Playing Off the Rail....real vs fiction

B

billb

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Read this book for the millionth time...just wondering if any posters were around for any of the stories in the book or have first hand knowledge of them. Specifically, the ones from the east coast are of interest to me as well as the sections regarding Keith McCready. Those are, in my opinion, the best parts of the book. Are the descriptions how scenarios played out or were things tweeked a bit to make the book more interesting?

I am certainly not saying the author added his own details...just starting a thread for discussion.

Just for the record, I think the book is a great read and would recommend it to anyone.
 
billb said:
Read this book for the millionth time...just wondering if any posters were around for any of the stories in the book or have first hand knowledge of them. Specifically, the ones from the east coast are of interest to me as well as the sections regarding Keith McCready. Those are, in my opinion, the best parts of the book. Are the descriptions how scenarios played out or were things tweeked a bit to make the book more interesting?

I am certainly not saying the author added his own details...just starting a thread for discussion.

Just for the record, I think the book is a great read and would recommend it to anyone.
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a friend of mine says he's one of the guys that loaned "Boy George" aka dave R. more dough to play tony.

i liked that book because i'm from nor cal and i've ran into 3-5 people that were talked about in the book. who knows if it's 100% on point. take it for what it was, a decently written story
 
I watched almost the entire Kamikazee Bob and Boy George match. I recall Bob playing like a fool and losing 10/11 sets for 2000 a pop. Got the 7 out I think but he was drunk and couldn't make any shot over a foot long.

Bob backed Louis Lemke against Annigoni after that and lost in record time on a table with huge pockets and weird rolls. Another 5500.

I had free drink tickets so I just chilled and drank Heineken and watched Bob get fleeced. Great hustle job by Boy George- he even gave him a card with his phone # when they were done in case Bob wanted to play again lol.
 
Tony and I are good friends and have been for a long time. Basically everything in the book happened, but maybe not exactly as depicted. Let's just call it "writer's liberties". I would call the book 90% accurate and 10% embellished. Look, even in my own book Pool Wars I didn't always get my dates and locations 100% accurate. The passage of time blurs the memories. :sorry:
 
I spoke to one pro who was just an up and coming pro when the events of the book supposedly happened and he was mentioned in one of the chapters but he says he was not there at all and had no idea who Tony Annigoni was. So to me the rest of the book is suspect.
 
Morning Dew

The $ amounts and playing times in the chapter The Dew Factor are accurate. Danny did mess with the chess game. Danny says that Junior Harris did win $500 off of Tony. The description of Jack & Jill's is also accurate. That place was scary! Closed now.

Jim "Shorty" Henson remembers Tony coming into Shirlington Rd (near Glebe Rd) Champions a couple of chapters earlier. The description of how Shorty shoots is dead-on. Jim McAdams (rip) also told me he remembered talking with Tony about Baltimore pool rooms.

Andy
 
I also read the book several times over the years, it's my favorite. I have most of the pool story books. Their great reads.
 
jay helfert said:
Tony and I are good friends and have been for a long time. Basically everything in the book happened, but maybe not exactly as depicted. Let's just call it "writer's liberties". I would call the book 90% accurate and 10% embellished. Look, even in my own book Pool Wars I didn't always get my dates and locations 100% accurate. The passage of time blurs the memories. :sorry:
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I've also known Tony and been friends with him since the mid '80s. I don't think any book he was in would be embellished too much, if he had any say in it.
 
alinco said:
The $ amounts and playing times in the chapter The Dew Factor are accurate. Danny did mess with the chess game. Danny says that Junior Harris did win $500 off of Tony. The description of Jack & Jill's is also accurate. That place was scary! Closed now.

Jim "Shorty" Henson remembers Tony coming into Shirlington Rd (near Glebe Rd) Champions a couple of chapters earlier. The description of how Shorty shoots is dead-on. Jim McAdams (rip) also told me he remembered talking with Tony about Baltimore pool rooms.

Andy
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That is exactly right, Andy.

Also, Geese was totally pissed off at the depiction they had of him in this book. It wasn't very flattering, but, hey, Geese was a little rough to gamble with, if you know what I mean. :wink:
 
JAM said:
That is exactly right, Andy.

Also, Geese was totally pissed off at the depiction they had of him in this book. It wasn't very flattering, but, hey, Geese was a little rough to gamble with, if you know what I mean. :wink:
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How about the description of Keith and Cecil playing one-hole? :)
 
Pushout said:
I've also known Tony and been friends with him since the mid '80s. I don't think any book he was in would be embellished too much, if he had any say in it.
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Sometimes authors do take the liberty of embellishment to suit their own needs. I have a story about embellishment of the truth, but in order for me to relay it on this forum, I'd have to embellish it a bit, so that it wouldn't seem too mean. :o
 
JoeyInCali said:
How about the description of Keith and Cecil playing one-hole? :)
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Poor Keith. His life is the stuff that pool books are written about. Yet, he's never received one penny of compensation. In fact, he's never even received a copy of the book that contains the so-called "tales" written about him. :grin-square:

Ah, such is life. One day, the truth will come up, and it will be a real eye-opener. Timing, though, is everything, as they say. :wink:
 
Do you believe?

