Hey Jam,
Tony was wearing the same shirt yesterday. It must be his "lucky attire" that he wears on Sunday like Tiger Woods wears red.
Tony told me that he might match up with Billy Bailey giving Billy the 7 ball, but nothing ever materialized. He also said that he was in negotiations to match up with Stevie even, but nothing came of that either. When I left the pool room yesterday afternoon, there were a few action guys on the scene, so I don't know if anyting happened last night or not.
I allso would like to give kudos to Danny Turner, a local guy who played well this weekend.
Shannon runs a great event, and Sporty's is a top notch pool room. I'm sure that with the success of the tournaments at the Palace and Sporty's, there will be at least 2 tournaments in Greenville worth attending each year.
In fact, we are lucky in Greenville to have the pool talent to watch and learn from. I don't think that there is a more concentrated area where the IPT is represented as well as it is around the upstate area. Stevie recently moved to Atlanta, but was born and raised around the Greenville area. Shannon Daulton is living here now. So are Sammy and Loree Jon Jones. We also have Mike Gulyassy who is a great player and cue maker who lives in Greenville. Larry Nevel lived in Greenville until a couple of months ago. Earl lives about 50 miles north of town and Grady Mathews lives in Columbia, SC less than 100 miles south of Greenville. We see both of them at alot of the local tournaments. Of course Tony Watson adds to the "action" side of things around.
It was great to have Monica and Helena around for the 2 events in Greenville. They are both class acts, and world class players. There are many excellent female players in the area, and they get a treat seeing in person how well Monica and Helena actually play.
Alice Rim also showed up as a railbird this weekend. I am more impressed with Alice, and her game each time that I am able to speak with her.
One other note of interest....I talked some to Mike Janis at the tournament and he told me that he has several tournaments planned in the Southeast between now and the $25,000 added Viking National Championships in November. So if anyone wants to play to get the free entry into the National Championships, they will get the opportunity over the next 6 weeks or so. We all miss Mike's tournaments (he hasn't had one in a few months), and look forward to the Viking events coming up in the area.
Mike
