I'm not from there nor have I ever visited, but from all accounts Chicago has a very good history when it comes to pool. I recently saw a video on the hall that the color of money was shot in and it's one of those old timeless places that seems like it will never go away.
Anyway, my question is, why are there no major pro pool tournaments being held in Chicago? Since I've been on this site I've never seen or heard of anyone doing anything in that city. Is it not possible?
The real reason. Pool is dead. I mean, pool died in Chicago a long time ago. A city this size should have dozens and dozens of pool rooms in the Chicago metro area. There is around 6M folks in the area.
I sponsored a few pro Exhibitions in Chicago 8-9 years ago. I talked to the promoter, Mark Cantrell, who was gonna be in Peoria to come to Chicago with Buddy Hall and Nick Varner. He first said no because they don't sell well in Chicago, thus not worth their time, costs (hotel, food, gas) to drive another 2 hours to Chicago from Peoria, IL. Imagine that? They didn't want to drive from some small town in IL to one of the largest cities in the country because there was no money in it for them?
So, I told them I would pay their "appearance fee" myself and then I would sell the tickets to recoup my money. If I don't recoup, that's on me. Plus, I put all three up at my house so there would be no hotel expense and the wife cooked dinner on the BBQ for them
I broke even on the venture, but it was tough selling the few remaining tickets to get to the break even point. I mean, there were folks shooting pool during the exhibition and they had no interest to stop by... tickets were $20 for a few hours of entertainment, ask questions, get autographs, and play some games with Buddy and Nick. A bargain if you ask me.
Heck, I lived there and I couldn't believe they would not come to Chicago but Mark was right, it was a tough sell, but I marketed the heck out of it, called everyone I knew in pool, league operators, players, friends, family, etc. and to just to break even. Which was fine by me, heck, I was willing to lose a few hundo on the deal just to get it done, but jeez, with those two names attached it should have been a "no brainer".