I really had a great time at the tournament. The Marietta Billiard Club was HUGE.
The place was spotless. Kim Davenport was wearing every hat you can imagine. Johnny was everywhere and the tournament sped by so fast, I couldn't even make my normal phone calls to pool friends who I normally update when I go out of town to tournaments. (Sorry EVERYONE! :embarrassed2
This tournament started off the way I like them to start off. One of my buddies had just purchased a beautiful PENTHOUSE in Brookhaven. He had a Diamond 9 footer installed by Mark Gregory just days prior to my arrival. My buddy had room for another tournament buddy of mine and myself and invited us to visit him and play in the tournament. Saving the dough on the hotel and auto rental were big plusses financially but having someone who had a GPS in their car and to chauffeur us around for the entire tournament was the NUTS!
The neat thing about his penthouse is that it was one small city block away from the MARTA, the popular rail system in Atlanta. It is cheap and FAST to get around. For those of you who need the inside scoop, there are TWO NORTHERN bound MARTA trains, one going to the NORTH and one going to the NORTHEAST. Naturally I took the North bound one when I should have taken the Northeastern bound train but it was so quick that I didn't even get annoyed at myself for not knowing about the two different northern trains. I was headed to Brookhaven where his penthouse is located.
I have to tell you I was not too happy to hear that we would be playing on Olhausen tables. They aren't my favorite table by any stretch of the imagination however was I ever surprised. These 9 footers had new ARAMITH cloth on the tables and they played PERFECTLY. I had been warned about the unique properties of the pockets. The Olhausen pockets look like caverns but are tricky. Hit the outside facing with a little speed and the deep shelves and unusual cuts of the pockets will send you to your chair with a long face. Luckily that didn't happen to often to me. I think I saw Johnny Archer get sent to the chair twice for the same problem so I don't feel too bad at all.
There was good food to be had, bathrooms that were kept clean from the beginning to the end and that is hard to do when you have HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE eating and drinking all day and night.
The tournament was a great success. Sold out way before tournament day with people on the waiting list. There were big names everywhere you looked.
My first match was against my friend John Schmidt. Wouldn't you know it? My buddies and I had bought him in the blind Calcutta for some pretty good bucks. I just told them I would go along with whatever they decided and they didn't hesitate to spend some of my money. :smile: I knew John was enjoying playing with his OB2 and his break cue is also an OB cue so I thought he would be in stroke for the tournament and told my buds that. The very first match I'm see-sawing with John. He probably felt kind of sorry for me.
I got some rolls and played pretty decent and had John stuck 4-3 and was licking my chops. It was about then that my buddies hollered at me that I was beating our horse and that if I wanted some place to sleep that night I had better let up on him. (That was a lie, not about the score but about them wanting me to let up on him).
John started getting a couple of rolls mixed in with some good plays.. but OH I forgot. Like usual at the beginning of the tournament I was mixing it up with Earl Strickland, Scotty Townsend and John Schmidt and John was trying the SLOW BREAK, but it wasn't working too good. As I made my way around the tournament room, I spoke to Shawn Putnam about John trying to slow break and he said it wasn't going to work on those Olhausens and boy was he right. I reported back to John about what Putnam had said and when I started playing John, he wasn't experimenting with the slow break any longer.
Earl was GREAT. He had a VERY GOOD IDEA which I will be implementing from now on at tournaments I go to play in. I asked him if I could share the table with him as he was playing alone and everyone was kind of just watching him play at a distance. He said sure and he continued hitting balls while I just stood there. He would miss a tough shot and set it up again and again until he owned the shot and finally the table was cleared and he dug the ten balls out of the pockets and threw them on the table and said "Go Ahead". I was kind of taken aback for a couple of seconds when I realized that we wouldn't be sparring, and that's when I remembered a suggestion that was made to me several months ago about playing in tournaments. The suggestion was, "Don't compete just before a tournament", just practice making balls and gettin comfortable with the equipment and the pool room sounds and noises. I started off pretty good running out the rack. I was hoping to impress Earl enough that he wouldn't be too disappointed in sharing his table with me. We did that for about a half hour and I asked him to set up his trademark shot where he hits the object ball twenty miles per hour with super spin on the cue and IT goes THREE RAILS CRAZY, but with extreme precision and same path every time. He warmed up the cue a couple of times and had the cue doing what he is known for and teased me about "What are you looking at?" when he saw I was on his one yard line, absorbing everything about the shot. I will be making it in the next fewdays I guarantee....
Anyway, after hitting each table for several games, I would turn that particular table over to another player looking to warm up, seeking out another table that only had one or two people on it.
