Players Attempting to Unionize?

Nobody's making that kind of money just from playing pool. It's how wisely they leverage themselves, and some of the top women seem to be doing a very good job at it. Take Nascar, and Dale Jr's estimated net worth, 300 million +. Sure didn't make that in prize money, especially considering prize money is shared with the team to an extent. Prize money, I'm sure would just be a small piece of a financially successful pool players income.
 
muskyed said:
Kelly Fisher, I was shocked at that figure, but who knows where it really came from. Looks as though the boys have some catching up to do. I only looked up two, but I'm sure there are more. Did not look up Jeanette Lee this time, but if I remember her family's worth was estimated about 6 mil, a lot of that might be family income. It's a simple search really, but as to the accuracy of what's reported, who really knows. One thing for certain is when you search the estimated net worth of a few of the top men, it is substantially less. All these clips, and comments on gambling and side betting by the men could very well have something to do with that.
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The women had a more successful tour (financially) than the men due to a cleaner image and the draw of women playing pool. That being said, Kelly Fisher's primary occupation was snooker player and she made the lion's share of her net worth playing snooker. I would also estimate Allison Fisher (Est. net worth $10M) made most of her money play snooker as well but she played pool at a very high level for close to a couple of decades so I could be wrong. Jeanette Lee (Est. net worth $7M) was the top female player for a while as well but most know the primary driver of her income was endorsement deals with the likes of the APA, etc.
 
I have no idea what Kelly Fishers financial situation is so I won’t comment. But those net worth sites are highly dubious. Especially when dealing with fringe celebrities where very little about their financials are publicly posted.
 
middleofnowhere said:
Any player with any net worth to speak of it would have to come from investments and endorsements.

I remember some years ago reading of pro athletes annual earnings. Arnold Palmer who had not golf in years was still in the top 10 earners.

In an individual sport, not a team sport where a player has a contract, the big money doesn't come from prize money.
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That's that iced tea and lemonade money...
 
Chicagoplayer said:
I believe Bobby Hunter and Allen Hopkins were the presidents of the PPPA.
They’d be good reference.
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Perhaps they were both presidents, but the PPPA grew out of a small group of players, most of them from New Jersey and New York, who conceived of the idea in either 1974 or 1975 and implemented it in 1976. The primary forces behind the creation of the PPPA were Steve Mizerak, Pete Margo, Pat Fleming, Jack Colavita, Allen Hopkins and several others.
 
Being in a union for decades
I can say much is needed.
An employer.
An administrator.
Contributing members.
Funny thing. I never see the last thing happening.
Or the first.
Or the second.
I was a union steward in law was a union pres.
The money to operate is stupid!
Then the lawyers.
There are always the advantages.
Many advantages.
Maybe a look at the old New Youk Musician's Union's structure would be helpful for organizers.
Good Luck,
Nick :)
 
VVP said:
Hopefully everyone commenting here had a chance to look at this and then form their opinion. I don't think it's a bad thing they are trying to do and wish them luck.

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That was a nice interview. Darren is a great speaker, he made the interview fun to listen to. I watched the whole thing in one sitting.

I really like how he said to give Predator a chance, that they are working super hard to correct issues, and the effort they are putting into their table is the most important thing. If they keep the effort high, it will eventually yield a top class product.
 
Listenign to Darren's interview, all the intentions are great. I think anyone would agree to that. One of his main points was standardizing the game.

But listening to him about his preferred rules, they are different than other pro's preferred rules. For example he is a strong proponent of alternate break. With a player's organization, you will have many different viewpoints, many different opinions, within the group. It just human nature. So if they all vote and say they like alternate break, and the promoters all switch to alternate break, there will be a bunch of players and fans both, that don't like it. That is just one example. You can extrapolate that to any type of rule. Then maybe as this goes further along, the dissenting players will form their own "union" and make the rules the way they want them. Take that a few more rounds and you are back to square one. Which is what has happened the past 100 years.

The way it is now, with the Wild West of Pool, you have many choices. If you like one hole, there are one hole tournaments. If you want to run racks, there are winner break 9 ball tournaments. If you want to dress like a bum, there are tournaments you can do that. If you want to stay in bed for 6 months, and only come out to play twice a year, you can do that.

If there was one rule set, it would take away all this autonomy pool players have now. At the extreme, you'd have one game, one rule set, one table, one ball, one cue stick you must shoot with, one outfit you must wear, must do charity work with kids before your match, etc.

That takes away the autonomy of pool. That was what I meant a few posts back when I said players will never form an organization, because it goes agains the pool player psyche. Pool is one of the last activates you can do where you can figuratively get on a horse with a gun on your side and ride across the country and do battle. I suck as a pool player and even I did that a few times, and had a blast.

