Thoughts about state of pool.

Poolmanis

Poolmanis

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Hello. First i have to say I'm from Finland so my english is not so good but here we go nonetheless...:wink:

I don't write here much but i like to visit here often because lot of cool knowledge and stories.
Lately there have been a lot of threads about state of pool nowadays and they got me thinking... Also i watched interesting general talk about pool in CSIpodcast.
They have surely knowledge about financial problems of pool. Both, players and commercial sides.

Instead people suggesting different tournament structures and tv coverage's and all kind of good but minor suggestions they could do just a little things what really matters to bring pool more popular and famous locally.

I really can't write what i mean but i try.. I use example of younger me in past.


I'm from little town northern Finland and i learned play pool by myself and i got really hooked in to it. I studied it A LOT and made slow progress.. Our pool hall owner was smart businessman and he offered me free games and practice if i help him to deal with junior players.
We had plan to get billiards famous on that town so people come to play pool daily and we did it..
First we arranged absolutely free tournament's to 8-16 year old child's. Before tournament we teach basics of hitting pool ball and rules of 8-ball. Then they have fun competition and bests got pool hall t-shirt and free table time cards. Then i shoot some trickshots and we ask kids if they are interested about learning play pool really good and doing competing. We then form group about 6 to 10 kids who are taught by me(for free) and really cheap practice time from owner(playing still costs). We also did go places where young people like to hang and play pool and ping pong and did some teaching and shows there for free...
After 1-2 year we started get results.. we got first junior Finnish pool champions medal and my little sister came 5th on European championships for girls. We contacted local newspapers and got lot of interest..
Time goes by and I teach new kids and we get real champions whom win Finnish champs for juniors and get medals from European champs..

Local media get stories time to time from us and we get good image and pool hall comes big success. Whole town know something about pool and it now does have sporty image there.
I get good experience and joy from young guns success. And I also get good players to play against myself.

What I try to tell with this story that everyone can make our loved game have better image and more people in it!
This kinda work is just influencing locally but if this happens many cities then it's getting big suddenly..
Also I like to mention this kinda act bring spectators to game too... They wanna see how their friends,family... And so on does in competitions.

I probably forgot to add something but maybe you guys get the idea behind this.
You can't build house so you make roof first. Same goes to pool also. :)
 
Great story, the room owner that helped you had the foresight to develop young players, which was truly a long-term investment in his business as well as the for pool in Finland.
 
Nice Story

Poolmanis said:
Hello. First i have to say I'm from Finland so my english is not so good but here we go nonetheless...:wink:

I don't write here much but i like to visit here often because lot of cool knowledge and stories.
Lately there have been a lot of threads about state of pool nowadays and they got me thinking... Also i watched interesting general talk about pool in CSIpodcast.
They have surely knowledge about financial problems of pool. Both, players and commercial sides.

Instead people suggesting different tournament structures and tv coverage's and all kind of good but minor suggestions they could do just a little things what really matters to bring pool more popular and famous locally.

I really can't write what i mean but i try.. I use example of younger me in past.


I'm from little town northern Finland and i learned play pool by myself and i got really hooked in to it. I studied it A LOT and made slow progress.. Our pool hall owner was smart businessman and he offered me free games and practice if i help him to deal with junior players.
We had plan to get billiards famous on that town so people come to play pool daily and we did it..
First we arranged absolutely free tournament's to 8-16 year old child's. Before tournament we teach basics of hitting pool ball and rules of 8-ball. Then they have fun competition and bests got pool hall t-shirt and free table time cards. Then i shoot some trickshots and we ask kids if they are interested about learning play pool really good and doing competing. We then form group about 6 to 10 kids who are taught by me(for free) and really cheap practice time from owner(playing still costs). We also did go places where young people like to hang and play pool and ping pong and did some teaching and shows there for free...
After 1-2 year we started get results.. we got first junior Finnish pool champions medal and my little sister came 5th on European championships for girls. We contacted local newspapers and got lot of interest..
Time goes by and I teach new kids and we get real champions whom win Finnish champs for juniors and get medals from European champs..

Local media get stories time to time from us and we get good image and pool hall comes big success. Whole town know something about pool and it now does have sporty image there.
I get good experience and joy from young guns success. And I also get good players to play against myself.

What I try to tell with this story that everyone can make our loved game have better image and more people in it!
This kinda work is just influencing locally but if this happens many cities then it's getting big suddenly..
Also I like to mention this kinda act bring spectators to game too... They wanna see how their friends,family... And so on does in competitions.

I probably forgot to add something but maybe you guys get the idea behind this.
You can't build house so you make roof first. Same goes to pool also. :)
Click to expand...

I also saw the Podcast # 10. I watched 9 as well. I think Pool is set to start an upward turn. Positive things are happening in pool just like the story you told about good things that happened where you are. I was watching league play in my home room yesterday as I was playing my Sunday match and I tried to think what pool was like for me when I was where the league players. I think league pool is awesome. The people are interested, they are having fun and pool is important to them. I think those are the principles that will be at the core of rebuilding pool from the ground up. I don't think we are set to get all of the new players in that we need just yet but when we do I think the pool league system will be there to handle the influx of new players. I think that we will have something perhaps different they we envisioned but I think it will perhaps be workable for building the sport and that will be better than where we have been. All of this is just my opinion of course but I see the negatives giving way to new positives and new positives bring in more business for room owners and that gives the industry something to hold on to.
 