I warmed up with David Ross (age 74) who plays like he is 40 years old. He and I shared a table with another guy for a little while until I moved on. Little did I know that David would give John Schmidt all he could stand later in the tournament, scaring the daylights out of me and my buddies who owned John in the Calcutta. Mr. Ross took it to John and the match ended with a score of 9-8. By that time, I was sweating big beads of sweat. lol.
My buddy Scotty was smiling like he always does when he see me and we talked and played a few games and I kept looking at him to see what was different about him and finally I realized what was missing. It was his cowboy boots. In their place was a nice fancy pair of shoes, something I had never seen him wear in the 20 years I have known him. Scotty was giving me some tips as I was playing and I always enjoy my time hanging out with him but I moved on, soaking up the tournament room atmosphere, knowing that Scotty and I would talk again at a later time.
John picked up his speed a notch and stretched out his lead. He got a couple of lucky rolls and I got a couple of bad rolls and one really bad shot on my part and he beat me 9-5. No biggee but the score wasn't as bad as it looks on paper. I didn't play that poorly, even though I knew John could have played better. I know his speed very well since I have played a lot of matches with him over the years.
My next match was against a very nice fellow who allowed me top let my stroke out and I did. My opponent only won one game unfortunately for him but I really did get all of the rolls and played very well. It happens that way some times.
My third match was against Mitch Yarborough who I've seen play many times in the past. He is a tough competitor and shoots straight. He's a lefty as I recall. We traded games the entire match with Mitch leading the way. At one point he was up by three games and somehow I found the determination to fight back to even at 7-7 with him winning the next game to go up 8-7. I won the next game to tie it up and he won the next game to get to the hill first. I then fought back and got to the hill with him and he struggled and I struggled to come out on top and he was fortunate enough to have handled the pressure a little better than me and he took advantage of a poorly played safe to win the match 9-8. It was a lot of fun playing him and I played pretty decent so in spite of the loss, I still felt pretty good about my play.
I had thoughts about gambling but my AZ Billiards buddy BoraDriver wanted to play some one pocket and he's done me too many favors to gamble with him so we had fun knocking some balls around. I put out the word to my other two buddies that I was looking for action and they agreed to put me in action (as long as I put up one third LOL).
There was SO MUCH excellent play at the tournament that our thoughts and minds turned to trying to learn something from these great players so we sat and watched match after match with some of the best players in the world beat up on each other match after match for three days.
Actually, I did learn some valuable things at this tournament which I know will help my game. I saw John Brumback, the Derby City Classic Bank Pool Champion and All aRound Champion for 2009 and was going to approach him for a bank pool lesson so that I could whip up on Jay Helfert but as soon as I was out of the tournament and ready to take a lesson, he was GONE. NO one new where he had gone and so I just watch ten ball until I had to put in the eye drops.
We had some great Mexican Food (David didn't think it was all that good) and some nice Barbecue (David didn't think it was that good) and great club sandwich at one of the local diners. We missed eating at the Marietta Diner and I regret that but we will hit that one next year.
The Tables rolled STRAIGHT as you could every hope for them to do so. The matches were posted so you knew when you were going to play.
EVERYTHING was great. I wanted to talk to Johnny about something but he was playing well and I wasn't about to talk business with him while he was competing and doing so well. Johnny wound up beating EVERYONE and he deserved to win. The finals were Stevie Moore and Archer and neither player disappointed anyone. They both play top speed ten ball. Our horse Schmitty got our inflated Calcutta bid back with a couple of dollars extra for us to enjoy a nice meal or two but the Calcutta paid DEEP (which I like) and the tournment itself paid 32 places.
I saw Chris Bartram and a number of other AZBilliards members. These tournments go by fast and you don't really have that much time to get to know the AZBers but it is always good to match a face with a screen name although I kind of instinctively knew what Corvette 1340 would look like. (It was one of the first times that I guessed kind of right.
) I could see that some of his big whoppers about the women in his past, might not be all that far off the mark. I swear I wanted to meet KING but darn if I can remember crossing paths with him. 
Maybe I am getting old but I didn't have too many people woofing at me this trip. Even Scotty didn't offer his famous 5 ball spot. :thumbup:
The Marietta Billiard Club is SWEET! Talking about Sweet... I didn't see the infamous Sweet Marissa and I looked hard in the non-smoking room of the Scorpion Room where they had a great cue show going on.
I would recommend the Marietta Club to anyone wanting to go to a well run billiard club. The waitresses were a little slow but it was undoubtedly due to the ENORMOUS NUMBERS of people who stayed there thoughout the whole tournament.
