Some of the things in this thread are mind boggling. Snooker & pool are 2 different animals, realistically the different variations of pool, 14-1, 9 ball, 10 ball, one pocket are all different animals requiring varying skill sets. Snooker has a tour, it's top players can more than a comfortable living, pool does not, it never has & therein lies its problem. Anyone that has ever excelled in any cue sport realizes the time & dedication it requires to become world class. The problem has always been that for everything you have to put into it to reach an elite level there is no return on it, only a small handful can make enough $ to not have a regular job & devote their life to their craft, this reason is why gambling has always been so prevalent. Players had to resort to the road & gambling in order to NOT have to keep a regular job to survive. This reason is truly why there has never been a functional tour where pools top players can make a good enough living to forgo gambling. Potential corporate sponsors have 0 desire to be associated with the negative specter of gambling. Therein lies the conundrum, sponsors don't want to be associated with gambling so there's no tour, players gamble because there is no tour that provides a way to make a living at the skill they've dedicated their life to developing & on & on like a dog chasing its tail & never catching it. This bleeds down, it isn't that this sport isn't appealing to young people, it's that for the time & dedication you must invest to become great, there's no return, no endgame. Therefore pool over the last 40 years since I became involved in it is something that's considered to be a denizen for gamblers, hustlers, louts & layabouts like myself. Because this is how it's perceived no corporate sponsor will touch it & why it's wrongly perceived as not being a sport which is a travesty as I believe it's the greatest sport that's ever existed. It really has nothing to do with schools or formal instruction or anything of the kind. In my time I've known thousands of world class talents that no ones ever heard of that hung it up just for the simple fact that in order to have a family or what most consider a normal life, a home, a family, stability they had to give up what they loved to get a job to support that life. Only those willing to live a relatively lone existence chasing their dream of making a living at this game IE, traveling, gambling, getting a game wherever they can stay in it & forgo what most consider to be a normal existence, it's just the way it is. For those who want to denigrate American players & their skill sets vs snooker players, I offer you this. Step out of your comfortable world of arriving at a tour event well rested in your cute little vest where you'll earn thousands for just showing up without having pocketed a ball & step into a world where you drive all night in a cramped car, eat at some chain diner, check into a modest motel in the interests of bankroll management, get a few hours sleep & then set off to find a game understanding that your continued existence counts not only on finding that game but winning it & failure to do so places you in a precarious position. Match up & grind for 8,10, 36 hours in a hostile environment where no one is rooting for you & if you take it down & get out you have to think about getting back to your motel without getting robbed or worse, try that for a few years & tell how it sits with you. As far as American players or those that play pool venturing into the snooker world, well as you can see, not many have, not because they can't but because they're just not interested, it's a different game & it's not popular here because most consider it boring, hence the lack of snooker tables here. Those that have, Cory Duell, Pagulayan, it's about $, not a love for the game. At the end of the day it's a travesty Pool isn't perceived as a sport for reasons I've already mentioned but to suggest American pool players aren't as skilled as snooker players because of a lack of a formal training school or that we don't have a tour because of a lack of a formal training school to develop upcoming players is ludicrous. Pro pool players do take their craft seriously but are jaded by a lack of a way to earn a living at it without having to gamble & it's gambling that keeps a corporate sponsor from backing a reputable tour, not because of unskilled players or pros who don't take it seriously.
Why am I the Colonel? Because I always get the chicken
Either I'm not communicating properly, or you just aren't understanding. I give up.