Great story thanks for sharing that no doubt that pool needs more young people
Most pool rooms in the US have to sell booze to make enough profit to stay open
so no kids allowed and most parents think the pool hall is not a good place for the kids
to hang out and for the most part that is true.
Not sure what can be done to change that image but there is hope with people like
Mark Wilson and his program at Lindenwood University Billiards.
1st thing we need is more respectable places to play
so kids can have access to pool and people like you that care to teach them .
 
Your English is very good; far better than my Finnish.

It sounds to me like your advantage was that pool didn't have a negative image in Finland like it does in the U.S. It would be VERY difficult to convince the parents of 8-14 year olds to allow their children in a pool hall. The U.S. image of pool halls is a place for drunken gamblers who will never amount to anything.

There's been some attempt to include pool tables in "family fun centers" along with other games like foosball, darts, etc., but they take up a lot of square footage for the amount of revenue they generate.
 
That's a great story and some very forward thinking by the pool room owner. It's absolutely a great long term plan of seed planting to have a much bigger field of "crops" later down the road. Back in the day, it was common to work hard upfront for payment afterwards. These days, it's about getting things now and wanting the rewards upfront before actually working for it. That's why we have nothing but debts now. Pool is mostly being demolished by those looking for the quick cash and don't care how many empty pockets are left getting it. It's possible to pull pool out of the bars and have it flourish in environments more oriented to children and family outings. But that would mean you'd have to do more than put in a table with a sign that read "cold beer". I've been frequenting a pool hall that gave up it's liquor license (due to cost) a few months back. While I watched many regular and would be customers walk out due to no alcohol, I've seen just as many new faces from all walks coming in now. The difference in demeanor, courtesies, and overall atmosphere is in stark contrast to what I witness in any other pool hall. There is a very large market of non-drinking players and would be players that typically have more time and money to invest because they're not ingesting a good portion of their income.
 
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Thanks. I just used my story to example. What I tried to say we all can make pool scene better by making little things ... Not necessary teaching kids.
It could be anything.. Dunno what though but that why I made this topic to bring that idea on peoples mind here at azb.:)
I'm sure one thing is local news and newspapers could be used to get more publicity to pro speed tournaments around.
 
And as you all know we need to make positive snowball effect to get pool rolling.
>people's interested >more tv maybe>sponsors getting on pool also outside pool scene>more prize money> more pro players
 
Good post!

Good for the pool room owner, nice guy :).

I can relate to your story, something similar but I was cleaning the new pool room on the country club 1/4 of a mile away when I was 14 (oldest allowed to play was 16), until they found someone permanent, got hooked since day one. Started playing here and there, before opening time and after closing. When I was 16, started playing regularly, learning as I went, no tutor or instructor and became a little more than average. By the time I was about to be 18 entered my first tournament, 4th place, a trophy ...woohoo!, felt like a champ. What got my attention was that everybody playing was educated, well dressed professionals, a couple of them took time to teach me a few things but on a regular basis, shocked that some rich guy would pay attention to me. There was a dress code for tournaments, no profanities, quite room, referee wearing tie and all. I really liked that environment, I was a poor guy mingling with a higher social status playing pool, by the way, was a 15 ball rotation to 61, almost like Filipino style. We were living in the Dominican Republic and my family went back to Italy so I decided to come to the US in 1984. As soon as I was familiar with New York, started looking for pool halls to play, visited a few but rapidly became frustrated and sad that I couldn'y find a place like home to play, stopped playing completely. Fast forward 30 years and the pool fever came back, joined APA league on sundays and played a session for 3 months.
Still having issues with how much pool playing have degraded, today pool playing is a bar activity and not taken seriously anymore, no respect for the sport as it should, wish that the days of Mosconi with a suite will come back. To me started dying when games and rules started to change for the sake of speeding up the game and TV convenience, 8 and 9 ball rules like ball in hand anywhere in the table, no balls spotted after making a ball not intended, no call balls or pockets, handicap situations, etc., you guys get the point. Wish the true pool paying were govern by a set rules we all should follow like any other sport. Shame that what we love to do is better learned playing for money, forced to think carefully when playing, would like to see a serious, player centered set of rules, where players are awarded for their accomplishments, not punishing the failures, like giving ball in hand anywhere in the table to your opponent when you don't hit your object ball, loss of turn is more than a enough for me, never knew that it actually existed as a rule when I played 9 ball here for the first time.
Just had my new toy installed last week, here is the pic.,

https://www.dropbox.com/s/7go0th4uk9zyzg5/IMAG0095.jpg?dl=0

Sorry for the long post, anyone feel the same way?
There are 15 balls on the rack, why play with only 9? :), bring back the 15 ball rotation call ball and pocket back :).

Marcos
 
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