Ok, Steve pm'd me wanting to hear the stolen BB story so I'm going to put it here for everyone to enjoy.
Ok, I have a friend that is an amateur champion player. The guy shoots really really well. He was going to turn pro but ended up getting married and having a family instead. He owns a pool room about an hour and a half from here called "BB Billiards". The BB has no relation to Black Boar as far as I know.
Anyway, in one of the bigger tournaments he came out the winner and one of the prizes was a really nice leather Instroke 2x4 cases with "Tokai Champion" embroidered down the back spine of the case. I should mention now that he had placed a sticker on the lower end of the case with his pool room's name on it "BB".
Well, a few years ago he was at a tournament and when the day was over and done with everyone packed up their stuff and went their merry ways. My friend and a group of his buddies went out to dinner. Since Japan is not very dangerous as far as leaving your stuff around he had no problem leaving his cue case laying in the back seat of his car while he was in the restaurant. When he came out after dinner he noticed that someone had busted his back window and snatched his cue case.
Now, not only was this a custom case, inside the case was a very very expensive 8 point Black Boar cue. Maple forearm with 8 ivory points, malachite diamonds surrounded in silver lining the area above and below the wrap......the type of cue that Tikkler would have in his collection. I believe he said he paid about 26 thousand for it.
Well, the cue was gone. He called the cops but there really isn't anything they could do about it.
Well, about 2 years pass and he gets a call from one of his customers saying "I think your cue is up for sale on Yahoo Auction." so he logs on and sure enough, there is a photo of his Black Boar, his break cue and that leather Instroke case with "Tokai Champion" embroidered down the back.....with the BB sticker at the bottom. Let us not forget that Black Boar has BB inlayed in silver on the butt end of their cues.
Well, the description read (rough translation)
"BB billiard cue and BB real leather case. Good condition....yada yada"
Starting price...........30 bucks.
Turns out that the person that had the cue up for sale was a recycle shop, kind of like a pawn shop. He contacted them and told them the situation that it was his cue that was stolen out of his car etc... etc... and he got his stuff back, but he had to pay the 30 bucks. Looks like the guy that stole the stuff pawned it at their shop. He didn't know what he had and the pawn shop knew nothing about cues. They paid him 30 bucks for the whole shebang but get this, the reason they gave him so much for it was because the case is real leather. They said they gave him 10 bucks for the cues and 20 for the case so when they put it up on auction they just wanted to get their money back.....so he obliged them and paid it.
Here in Japan it would be a huge stigma for that shop if they were known to have purchased stolen goods so they asked my friend not to get the police involved. They really didn't know who brought it in anyway so the only thing getting the police involved would do is but a black mark on their shop. Hey, that's the way they do things here, so he didn't push it. He was just happy to have his cue back.
Needless to say he hasn't left his cue in his car since.
And that is my stolen Black Boar story. A $26,000 cue for 30 bucks because the case is real leather. hahahahaha!!!
MULLY
yes, this story is 100% true
now i want the group pics of your 3 BB cues ..:thumbup: