Hey Jay who out of all the best players of any era held their speed the best under high pressure tournament play or high stakes gambling?
Tough question to answer but take your best shot.
Who would you stake for $100,000 of your own money?
Open for others to answer if you have seen enough players to form an opinion?
I've always heard that Hopkins held his speed better than anyone,but that's just second hand info from his one time high stakes backer.
Ronnie Allen in One Pocket for sure. I bet on him many times, even when it looked like he had the worst of it, and still won pretty much every time. Ronnie's famous quote that I loved was, "You make the biggest scores when you give up the nuts!" And he did, or at least his opponents thought so. After Ronnie, Keith was a good bet at 9-Ball. Many people don't know that when Efren first came to this country, he landed in Los Angeles before going to Texas. He ran into Keith at the Orange County Sports Arena and Keith gave him the eight ball playing 9-Ball, as was his custom for all strangers, especially Hispanic ones (which he thought Efren was). Keith put a whipping on him that Efren never forgot.
Other very good bets included Billy Incardona who seemed to book all winners. He gave a very strong playing Bucktooth (when Tooth was much younger) the six ball for 300 a game back in the early 1970's in Vegas. I thought Tooth had the nuts and bet 20 a game on him. After I was stuck 100, I switched over to Billy and ended up 200 winners. One other relatively unknown player back then was Jack Perkins. I never saw him lose a money game. People under-rated his game and he could really play, maybe only a ball below the champions. Any time I saw him in action I automatically got a bet down. I saw some great players (Cole and Jimmy Reid among others) try to give him the seven ball and they didn't like it.
The only guy I would ever bet all my money on was Harold Worst. He just wouldn't let anyone beat him at any game. If he needed to raise his level he would do it. EVERYONE (tournament or money player) feared Worst back then for about three years (1964-67). He was the best player and we all knew it!