Tour Ideas Needed

M

MikeJanis

Banned
Hello everyone. I'm Mike Janis from the Viking Cue 9-Ball Tour.

I am looking for some ideas on how to make our great sport better for everyone.

Here is my dilemma. I'm trying to figure out a way to combine the existing regional tours into one big one. Or at least for now, I'm trying to figure out how we (the different tours) could work together to make things better for everyone.

I welcome any suggestions or constructive comments.

Some of the current issues I have encountered........

Each tour has a different title sponsor and we don't want to alienate anyone. Especially the sponsors.

Each tour has a tour card fee and/or other fees that we don't want to share with each other because it helps fund the operation of each tour.

Each tour operates in a different region.

And the biggest problem is... How exactly will the non-professional players benefit from the regional tours working together?

I look forward to any and all Ideas.

Mike Janis
President / Founder
The Viking Cue 9-Ball Tour
 
Mike,

Did you ever think of having all the differn't regional tour winners face one another for a grand tour champion.Maybe,winner take all.The differn't tours could each throw some money into the pot.Just a thought.
 
Mike,
Ever consider have an Armed Forces Tour in the US only? A tour that is open to Department of Defense members only! "Uncle Sam wants you" to "Aim High" and "be all you can be"! haha!! I'm looking into getting something like this started, but will need much help from outside of the Military from companies in our (the billiards) industry!
Thanks Mike,
Zim
 
Dear Mike, Viking Tours has an opportunity to attract crowds, negotiate Televison coverage, and generate national interest if they would consider a combined Senior Tour&WPBA nine ball event. The event should be staged at a family friendly venue, not a casino which harkens up only gambling images,preferably a large resort Hotel, and it should be be filled with charity "beat the Pro" , meet the pro' Lessons and exhibitons from the pro" events. Even a Pro am pretournament teams event for charity would bring in community involvement. A thouroghbred professional events coordinator and negotiator could make this an annual National Treasure for billiards and revive a sport which is caught curently on its own self absorbed contradictions. Having the person with the vision and persistance and Professionalism to accomplish this will not be an easy find , but anything less will produce another "kiss the Tar Baby " just another promoter led event. Pool is a sport that needs a Break Out and the talent and Luck to provide that are there but not yet coordinated.
 
You could have 4 Major Tournies............likes golf and tennis. Open for the top 20 players or so from each small tour. Combining each of the other tours sponsors together for the 4 Majors. Which would make for 4 huge tournaments a year.
 
Mike

Get with me off the board and possibly we can have a discussion about this. We all know what has not worked in the past. You are working with a great company that has done its best to make sure that there are great events all over the country. Many people are tired of the "mob mentality" and bullying that has been going on for years. As a player that has been around a while, I have seen tours come and go, and I have seen the mistakes that obviously nobody has learned from. Above all else, we need make sure that all decisions are made in the best interest of the game. Many decisions are made with finances being the main concern. We need to understand that if our product is honest, sincere, and well put together by people with good intentions, the financial gains will soon follow. The problem with pool, is that we need to stop throwing money at it. Camel threw a ton of money at pool and it made no difference.

We also need to get our high profiles players to the forefront. I cannot tell you the last time I tuned in to ESPN and saw a profile done on a pool player, male or female. I'm not talking about interviews, I am talking about doing a 1 minute segment on the player, his life and his personality. A one minute profile on players like Mike Massey, Tom Kennedy, Tom Rossman, or Robin Dodson would do much to bury the poor image of our sport. This is where the problem is....
 
Hello Mike,
I'm Tim Higgins, Tour Director for the Lucasi Cues Florida & Carolinas Amateur 9-Ball Tours. I am now setting up individual state tours that run independently of themselves with regional event coordinators all headed under one group, Kings Bay Promotions, Inc. Lucasi Cues is a wonderful tour sponsor and have supported us all the way!!!
My first comment to your posting is that this is the first time I have ever heard another tour group in our sport hold up the peace pipe like that. You have already made the first hurdle.
Secondly, I would be very interested in seeing something like you are proposing come about.
Last, but not least, count me in. Teamwork can be a great asset.
Tim Higgins
Kings Bay Promotions, Inc.
higgins3@gate.net
 
The only thing i see a frustrating is this..... people that live in the Midwest only get about 6 Big Tourn. a year and the bad thing is 2 of them(Derby, Windy City) fall the same Month a week apart. now the average working man cant take this much time off to attend. I see around the country alot of areas getting their own tour going. What about the Midwest. Here in Indianapolis home of Jeanette Lee and we dont see anything major except her charity events that dont draw but 1 or 2 BIG names. Viking i believe only offers 4-5 stops in the area a year and for people in Indy that means 1.5-6 hour drive depending on where the stop is. More stops in the Midwest(Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, Kentucky) would be nice.
Mickey and Billy's in Ft. Wayne offers 2 nice size tourn a year, Derby city classic, Windy City,the new Expo coming this fall in Chicago and about 4 Viking stops and Indiana has to travel some kind of a distance for the others.
I understand there are regualtions to meet the standards of the Viking tour and not all rooms qualify but dang i bet Chalkies (Ms. Lee's home room) would work out well. Thanks for listening hope to see Viking around this neighborhood soon.
 
Well, one thing you can consider is having a 128 player field super tournament with each spot going to a local tour winner. If, on the local level, every player pays $100 to enter and all of that money is put toward travel and funding the super tournament, you can generate a HUGE pay-out for the final event. Assuming each local tournament can draw 32 players and half would be used for travel, you can generate $1600 per individual. Multiply that by 128 players and you've got a total purse of over $200,000 and I haven't even factored in what sponsors could potentially add.