JoeyA
The place was spotless. Kim Davenport was wearing every hat you can imagine. Johnny was everywhere and the tournament sped by so fast, I couldn't even make my normal phone calls to pool friends who I normally update when I go out of town to tournaments. (Sorry EVERYONE! :embarrassed2
This tournament started off the way I like them to start off. One of my buddies had just purchased a beautiful PENTHOUSE in Brookhaven. He had a Diamond 9 footer installed by Mark Gregory just days prior to my arrival. My buddy had room for another tournament buddy of mine and myself and invited us to visit him and play in the tournament. Saving the dough on the hotel and auto rental were big plusses financially but having someone who had a GPS in their car and to chauffeur us around for the entire tournament was the NUTS!
The neat thing about his penthouse is that it was one small city block away from the MARTA, the popular rail system in Atlanta. It is cheap and FAST to get around. For those of you who need the inside scoop, there are TWO NORTHERN bound MARTA trains, one going to the NORTH and one going to the NORTHEAST. Naturally I took the North bound one when I should have taken the Northeastern bound train but it was so quick that I didn't even get annoyed at myself for not knowing about the two different northern trains. I was headed to Brookhaven where his penthouse is located.
I have to tell you I was not too happy to hear that we would be playing on Olhausen tables. They aren't my favorite table by any stretch of the imagination however was I ever surprised. These 9 footers had new ARAMITH cloth on the tables and they played PERFECTLY. I had been warned about the unique properties of the pockets. The Olhausen pockets look like caverns but are tricky. Hit the outside facing with a little speed and the deep shelves and unusual cuts of the pockets will send you to your chair with a long face. Luckily that didn't happen to often to me. I think I saw Johnny Archer get sent to the chair twice for the same problem so I don't feel too bad at all.
There was good food to be had, bathrooms that were kept clean from the beginning to the end and that is hard to do when you have HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE eating and drinking all day and night.
The tournament was a great success. Sold out way before tournament day with people on the waiting list. There were big names everywhere you looked.
My first match was against my friend John Schmidt. Wouldn't you know it? My buddies and I had bought him in the blind Calcutta for some pretty good bucks. I just told them I would go along with whatever they decided and they didn't hesitate to spend some of my money. :smile: I knew John was enjoying playing with his OB2 and his break cue is also an OB cue so I thought he would be in stroke for the tournament and told my buds that. The very first match I'm see-sawing with John. He probably felt kind of sorry for me.
I got some rolls and played pretty decent and had John stuck 4-3 and was licking my chops. It was about then that my buddies hollered at me that I was beating our horse and that if I wanted some place to sleep that night I had better let up on him. (That was a lie, not about the score but about them wanting me to let up on him). John started getting a couple of rolls mixed in with some good plays.. but OH I forgot. Like usual at the beginning of the tournament I was mixing it up with Earl Strickland, Scotty Townsend and John Schmidt and John was trying the SLOW BREAK, but it wasn't working too good. As I made my way around the tournament room, I spoke to Shawn Putnam about John trying to slow break and he said it wasn't going to work on those Olhausens and boy was he right. I reported back to John about what Putnam had said and when I started playing John, he wasn't experimenting with the slow break any longer.
Earl was GREAT. He had a VERY GOOD IDEA which I will be implementing from now on at tournaments I go to play in. I asked him if I could share the table with him as he was playing alone and everyone was kind of just watching him play at a distance. He said sure and he continued hitting balls while I just stood there. He would miss a tough shot and set it up again and again until he owned the shot and finally the table was cleared and he dug the ten balls out of the pockets and threw them on the table and said "Go Ahead". I was kind of taken aback for a couple of seconds when I realized that we wouldn't be sparring, and that's when I remembered a suggestion that was made to me several months ago about playing in tournaments. The suggestion was, "Don't compete just before a tournament", just practice making balls and gettin comfortable with the equipment and the pool room sounds and noises. I started off pretty good running out the rack. I was hoping to impress Earl enough that he wouldn't be too disappointed in sharing his table with me. We did that for about a half hour and I asked him to set up his trademark shot where he hits the object ball twenty miles per hour with super spin on the cue and IT goes THREE RAILS CRAZY, but with extreme precision and same path every time. He warmed up the cue a couple of times and had the cue doing what he is known for and teased me about "What are you looking at?" when he saw I was on his one yard line, absorbing everything about the shot. I will be making it in the next fewdays I guarantee....
Anyway, after hitting each table for several games, I would turn that particular table over to another player looking to warm up, seeking out another table that only had one or two people on it.
