SJM at the BCA Pro Events

[JoeyA]

The quarterfinals are now in the books.

Charlie Williams and Dennis Orcullo had a good match, but a couple of bad rolls hurt Charlie, and Dennis ran two racks off of each of Charlie's two major errors, which added up to a victory for Orcullo in a very competitve match.

Ralf Souquet, who breezed through all three of his matches today, was dominant in his 11-3 win over Archer.

Warren Kiamco dominated Majid, who had knocked otu Deuel in the prior match.

The wild one was Pagulayan vs Boyes, an even match up to 9-9, when a fifteen minute safety battle with some freaky rolls was won by Boyes. Moments later, however, Boyes missed the shape on the eight, and sold out with a miss, giving Alex a 10-9 lead. A missed kick safe in rack twenty seemed to doom Boyes, but Alex miscued on a routine five ball, leaving Boyes a 5-10 combo which Boyes missed, selling out the match, with Alex prevailing in a match that was half laborious and half entertainment.

So, tomorrow, it's Souquet vs Pagulayan and Orcullo vs Kiamco. Of the four, Kiamco has been the best player this week, but Souquet was the best if Friday alone is considered. Of course, it's anybody's tournament now. Should be fun!

WOW! Those Filipinos must know something. Three in the finals.:thumbup:

Ralf an always be relied upon to remain staying in the hunt. It is hard to keep a good man down.

Speaking of good men, thanks again sjm for all of your posts. We will have to take a look at your fortune telling skills, though.

(Hint: Don't bet against the Kaiser unless JoeyA has already picked him.:grin-square
JoeyA

 

[JimS]

SJM...

I don't know who the hell you are but I know you produce dammed fine pool reports. Thanks.

 

[JMuck]

Thank you sjm for taking time to reduce all this information to this simple,enlightened descriptive form.I'm looking forward to all your future posts.

 

[Roy Steffensen]

Thanks for all the nice reports, SJM! Much appreciated!

 

[sjm]

It's all over now.

Kiamco was a little sloppy against Orcullo in the first semifinal and made it pretty easy for Dennis to advance.

Souquet played one of the best sets of ten ball imaginable against Pagulayan, getting all seven of his racks by running one through ten, never losing his pattern in any of them. He broke dry once and had to tie two balls up after a perfect Pagulayan safety, but was otherwise perfect. Alex never had a chance in the 7-1 thrashing.

Ralf never had to play a safety in the seimfinal match, and, arguably, this hurt him in the final, where three defensive errors cost him three racks, with Orcullo winning comforably.

Well played, Dennis Orcullo. Congratulations!

That completes my coverage of the BCA event in Vegas. Hope you enjoyed it. Flying back to NYC shortly, and look forward to it, but ... I had a wonderul nine days here in Vegas, seeing a lot of great pool, renewing old friendships and making a few new friends.

If you were here and I said hello, it was great seeing you. If you were here and I didn't have the chance to say hello, I regret it. If you weren't here, I hope to catch up with you at a poolroom or pool event soon.

Bye now.

 

[bud green]

I'm sure I speak for everyone who wants to give you a big "Thanks" for spending the time to post your, as usual, excellent observations.

Shame its a short race the way Ralf played against Alex but overall it seemed to be a good event and Dennis is without a doubt a worthy champion.

 

[JAM]

It's all over now.

Kiamco was a little sloppy against Orcullo in the first semifinal and made it pretty easy for Dennis to advance.

Souquet played one of the best sets of ten ball imaginable against Pagulayan, getting all seven of his racks by running one through ten, never losing his pattern in any of them. He broke dry once and had to tie two balls up after a perfect Pagulayan safety, but was otherwise perfect. Alex never had a chance in the 7-1 thrashing.

Ralf never had to play a safety in the seimfinal match, and, arguably, this hurt him in the final, where three defensive errors cost him three racks, with Orcullo winning comforably.

Well played, Dennis Orcullo. Congratulations!

That completes my coverage of the BCA event in Vegas. Hope you enjoyed it. Flying back to NYC shortly, and look forward to it, but ... I had a wonderul nine days here in Vegas, seeing a lot of great pool, renewing old friendships and making a few new friends.

If you were here and I said hello, it was great seeing you. If you were here and I didn't have the chance to say hello, I regret it. If you weren't here, I hope to catch up with you at a poolroom or pool event soon.

Bye now.

Thank the good Lord for SJM's updates. I came onto this forum this morning, wanting to know who won the tournament.

I read several threads, with no mention of the winner. There was a lot of colloquy about betting on the players as if they were racehorses, but no mention of the great triumph.

Thanks, Stu. I knew I could count on you and this thread for the facts, always well written and enjoyable.

 

[sjm]

Home sweet home.

Would like to share a couple of more things about the BCA experience.

I must concede that I felt a bit ignorant when the fact that soft-breaking wasn't being permitted was mentioned just before the TV rounds in the Predator 10-ball challenge. Apparently, for the length of the tournament, the rule in effect was that if, in the referee's judgment, a break attempt did not qualify as an attempt to hit the balls hard, the penalty would be loss of that rack.

A story that continued to quietly emerge during my trip to the BCA's was the continued improvement of the English players. Darren Appleton won the World Pool Masters, and in the Predator 10-ball event, Karl Boyes, who came 5th, barely missed beating Pagualayan out of a semifinal appearance, while Imran Majid was good enough to finish ninth, eliminating Corey Deuel alng the way. In fact, Yorkshire alone has now produced World 10-ball champion Darren Appleton, 2008 WPBA Player of the Year Kelly Fisher, and 2007 World 9-ball Campion Darryl Peach.

