the IPT and the Provincial pool mind

[cheesemouse]

Sunday, the day the finals in Reno were to be played, I had to play in a local Ryder Cup golf event we have every year. My team, the public course, plays against the local Country Club. We each put up our best players and tee it up for the trophy...it is for bragging rights over the long winter to come. Now you may ask how this is IPT related?
After the matches were completed all 40 golfers were in the bar telling their lies about their bad lies( I like that sentence even if it is grammatically incorrect)...it just so happened that when I looked at the clock it registered to me that Reyes/Rodney were in the heat of battle as I sat there downing my cocktail. I looked around the room and counted the golfers who I would be playing against in the pool leagues this coming winter, out of 40 golfers there would be 11 pool league players. I thought to myself "I bet not one of these 11 has any idea the the BIGGEST prize in pool was being contested at this very moment"....I wasn't about to test this idea but I did insert in the conversation at my table of six, two of whom are avid pool players, that 500K was being disputed at this very time. Just as I suspected only blank stares, a short silence, and then one guy says "did you see the prize money that Russian girl won yesterday in the US Open Tennis yesterday?"...we here on this forum are a rare breed. We care about pool, we know what is going on in the game, we have hopes for it's future but for pool to make the bigtime somehow it has to be in the minds of those 11 guys........it's not.
From my experience the debate about the IPT is taking place in this small little bubble. The IPT could fold tomorrow and these 11 guys wouldn't know it and futhermore they would not give a $hit. Now, even knowing this is true I still hope that the efforts of the IPT succeed wildly because I'm a pool freak and so are you and there are damn few of us......
Will this post get any play? Will any of you reply with similiar experiences of how oblivious the run of the mill pool players are to the state of the game and to the IPT? Hell, I don't know. I'm just a poolplayer with a passion for the game and an Internet connection..... Is the IPT a good thing? Sure it is. It's something...

 

[ScottW]

I think it's human nature to, when someone is passionate about something, they can't understand why everyone ELSE isn't as well. Stems from a the whole 'everyone considers themselves normal' theory I've got.

Pool is a niche sport, in the end. Only a tiny percentage of the planet's population is *really* into it like the folks who participate on this forum. And we have the internet to thank that folks like us have a way to communicate, share thoughts, scream and yell at each other, etc. etc.

And I think that helps create a subconsious illusion that more folks are into what we're into - i.e. there are SO many people on this forum, that it's almost like a social circle - like the ones we have out in the Real World - and they subconsiously get thrown together in a sense. Subconsiously we expect that folks in one circle feel the same way as folks in another circle.

*shrug* I'm just tossing out thoughts here, I'm by no means a qualified anthropologist.

 

[rackmsuckr]

It is my belief that we need to get more regional, with feet on the street in every area of the world. We can start right here in the US. If the IPT were to design a poster, I know all of us IPT supporters would make sure copies got into our home rooms, golf courses, bars, etc. to advertise on a local level.

I think the IPT is considering regional sales managers to not only get merchandise into pro shops, but to get the word out more locally.