I bet many of those comments, like most on Yahoo, are from the jackasses that are die hard, never miss a game, NFL, NBA, NHL or MLB fans, that NEVER played any of the games or if did, sputtered out around the age of 12. They are usually the drunken loud mouths at sporting events calling everyone a bum because they struck out, or threw an interception. The don't get it, and never will.
Pool is a sport, not a popular sport, or an athletic one, but one the requires very good eye hand coordination, the ability to have "touch", good eye sight, and the skills to know what spin to put on the cueball and when.
If it was NOT a sport, I should be able to teach my grandmother to play excellent pool But I can't. I should expect somone older than 50 to win a world championship, but we can't. Because one's skills, hand eye coordination and eye sight fade with age. Not so with games. Still plenty of top poker players, chess players and bridge players over the age of 50 !!!
If it was just a "game", those APA bangers who are stuck at a 3 or 4 rating for years are either mentally retarded, or lack the hand eye coordination and/or others skills it requires to move up a level or two
I tend to think they just don't have the skills. Not everyone has the eye hand coordination to really get good.
I find it funny that some folks compare it to checkers?? I can play checkers or chess, and have someone move the piece for me, I don't even need to be in the same room, building, city or even country with someone and I can still beat them in a chess match.
As long as Curling is a sport, and a recognized Olympic sport at that, than Billiards qualifies. If someone can win a Gold Medal for brushing ice with a broom, then they need to leave the insutls to pool the FCK alone :thumbup:
But the bottomline, I still don't believe Billiards is a good enough athletic endeavor to qualify for an Olympic sport. And it is also about the ratings, and though the ratings might go up in a few select countries for Snooker, the rest of the world would be changing the channel, and that means lost revenue. Nobody wants to spend $10B to buy the TV rights, and then have folks change the channel !!!