Oh, one last thing. Jay Helfert did one hell of a job directing, up until Saturday, at which time he was unconscionably demoted in rank to shotclock official, a capacity in which he, once again, shined.

 

[JimS]

Oh, one last thing. Jay Helfert did one hell of a job directing, up until Saturday, at which time he was unconscionably demoted in rank to shotclock official, a capacity in which he, once again, shined.

You lost me here. Could you elaborate? (on the underlined part I mean.)

Thanks... for all the reporting. Exemplary job!!

 

[jay helfert]

You lost me here. Could you elaborate? (on the underlined part I mean.)

Thanks... for all the reporting. Exemplary job!!

My co-directors Scott Smith and Justin ref'd the final three matches. Both are very capable officials and, in truth, working the shot clock and scoring device is more complicated. There are buttons to push and reset on each player's turn, and you must watch the clock closely at all times, and you have to keep track of time clock "extensions" and make sure you have the correct score. Sounds easy, but it required my 100% concentration.

 

[sjm]

My co-directors Scott Smith and Justin ref'd the final three matches. Both are very capable officials and, in truth, working the shot clock and scoring device is more complicated. There are buttons to push and reset on each player's turn, and you must watch the clock closely at all times, and you have to keep track of time clock "extensions" and make sure you have the correct score. Sounds easy, but it required my 100% concentration.

Just kidding here, of course, Jay. It was great seeing you in Vegas. Hope to catch up again soon.

 

[DogsPlayingPool]

I didn't know that about the soft break rule either and I was there Monday night thru Friday. But now I more fully appreciate the work you did all week Jay. I mean even when you weren't involved in a immediate situation you always were looking over all the matches in the entire room and now I understand that you had to always be aware when a new rack was being broken into so you would be in position to enforce that rule if you saw a violation.

 

[sjm]

Ok, I kind of missed the social recap, so here goes:

Caught up, in some cases just briefly, with these AZBers this week.

Boradriver, Nostroke, TheOne, Milo, Jay Helfert, Robroy (BCA Hall of Famer Robin Dodson), Collection Guru, Mark Griffin, Cris Delagarza, Vagabond, Jude Rosenstock, Bob Jewett, GG11, Crown City Corey, Fatboy, Melissa Herndon, Sarah Rousey, Liz Ford, Dan Barouty, Steve Lipsky, Marop, Williebetmore ...... and many more.

Two of the highlights of my week were a) a Tuesday breakfast with Williebetmore, Vagabond and a few others, and b) a Friday breakfast with Melissa Herndon and former WPBA pro Kristi Carter.

Other than the aformentioned pros who post here, I caught up with each of the following current pros whom I'm pleased to count as friends: Allison Fisher, Kim Shaw, Jennifer Barretta, Kelly Fisher, Val Finnie, Jeanette Lee, Jasmin Ouschan, Ralf Souquet, Jeremy Jones, Kim Davenport, Tony Robles, Max Eberle, Rodney Morris, Al Lapena, Thorsten Hohmann, Oliver Ortmann, Darren Appleton, Nick VanDenBerg ..... and many others.

I was also pleased to meet and chat with these pros for the first time: a) Karl Boyes, an animated, friendly, fellow from Blackpool, England, where I once vacationed, and b) Tony Drago, who is extremely amusing and very personable, and c) Neil Fujiwara, a very friendly guy I met at the Tiger booth.

I hadn't seen him for 28 years, but I caught up with Sal Butera (Lou's son), whom I last saw at the 1981 World Straight Pool Championships in New York City. He was quite impressed that I remembered his participation in that event.

Finally, I thought I'd relate that when Robroy (BCA Hall of Fame Robin Dodson) and I had a nice long chat, I complained at length to her that she seems to have, quite unfairly, staved off the aging process. I don't know how she does it, but Robin still manages to look very young over twenty five years after I first met her. She really looks great, as does my friend and former WPBA pro Darlene Stinson, who was working at Robin's booth.

Thanks to all for the companionship and the memories. We'll do it again soon.

... and, of course, before signing off, thank you to Matchroom Sports and Mark Griffin for everything you do for our sport.

 

[Fuji-whopper]

Great to finally meet you SJM, thank you for coming to the Tiger booth to introduce yourself. Your writing is amazing so thank you for taking the time to use your own words (and Wei layouts) to explain in detail what was happening for those of us that weren't able to watch the matches.

Thanks again and great to meet you!!

 

[JimS]

My co-directors Scott Smith and Justin ref'd the final three matches. Both are very capable officials and, in truth, working the shot clock and scoring device is more complicated. There are buttons to push and reset on each player's turn, and you must watch the clock closely at all times, and you have to keep track of time clock "extensions" and make sure you have the correct score. Sounds easy, but it required my 100% concentration.

Thanks Jay.

Sounds like you were entrusted with a duty that demanded quite a bit of knowledge, ability and integrity. That's not a small job and you, it seems to me, are the very definition of the "go to guy" when it's imperative that a job be done right the FIRST time.

SJM... you are a very knowledge and bright guy. I hope we meet up one day. Thanks again for your insights and the gift of energy you expended allowing us the privilege of experiencing your insights.

 

[Brian in VA]

Stu,

Thanks so much for these amazing reports, layouts and insightful analysis! I know how difficult it can be to produce these sorts of things and you've done an incredible job over the past nine days. I hope to make your acquaintance at a future event!

Best regards to you!

Brian in VA

 

[sjm]

I hope to make your acquaintance at a future event!

I'm about 50/50 for the US Open at Chesapeake in the fall. If you'll be there, Brian, PM me before the event begins, and, if I'm going, we can prearrange a hookup.