Story - Unknown Hustler

[Ak147]

Unknown Hustler

Just returning back from Asia pool challenge event in Saigon, Vietnam It is an amature pool team event where you would see top amature in action from the asia region.

Stuart Petttman ex snooker pro was at the event as team manager for Bangkok team. He is still very active with pool and playes with top pool pro for money. He had won against Aloysius Yapp last year for money.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuart_Pettman

Anyways an unknown guy from Seoul ask Stuart to play for money and everyone thought he was crazy. His teammates were like why don't you play against us first. Even though this unknown guy appeared solid player but no one put money on him as everyone thought had no chance against Stuart. They agreed to play 10 ball race to 11 for 500 or 1000 and Stuart gave him 2 racks.

Unfortunately i did't see the game as i was tired and i thought it would be one sided affair anyways. It turned out to be that way but in favour of guy from Seoul 11-6.

Wonder how many unknown player out there who are pro speed but not on the tour.

 

[ROB.M]

Player

In Asia there is a strong player on every block in every city...
Most of there internet is restricted or nonexistent.







Rob.M

 

[alphadog]

Just because the guy won does not make him equall or better then Stuart. I wish everyone had a chance to watch Schmidt beat CJ 10 ahead in like 45 minutes. Schmidt got all the oppurtunities and made the most of them. CJ made 1 or 2 errors. That was all the chances he got.

Consider this, if 2 equall players play any race,7,11,21,1000, todays results might be exact opposite of tomorrows,and so on.

Pool is not golf you dont get equall chances.

Forgot to add "HUSTLERS" dont usually match up with the strongest player first. Unless of course if there is "complicity".

 

[Ak147]

It may not make him better than Stuart but certainly he is at pro speed. Not many players can win Stuart for money that convicingly.

 

[PhilosopherKing]

When Shane played Mika in New York there were three guys from Japan in the front beating everyone. Lo Li Wen was one of them.

When Kevin Cheng first came over, the story is he and his partner were able to play in the amateur division of some BCA type of event.

 

[ghost ball]

....................

 

[HaroldWilson]

Just returning back from Asia pool challenge event in Saigon, Vietnam It is an amature pool team event where you would see top amature in action from the asia region.

Stuart Petttman ex snooker pro was at the event as team manager for Bangkok team. He is still very active with pool and playes with top pool pro for money. He had won against Aloysius Yapp last year for money.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuart_Pettman

Anyways an unknown guy from Seoul ask Stuart to play for money and everyone thought he was crazy. His teammates were like why don't you play against us first. Even though this unknown guy appeared solid player but no one put money on him as everyone thought had no chance against Stuart. They agreed to play 10 ball race to 11 for 500 or 1000 and Stuart gave him 2 racks.

Unfortunately i did't see the game as i was tired and i thought it would be one sided affair anyways. It turned out to be that way but in favour of guy from Seoul 11-6.

Wonder how many unknown player out there who are pro speed but not on the tour.

There are hundreds if not thousands of pro speed players who do not compete on the tour. I was a UK 9-ball pro and then semi pro journeyman for many years and travelled to around 20+ countries playing against some of the top pro players across Europe and Asia often making the final stages of big events. At my highest points I was going hill hill with players such as Imran Majid, Denis Grabe etc and taking everyone else out underneath that level, knocking in centuries in snooker practice and even went hill hill with Judd Trump in a tournament.

Anyway I did a 2 year stint playing in Indonesia when i was studying and was playing money games every day of the week against pro standard players who slept on the pool room floor at the end of every evening and worked 6 days a week, 12 hrs a day for less than $100 a month. These guys played under backers and lived and breathed the game and often had pure natural raw talent which would be a match for any of the professionally coached players I have seen.

With a pool room on virtually every corner, I learnt more about the game and about my own speed during that time than at any other stage of the 25 odd years I have been playing competitively. I can run racks and used to like walking around dressed up smart with my hair slicked back but I no longer consider myself a good player after these experiences and i left with a severely bruised ego and a much more realistic outlook on my limitations. There is nothing like playing a local at midnight who is running rack upon rack during a monsoon with buckets catching the water from the leaking roof around the table in front of a smoke filled room full of spectators. I have friends there who are completely unknown outside of Indonesia who have hammered visiting players such as Ralf Souqet under tournament conditions.

When you talk to a lot of pros the first thing they say is that the only reason they started playing tournaments is because they got too well known as money players. If you check Youtube there are teenagers in the Philippines who are giving starts to Efren, Alcano and Bustamante and hammering them in money matches as well as taking apart visitors such as Thorsten Hohmann, Niels Feijen etc whilst wearing shorts, singlets and sandles

These are good ones to watch and u can come across players like this in a lot of places:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qz1UvMaFW8U
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OozxcYRmhbA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QELdvlzXrac

 

[Ak147]

Thanks Harold for the story. This was my first hand experience which has changed my view about pool pros for sure

 

[Lesh]

Something that struck me as I overheard a couple backers talking about their players during their set.... it was like the players were animals or not even life forms. "Yeah he's been killing me lately, I gotta get rid of him soon for all the money I'm pouring down this bottomless pit. I paid 8 grand for him from "So-and-so" for 3 months and I'm never gonna see the good side of it."

And the kid he was talking about was around 20... maybe 22. Really nice looking kid that had absolutely no clue what was going on. I was looking at my friend, who is absolutely no newbie. he came from New York and confirmed that this kind of thing has been going on since pool was invented. Kinda chilling. Im sure in any case where gambling is involved, there are similar situations and 'arrangements' made. But this just sat very wrong with me. I wanted to pummel the backer.

Reading this thread about how guys are sleeping on pool room floors like a stable. Im pretty sure that Efren came up the same way. So did Earl and many countless others.... sad.

Lesh

 

[HaroldWilson]

Something that struck me as I overheard a couple backers talking about their players during their set.... it was like the players were animals or not even life forms. "Yeah he's been killing me lately, I gotta get rid of him soon for all the money I'm pouring down this bottomless pit. I paid 8 grand for him from "So-and-so" for 3 months and I'm never gonna see the good side of it."

And the kid he was talking about was around 20... maybe 22. Really nice looking kid that had absolutely no clue what was going on. I was looking at my friend, who is absolutely no newbie. he came from New York and confirmed that this kind of thing has been going on since pool was invented. Kinda chilling. Im sure in any case where gambling is involved, there are similar situations and 'arrangements' made. But this just sat very wrong with me. I wanted to pummel the backer.

Reading this thread about how guys are sleeping on pool room floors like a stable. Im pretty sure that Efren came up the same way. So did Earl and many countless others.... sad.

Lesh

It is sad but it can cut both ways. I have a friend in Indonesia who backs players and has a house with a very good pool room. Every time I am in town he has a new unknown young player from a poor city and gets the parents permission to have the kid stay at his house and basically works with them day and night on the game before taking them around.

In some ways it is exploitation, in others the kid is getting to live a good lifestyle while it lasts and also makes more money than he can in his home city and of course has opportunities to move onto bigger things. A little bit like a boxer from a poor neighbourhood. I suppose it is good for them while it lasts but it is a dog eat dog world and someone better often seems to take their place but if they have something really special they can make a decent living from it in a third world country and opportunities in some of these places often never happen in most peoples lifetimes.