Too much organization takes that all away. Turns us all into working stiffs. Look at what happened to Fedor and Kristina. The organizational push of pool got them banned from the professional events, for something they had nothing to do with. When/if pool is completely organized, look out, because it might no longer be fun to be a pool player. It might just turn into a boring dayjob.

Respectfully, and IMO:)
 
iusedtoberich said:
Listenign to Darren's interview, all the intentions are great. I think anyone would agree to that. One of his main points was standardizing the game.

But listening to him about his preferred rules, they are different than other pro's preferred rules. For example he is a strong proponent of alternate break. With a player's organization, you will have many different viewpoints, many different opinions, within the group. It just human nature. So if they all vote and say they like alternate break, and the promoters all switch to alternate break, there will be a bunch of players and fans both, that don't like it. That is just one example. You can extrapolate that to any type of rule. Then maybe as this goes further along, the dissenting players will form their own "union" and make the rules the way they want them. Take that a few more rounds and you are back to square one. Which is what has happened the past 100 years.
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For better or worse, standardization is/will be good for the game in the long run from a player's perspective and a fan's. You are never going to make everyone happy and if there is a governing players association that books all the top events the "take my ball and go home crowd" can either conform to the standards or not play. I can't see another organization starting up. There's only one player's association in each of the major sports. This go around of the MLB collective bargaining agreement saw the MLBPA reps vote against the owner's last proposal but when the reps opened up to a player vote across the board, the majority of the "rank and file" voted yes so the MLBPA agreed to the terms. You don't see those that voted No starting their own player's association.
iusedtoberich said:
The way it is now, with the Wild West of Pool, you have many choices. If you like one hole, there are one hole tournaments. If you want to run racks, there are winner break 9 ball tournaments. If you want to dress like a bum, there are tournaments you can do that. If you want to stay in bed for 6 months, and only come out to play twice a year, you can do that.
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They are looking to standardize 9B as the "official" game of pro pool which makes sense from a casual fan perspective. It's easy to follow, fast and good for TV. There will most likely still be other professional events but I think they are looking at 9B as the primary driver with a standard set of rules for all events.
iusedtoberich said:
If there was one rule set, it would take away all this autonomy pool players have now. At the extreme, you'd have one game, one rule set, one table, one ball, one cue stick you must shoot with, one outfit you must wear, must do charity work with kids before your match, etc.

That takes away the autonomy of pool. That was what I meant a few posts back when I said players will never form an organization, because it goes agains the pool player psyche. Pool is one of the last activates you can do where you can figuratively get on a horse with a gun on your side and ride across the country and do battle. I suck as a pool player and even I did that a few times, and had a blast.

Too much organization takes that all away. Turns us all into working stiffs. Look at what happened to Fedor and Kristina. The organizational push of pool got them banned from the professional events, for something they had nothing to do with. When/if pool is completely organized, look out, because it might no longer be fun to be a pool player. It might just turn into a boring dayjob.

Respectfully, and IMO:)
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I think you are taking everything out of context. Fun? You know what would be fun? Having events with million dollar payouts. Organizing the players and standardizing the game is a step towards getting there.
 
rexus31 said:
Kelly Fisher's primary occupation was snooker player and she made the lion's share of her net worth playing snooker.
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Actually, when the women's snooker tour folded in about April of 2003, Kelly Fisher was just 24, and by the age of 25 she had moved to the United States.
 
Ahh, I see, might want to consider Jaysons’ style of speech. I haven’t seen or heard of anyone else. Joey Gray specifically asked SVB, and he said no. A players assoc. that seeks a seat at the table makes a lot of sense.
 
sjm said:
Actually, when the women's snooker tour folded in about April of 2003, Kelly Fisher was just 24, and by the age of 25 she had moved to the United States.
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Thanks for that Stu. While that is true, she still holds more snooker titles than 9 Ball. She was snooker world champ in 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002 and 2003. I'm not sure what her earnings were for those years and I can only assume they were more lucrative than her two 9 Ball title years in 2012 and 2019. I would also assume her net worth is from endorsements and commentator money. It certainly is not from her WPBA career.
 
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Bob Jewett said:
There are a lot of very positive ideas in that. I hope they succeed.
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Wow, and I thought I was the only one that had a problem with these super top-heavy 10-ball payouts that are a boon for the most elite players but make it hard for anyone else to make a profit from ten ball. As I've noted, the other problem is that professional hopefuls will go broke fast and many will have to give up the dream quickly, and it won't make any difference whether the pros work with the juniors if that scenario isn't avoided. Only the hobbyists and other dead money players that can afford it will stay the course. and this will stunt the growth of the next generation of talent.

That said, I think Darren had a lot of good ideas but I hope it is not the intent of the player's association to make demands of event producers. It will add a lot of value if they make recommendations rather than demands, and if they move in that direction, I think they'll get their fair share of results.
 
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