I know that organzing such an event would be murder but the result would be downright amazing. You can have players wear regional tour shirts and seed the tournament according to geographical region. Imagine The North playing the South in the semi-finals of the winners side and the East playing the West in the finals of the winner's side. Imagine one of the Joss Tour representatives matching up with one of the Viking tour representatives and keeping track of the event by the number of representatives of a given tour remaining in the event?

I don't organize tournaments so I couldn't even begin to imagine the logisitical problems in all this. It sure would be nice though.


Jude M. Rosenstock
 
Tour ideas

Mike .... You need to contact
Evelyn and Danny Dysert at
Edd@poncacity.net in Ponca City, Ok..

They run the Midwest 9 ball tour that plays in Ok, Tx, Ks, Mo, Ia, and Illinois that I know of.

They would be interested in your Regional tournaments idea.

They run a good tournament ...

They are at 7 Clans Casinos in Red Rock, Ok. this coming weekend (Fri-Sun) for a good sized tournament (probably 100-128 players, $7,000 added).
 
If you really want to affect the sport and break new ground I would recommend taking the big step that needs to be taken soon and ditch 9-ball as the game.

Seriously if the sponser would go for it try a rotation style game with all 15 balls being used and the number of the ball being the point count (aka the 3 ball is worth 3 points, the 12 is worth 12, ect....). Make matches be played to 1000 points or so and you bring back the excitement and stat collection/records that straight pool had in big point runs and yet you have a much more interesting game with amazing shots being made. Make a foul worth 2 points, the incomming shooter has the option to shoot or pass after the foul. Scratches cost 2 points and leave the opponent placing the ball on the headstring and shooting in any direction.

This game would still be played on 4 1/2 x 9 tables so you have no great cost switching over. The rules are quite simple and combine some of the best parts of 9-ball, straight pool, and snooker. The only thing that would need to be developed would be a new score keeping system that could handle the 1000 points and make it easy to add up. a bead setup like this.....

IOOOOOOOOOO-----------------------------I
IOOOOOOOOOO-----------------------------I
IOOOOOOOOOO-----------------------------I

With different colors for each level of beads. The top level is the 100 level and each bead represents 100 points. The middle level beads represent 10 points each. The bottom level beads are worth 1 point each. AKA if you make 57 points you move 7 of the bottom beads and 5 of the middle beads. If you then make 48 points you move 8 of the bottom beads (yet their are only 3 left so you add the 7 beads to the 8 to get 15 and therefore make it five beads on the bottom and then move 5 beads on the middle row. You are left with....

IOOOOOOOOOO-----------------------------I
I-----------------------------OOOOOOOOOOI
IOOOOO-----------------------------OOOOOI

or

IOOOOOOOOO-----------------------------OI
IOOOOOOOOOO-----------------------------I
OOOOO------------------------------OOOOOI

both of which represent 105 points. Fairly simple for both the fans and the players. Just an idea I thought up while writing this since you would need some system. A better one could be thought up maybe.

This game has alot more of a chance to impress the fans then 9-ball ever did. Runs of 3 tables would be amazing. The first large runs of 500 points or more would be huge news. Running a set would almost be unheard of yet if someone did it the amount of press it would get in pool magazines and the like would be unreal.

I have a feeling many of the top players would be very interested in a game like this. This game would allow the cream to rise to the top and make for great battles between the top players. You of course know many of the top players and you and them could tweak the rough draft of rules and the basics which I dreamed up in order to make the game perfect.

Now Viking would not have to worry about combining the tours. You would have a new game that would very likely take over as the premier pool game in America and the World once the players and fans caught on. Viking would lead the way much as Brunswick did in the straight pool era. Straight pool was passed on by 9-ball even though it was once the premier game that the pros played. This was due to flaws in the game of straight pool as a spectator sport and a pro-level game. 9-ball has some flaws in it that will not allow it to last forever as the premier game (one main one is it's ease and the bottleneck at the top of the game for the many top players and also the constant problems with the break/soft break/sardo/ect...)


[edit]

OK so I tested the game out for a while. It is kind of gimp since the beginning of the game is one massive safety battle in which safeties are very easy to get due to the number of balls and playing runs in the beginning is not worth it for points unless the table is very wide open. When the run becomes easy during the last 8 balls or so the points become staggering also which is a lame risk vs reward setup.

New idea I came up with though that I tested and works awesome. From the 1 to 5 ball the points are 1 to 5. At the six ball the points revert back to 1 and then go to 5 for the 10 ball. The 11 is worth 1 and the 15 worth 5 again. This way runs at the beginning of the game are not meaningless (as they seemed in the initial idea) A run from the 1 to the 5 is worth 15 points which is the same as running the 11 to the 15.

The fouls for 2 points a miss does not work well in practice. I think maybe ball in hand for scratches and fouls might actually be the way to go and no points.

With the number of balls on the table the chances of fluking balls when looking at a impossible shot is almost a curse. It is often better to blast a pack as more times then not something will find a pocket. Therefore I do think called shots (ball and pocket only such as 8-ball with no need to call kisses/combos/banks/ect...) are needed. Any balls that go in along with the called ball would count as long as the inital called shot goes in.

This game in practice worked really well. The number of points on the table is 45 each rack. The matches could be played to 300 or so for pro level events.
 
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