Remember pool on ESPN?!?!

atthecat

atthecat

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Remember all the great mens matches on ESPN! I remember a LIVE match with Earl Strickland. What's going on? Only womens tournaments. Sorry ladies...all this one rail position is driving me nuts. I wanna see the best of the best!
I guess back in the 80's and 90's there has a legit governing body?
 
the live match on ESPN

I only remember one live match from ESPN.

It was so long ago, I can't remember who played, but it was one sided. I remember
them stating that folks had asked for a live match, without "missing games", and they
allocated 90 minutes instead of the usual hour.

Then the winner won, and they had like 45 unanticipated minutes to fill, and Mike Massey
did a lot of trick shots to fill the remaining time.

I remember Mike saying something like, "Yeh, we have time for another one? Great!", and
proceeded to perform another trick shot. After a few, he almost seem very surprised that
he was getting so much airtime.

Was this the match?
 
Exactly. It was Strickland vs somebody, can't remember who. Maybe CJ Wiley or Howard Vickery???
 
ESPN taped a lot of good matches in the 80's and 90's, and they are collecting dust in a vault somewhere. Earl's match against Mizerak at Caesars Tahoe in 1982 was a classic. These matches should be shown on ESPN Classic! They have many great matches with Buddy, Rempe, Hopkins, Varner, even Louie Roberts and Brian Hashimoto were on these old shows. I have copies of many of them if anyone is interested in seeing them. Just e-mail me for a list. jayhelfert@yahoo.com

Why don't we start a letter (or e-mail) campaign to ESPN asking them to replay these great old matches. If enough people write to them, they may pay attention.
 
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It was on Prime Ticket and Earl played Efren in the finals. It was the PBT 9 ball World Championships live from Vegas. They showed the semi finals live to. Earl destroyed everyone he played. Earl won the finals something like 9-3, he just broke and ran out like it was nothing. I remember watching it and can not find it anywhere now.

Steve
 
Yeah, all these trickshot compitions are really helping my game! I miss seeing Varner, Hall, Sigel, Archer, Davenport, Miz, Strickland, Reyes, Mataya and the like on TV.
 
Jay, I'm on it. Writing to ESPN right now. Come on people!

Jay, is it the governing body that sucks? No main organization?
 
I'll say it again. 98% of the pool players make no effort to make it more entertaining when they are on camera so they really only have themselves to blame that there are few tv matches therefore few dollars to be won.

Don't they realize that poker wouldn't get all the air time if the players didn't make it entertaining by their personalities?

I'm not just saying this to say it. I really want it to happen. Players joking around with the crowd, players getting more excited when they make exciting shots, (Mike Massey and Tom Rossman know how to make sure they keep getting a shot at the big checks. So does that red haired speed pool guy)
More witty banter, More drama, more anguish on missed shots, Maybe a lil trash talking, "I'll bet you $100 bucks you don't run out!"

I know some of these examples are outrageous but it's called brain-storming. No bad ideas when you are brain-storming.

Pool has some real potential with all these challenge matches to bet on.
 
atthecat said:
Exactly. It was Strickland vs somebody, can't remember who. Maybe CJ Wiley or Howard Vickery???
Click to expand...

I think it was Vickery. CJ may have played too, but I don't remember. If I had to guess the year, I would say 1997. I think there may have been a few matches shown live, but the only two players I remember were Strickland and Vickery.
 
atthecat said:
Exactly. It was Strickland vs somebody, can't remember who. Maybe CJ Wiley or Howard Vickery???
Click to expand...

Was it Paul Potier that Earl beat? I think that was the match that was over real fast and they had extra time. I think it was a semi-final match. I remember watching them live and I think I have them recorded on VHS tape.
 
Rubyron said:
Was it Paul Potier that Earl beat? I think that was the match that was over real fast and they had extra time. I think it was a semi-final match. I remember watching them live and I think I have them recorded on VHS tape.
Click to expand...

That was the PCA tournament in Dallas where Earl ran ten racks. Earl beat Paul in the Semis and played CJ in the finals (and lost). It was televised by Prime Ticket. Jim Mataya did commentary with some mainstream sports guy. I racked the balls (what else is new :D )
I wish I had a copy of those shows.

Another great show that was televised was the PCA event at Hollywood Park in 1996. Hopkins played Matlock in the finals I believe. Matlock had beaten Earl and Hopkins had beaten Ortmann to reach the finals. Our own Joe Rogen did commentary with Tony Annigoni. I got promoted to TD for that one. Great matches with excellent commentary. Somewhere someone has those tapes. I would kill!
 
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Jay,

Is that the one where the light fell on a table that was not being used during matches going on. I remember watching Markus C. getting beat by Rafael Martinez and Jose Parica falling apart against Mark Jarvis. That was the first tournament that I saw that was rack your own. Mark made Jose rerack every time. Jose had him like 11-4 and Mark started to talk a lot of crap and Jose fell apart.

Steve
 
jay helfert said:
That was the PCA tournament in Dallas where Earl ran ten racks. Earl beat Paul in the Semis and played CJ in the finals (and lost). It was televised by Prime Ticket. Jim Mataya did commentary with some mainstream sports guy. I racked the balls (what else is new :D )
I wish I had a copy of those shows.
Click to expand...

I've got a box with probably 50 VHS tapes of televised matches from the 90's. I'm pretty sure I have this match. It might take me a little time to go through them but I'll dust off the VCR and see what I can find. If I have it you're more than welcome to it or at least a copy of it.
 
Rubyron, I have a bunch of old tapes too. We should swap some shows. If I can find my box!
 
Tablemechanic said:
Jay,

Is that the one where the light fell on a table that was not being used during matches going on. I remember watching Markus C. getting beat by Rafael Martinez and Jose Parica falling apart against Mark Jarvis. That was the first tournament that I saw that was rack your own. Mark made Jose rerack every time. Jose had him like 11-4 and Mark started to talk a lot of crap and Jose fell apart.

Steve
Click to expand...

Yep, a light fell during practice right before the matches. The worst one I ever saw was in Atlantic City at Resorts. The TV crew was setting up for the matches in the morning and the overhead camera fell (from high above) and just missed Mizerak! It might have killed him if it hit him on the head. They weren't so small back then. I remember the loud CRASH as it hit the floor, right next to Steve. It didn't seem to bother him that much.

Later in that same tournament, a camera platform they had at the top of the bleachers fell over backwards slowly, cameraman and all down to the floor. I watched it go from the directors podium where I was siting with Weenie Beenie. I said "Oh my God!" Fortunately the cameraman wasn't badly hurt, just shook up. They stopped the tournament and fixed the platform and that guy went back to work! Guess he wanted to make sure he got paid. :)
 
atthecat said:
Rubyron, I have a bunch of old tapes too. We should swap some shows. If I can find my box!
Click to expand...

I'm game! I just had to hunt for my box and finally found it. I'm going through the first tape right now. Looks like someone taped a soap opera over part of it but most of the tapes have more than one match on them. Fast forward on the VCR ain't so fast. It's going to take a little while but I'll start going through them and keep track of the matches I have. I'd like to find the easiest way to get them into a digital format.
 
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