The book was pretty good and decently factual. He described a tediously slow match I had with Paul Jones to a "T." But does anyone believe,"The Beard wisely ducked Tony Anagoni's action?" I took offense at that, and chastised the author severely for that when I next saw him in person. He apologized for that stretch and I let it go at that.

The Beard
I ducked nobody, and seldom did anything "wisely" in my whole life.
 
I just finished reading the book and it was GREAT!
Several times while reading I had to put the book down and go play some pool...that is just how inspirational it was!

My favorite quote is near the beginning (page 7 actually) when Tony was practicing nine ball:

"It was as though the table was his complaisant lover. She was flawless under his touch; he trusted every inch of her. He did not have to force the balls into the pockets; he could caress them instead"
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This thread caught my attention because I was wondering myself just how much of this book was real and how much was embellished story telling. I honestly don't care either way because I truly enjoyed the read. If those things really happened though, that just makes it more interesting and I feel like reading it again just knowing that it may have really happened that way.
 
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I am from Western Maryland and I knew Geese. Also, I have played Mr McAdams and Junior Harris. I thought the descriptions were pretty accurate. Geese was a unique individual. I never had any problems with him and he told me several funny stories. Many of those guys used to venture to Western Maryland/West Virginia....Keyser, WV and Cumberland, MD specifically to play a tournament at a place called Doug's Billiards. Small room, but lots of action. I remember several different trips they made....Mark Ford, Geese, Max Schlotlouer (sp??), Jason Hill...I believe they all came together. Also, the tournaments drew Giles Darr and some of those guys from the Virginia area. I specifically remember watching Geese and Jerry Slivka fire back and forth at each other over making a one pocket match. I would've loved to have seen that match up, but it did not pan out.

Needless to say, Geese was always entertaining and never held back....one of a kind for sure.

Knowing of many of these guys made that part of the book more interesting than some other parts for me personally. We traveled to Baltimore/DC to play before, but we did not go to Jack and Jills. We found all the action we needed at USA Billiards.
 
billb said:
I am from Western Maryland and I knew Geese. Also, I have played Mr McAdams and Junior Harris. I thought the descriptions were pretty accurate. Geese was a unique individual. I never had any problems with him and he told me several funny stories. Many of those guys used to venture to Western Maryland/West Virginia....Keyser, WV and Cumberland, MD specifically to play a tournament at a place called Doug's Billiards. Small room, but lots of action. I remember several different trips they made....Mark Ford, Geese, Max Schlotlouer (sp??), Jason Hill...I believe they all came together. Also, the tournaments drew Giles Darr and some of those guys from the Virginia area. I specifically remember watching Geese and Jerry Slivka fire back and forth at each other over making a one pocket match. I would've loved to have seen that match up, but it did not pan out.

Needless to say, Geese was always entertaining and never held back....one of a kind for sure.

Knowing of many of these guys made that part of the book more interesting than some other parts for me personally. We traveled to Baltimore/DC to play before, but we did not go to Jack and Jills. We found all the action we needed at USA Billiards.
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Geese could play all right. Our very own Ms. Jam knew him quite well. She could expound at length on this interesting and unique player. Sadly he left us too young, maybe in his 40's.
 
jay helfert said:
Geese could play all right. Our very own Ms. Jam knew him quite well. She could expound at length on this interesting and unique player. Sadly he left us too young, maybe in his 40's.
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My first Goose sighting was at Reds first or second year. I remember him playing Fat Randy on a box with the big cue ball, I even think the cops raided the place during his "MARATON" match, I think they played 45-56 hours straight, can't remember, but it was a looooooooooooooooooooooooooooG match, the Goose eventually won, chemical warfare one would think....at its finest, with two guys that knew how to take care of business on the box, I think Benny was wearing a white/black outfit at the time, kinda looked like the Penguin in batman. I would put the Goose on the top of the entertainment/player list, right up there with Ronnie Allen/Ether/St Louie....He sure could tell it like "he" saw it....from the Gooses point of perspective, which was Very entertaining. He was the only player in a tournament that ever walked out on me during a match, it was at the McDermott Masters in Vegas, since I'm 6'6" and can reach most shots, I took an up/down length of table cut, Rempe thin, made it, ran out (we're on the winners side) the Goose was so discusted, not that I made it but because I took the shot then ran out. He left the event, didn't even play his next match on the losers, I'm sure he had better action elsewhere.
 
The only inaccuracy i heard about the New York Chelsea action came from Waterdog. He told me he borrowed $100 from Tony and paid him back-he denied the $100 was for his silence. So based on that, Id say that id say it was fairly accurate.
 
alinco said:
Jim "Shorty" Henson remembers Tony coming into Shirlington Rd (near Glebe Rd) Champions a couple of chapters earlier. The description of how Shorty shoots is dead-on. Jim McAdams (rip) also told me he remembered talking with Tony about Baltimore pool rooms.

Andy
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I wasn't sure if the author was referring to Shorty or not. He described him as bald which made me doubtful, but I agree his description of Shorty's shooting is accurate.
 
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