I warmed up with David Ross (age 74) who plays like he is 40 years old. He and I shared a table with another guy for a little while until I moved on. Little did I know that David would give John Schmidt all he could stand later in the tournament, scaring the daylights out of me and my buddies who owned John in the Calcutta. Mr. Ross took it to John and the match ended with a score of 9-8. By that time, I was sweating big beads of sweat. lol.
My buddy Scotty was smiling like he always does when he see me and we talked and played a few games and I kept looking at him to see what was different about him and finally I realized what was missing. It was his cowboy boots. In their place was a nice fancy pair of shoes, something I had never seen him wear in the 20 years I have known him. Scotty was giving me some tips as I was playing and I always enjoy my time hanging out with him but I moved on, soaking up the tournament room atmosphere, knowing that Scotty and I would talk again at a later time.
John picked up his speed a notch and stretched out his lead. He got a couple of lucky rolls and I got a couple of bad rolls and one really bad shot on my part and he beat me 9-5. No biggee but the score wasn't as bad as it looks on paper. I didn't play that poorly, even though I knew John could have played better. I know his speed very well since I have played a lot of matches with him over the years.
My next match was against a very nice fellow who allowed me top let my stroke out and I did. My opponent only won one game unfortunately for him but I really did get all of the rolls and played very well. It happens that way some times.
My third match was against Mitch Yarborough who I've seen play many times in the past. He is a tough competitor and shoots straight. He's a lefty as I recall. We traded games the entire match with Mitch leading the way. At one point he was up by three games and somehow I found the determination to fight back to even at 7-7 with him winning the next game to go up 8-7. I won the next game to tie it up and he won the next game to get to the hill first. I then fought back and got to the hill with him and he struggled and I struggled to come out on top and he was fortunate enough to have handled the pressure a little better than me and he took advantage of a poorly played safe to win the match 9-8. It was a lot of fun playing him and I played pretty decent so in spite of the loss, I still felt pretty good about my play.
I had thoughts about gambling but my AZ Billiards buddy BoraDriver wanted to play some one pocket and he's done me too many favors to gamble with him so we had fun knocking some balls around. I put out the word to my other two buddies that I was looking for action and they agreed to put me in action (as long as I put up one third LOL).
There was SO MUCH excellent play at the tournament that our thoughts and minds turned to trying to learn something from these great players so we sat and watched match after match with some of the best players in the world beat up on each other match after match for three days.
Actually, I did learn some valuable things at this tournament which I know will help my game. I saw John Brumback, the Derby City Classic Bank Pool Champion and All aRound Champion for 2009 and was going to approach him for a bank pool lesson so that I could whip up on Jay Helfert but as soon as I was out of the tournament and ready to take a lesson, he was GONE. NO one new where he had gone and so I just watch ten ball until I had to put in the eye drops.
We had some great Mexican Food (David didn't think it was all that good) and some nice Barbecue (David didn't think it was that good) and great club sandwich at one of the local diners. We missed eating at the Marietta Diner and I regret that but we will hit that one next year.
The Tables rolled STRAIGHT as you could every hope for them to do so. The matches were posted so you knew when you were going to play.
EVERYTHING was great. I wanted to talk to Johnny about something but he was playing well and I wasn't about to talk business with him while he was competing and doing so well. Johnny wound up beating EVERYONE and he deserved to win. The finals were Stevie Moore and Archer and neither player disappointed anyone. They both play top speed ten ball. Our horse Schmitty got our inflated Calcutta bid back with a couple of dollars extra for us to enjoy a nice meal or two but the Calcutta paid DEEP (which I like) and the tournment itself paid 32 places.
I saw Chris Bartram and a number of other AZBilliards members. These tournments go by fast and you don't really have that much time to get to know the AZBers but it is always good to match a face with a screen name although I kind of instinctively knew what Corvette 1340 would look like. (It was one of the first times that I guessed kind of right.
) I could see that some of his big whoppers about the women in his past, might not be all that far off the mark. I swear I wanted to meet KING but darn if I can remember crossing paths with him. Maybe I am getting old but I didn't have too many people woofing at me this trip. Even Scotty didn't offer his famous 5 ball spot. :thumbup:The Marietta Billiard Club is SWEET! Talking about Sweet... I didn't see the infamous Sweet Marissa and I looked hard in the non-smoking room of the Scorpion Room where they had a great cue show going on.
I would recommend the Marietta Club to anyone wanting to go to a well run billiard club. The waitresses were a little slow but it was undoubtedly due to the ENORMOUS NUMBERS of people who stayed there thoughout the whole tournament.
JoeyA
