact those requirements into reality. The "Trade Association" did not want player input (votes) on the board. The USOC gave up on wait for the BCA to comply and told the board that the could reaply for consideration in 2007 if the Players were on the board. The BCA counter acted all inclusion of players being on the BCA Board of Directors and promtply put the BCA pool league up for sale.

The USOC will only recognize a non-profit organization that represents pool players and abides by the WPA rules, hence a partial reason for the formation of the new ACS (America CueSports) [see their web site for details]. If the ACS can show compliance to the USOC within two years we have a shot at inclusion into the Pan-Am Games in 2006 which is the next step in getting to the Olympics. Inclusion in the Pan -Am games also releases USOC funds for teaching and training US Olympic hopefuls in their sport.
Click to expand...
 
IMO seeking inclusion into the Olympics may have been one of the biggest misadventures leading us to where we are today. It was the BCA's focus for years rather than focusing on building the game or the pro game in general when inclusion was always at best an extreme long shot. A lot of wasted time and effort.

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk
 
Looks like you were thinking that the BCA acts in the interests of the pool enthusiasts...wrong.
:cool:
 
Kid Dynomite said:
I was checking on cue sports being included in the Olympics here on the forum. A search resulted in 20 threads! One thread was of great interest to me and here is a link to it below. Based on this post and other BCA drama. I had to ask myself WHO is CURRENTLY leading the push for cue sports in the Olympics??? Short answer seems to be no one based on my assessment. To be so close based on the post and walk away from inclusion in the Olympics due to a refusal to add 2 players to the board is more than an OUTRAGE!!! I put a copy of the post below for anyone interested. Seems the BCA dissolved when it sold the league and dropped the Olympic campaign. How does the INDUSTRY pick up the pieces is the whole point of my post and the question I have for those in the industry? Form another BCA? Reform the BCA? Please note the date of this post below is 5/11/2004 and 10 years of inaction is 10 years too many in my opinion.

The BCA really hurt the pro players who would have benefited from the inclusion of cue sports by the United States Olympic Committee. Upon inclusion then pro players would have been eligible for Olympic funding! Funding to train and funding to attend international events. Not to mention the boost in exposure of cue sports world wide. Seems to me greed and dollar signs from the sale of the league, lead to abandoning the non-profit origins and adopting a for profit posture based on the economic success of the league. Pro pool players and Olympic dreams be damned.

Sincerely,
KD

http://forums.azbilliards.com/showpost.php?p=44731&postcount=8
Click to expand...



What makes you think that the Pros would be chosen to play in the Olympics?
It would be an open qualifier.
What game is played World wide?
Could be Snooker or 3-cousion.

randyg
 
randyg said:
What makes you think that the Pros would be chosen to play in the Olympics?
It would be an open qualifier.
What game is played World wide?
Could be Snooker or 3-cousion.

randyg
Click to expand...

Shane or Johnny would break your arm to be a Olympic gold medalist! Wheaties box and Disney world commercials excluded. Just ask Michael Phelps!!!

plus, pool is most popular cue sport internationally! 9 or 10 ball!!!

KD
 
Maybe because in the Mosconi Cup people in the U.S. have to run around just trying
to find a link to watch the thing, and hope they get lucky and find the right link.

Real TV coverage and a Gold Medal
JUST A TAD DIFFERENT !
 
Just because it is the Olympics doesn't mean pool will get exposure. There are many sports in the Olympics that you never see on TV. Sure they may show clips and highlights. Might get lucky and see the medal rounds or just the finals.
 
Kid Dynomite said:
Shane or Johnny would break your arm to be a Olympic gold medalist! Wheaties box and Disney world commercials excluded. Just ask Michael Phelps!!!

plus, pool is most popular cue sport internationally! 9 or 10 ball!!!

KD
Click to expand...

Isn't this why pro pool is in the state that is is? What's in it for me. The OLYMPICS is about representing your country. So many make years of sacrifice with very little support. Do you think every American who wins a gold medal ends up on a Wheaties box? So why do they do it and what do most get out of it. To represent their county, test themselves against the best in the world. Some go to the Olympics broke and come back broke. It's self sacrificing.
 
Kid Dynomite said:
Shane or Johnny would break your arm to be a Olympic gold medalist! Wheaties box and Disney world commercials excluded. Just ask Michael Phelps!!!

plus, pool is most popular cue sport internationally! 9 or 10 ball!!!

KD
Click to expand...

Sorry....BUT, Snooker is far more popular (World Wide) than 9 or 10-Ball.

randyg
 
I may be wrong but I always thought that the WPA were the ones who are recognized by the IOC. So should it not be up to them to work to get Billiards/Pool in there?

Also I heard that each Olympiad they took away 2 sports that were not bringing in the fans or the viewership and replaced them with something else. That ho com Snow Boarding etc got in the Winter games. Thy don't keep adding events they have to take one away for each one they add. I'm sure someone will correct me on either topic here.
 
randyg said:
Sorry....BUT, Snooker is far more popular (World Wide) than 9 or 10-Ball.

randyg
Click to expand...

Then Corey Deuel would break your arm as the USA snooker champ! Shane and Johnny would be switching games if snooker got approved! But, asia makes POOL king of the hill in my opinion. Just look at azbilliards and the snooker section and 3 cushion gets a fraction of the traffic that POOL gets! This site is pretty well received by all cue sports in my opinion!

KD
 
I really hate to be the stuffshirt on this one......but Pool as an Olympic event? Are you guys serious? I love pool, I really do....but I think of Olympics as the 'best of the best' of athletes. While pool is very difficult, requires great skill, and near impossible to master, it does not require much physical exertion...and with all due respect, I hardly call a professional pool player an athlete. A couple groups I know tried to get skateboarding as an Olympic event, that went nowhere as well, just wrote it off as an 'extreme sport'...and that is a very skillful sport, requiring great athleticism along with the balls of a brass monkey if you're going to be considered 'good'.

I know I'll catch hell for this point of view, especially around here....but pool as an Olympic event? Just not going to happen.
 
If billiard games were put into the Olympics, it would all but destroy billiard games as a professional sport. Check swimming, weightlifting and many other mainstream Olympic sports.

2 main reasons:
1. Olympics pays nothing.
2. It empowers a centralized bureaucracy which focuses on political interests over business (think player revenue) interests.

Naturally, Olympics has been the focus of the bureaucrats for years. How many sponsors has the WPA found for events? hmmm yah, you get the idea!
 
I remember a thread a while back in which numerous people here were outraged because smoking had been banned in some pool venues.

I can think of several pros who would find out in short order how much their gold medal is worth as collateral in action.

Olympic sport? Unlikely.
 
I actually mentioned an effort to include Cue Sports into the Olympics a while ago when I was wracking my brain as to what would give this international band of miscreants their best shot at legitimacy.

http://forums.azbilliards.com/showpost.php?p=4501197&postcount=27

Being included in the Olympics is a positive and GIANT step in the right direction. I mean really WTF, synchronized swimming and dancing around with a ribbon and a ball are Olympic events. MARKSMANSHIP and ARCHERY are Olympic events. So to those that think cue sports are unworthy of Olympic Eventitude.... lurk moar, post less.

I really think the AZB community is a real live power in cue sports, nationally and internationally. Chuckle if you like, but its what we have... or am I to believe that there are no people in here that have any connections to people considered to be real live authorities in the billiard world?

Too much on your plate guys? Need a charismatic leader to rally behind? Im unemployed, so Im free. I shower regularly and can still find my junk. Impressive resume no?

Please please please let's do something.

Lesh
 
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