I can't cash. I am not good enough to play in an event of this magnitude nor would I ever try. I will confine my one pocket to picking my targets from the ones who do play in it with as little chance to win it as I have.
It’s not about... cashing or winning the tournament or even being good enough, John. It is about the journey.
It is about my wife asking me over dinner one night if I had finally sent in my entry fee for my very first US 1Pocket Open back in 1998 and my confessing that I had not and her berating me until I sent it in (God bless her).
It is about getting the chance to warm up the night before one US Open with the late, very great, Steve “Cookie Monster” Cook. It is about getting the chance to play Scott, Larry, Alex, Francisco, Raphael, Chris, et al. It is about winning my very first US Open 1pocket match in 20 minutes and playing another that went five hours. It is about going to Vespers late one night after the first evening of the US Open with Monsignor Lavin and Joey to The Good Church of the Mermaid up in Kalamazoo and engaging one of the topless college girls in an extended debate about the distinction between an exotic dancer and a stripper at our table. It is about playing Efren in front of a crowd. It is about getting Appleton in a wedge game, with him needing seven, and him escaping (damnit). It is about meeting so, so many very good people from RSP, ASP, OnePocket.org, and AZ.
It is about being fortunate enough that the team from OnePocket.org is making me their sponsored player for the 2014 US 1Pocket Open this year.
And it is about so many other memories I will alway treasure, including this one from 2011.
(insert flashback music)
It was just past midnight when I figured it was time to get some sleep for the long tournament slog ahead. The draw had been done in advance and I knew I was scheduled to play Richard Harris of Blue Grass Cues fame at 4pm on table eight, but still I was drawn to the tournament chart.
Big mistake.
Steve Booth, front man for OnePocket.org, is there by the chart and he excitedly tells me, “Did you see?! I tried texting you -- your match tomorrow is on the TV table.” Now, of all the things someone could have told me right before I was about to go off and try and get a good nights sleep this would have to rank near the bottom of my personal list.
The TV table. How on God’s good green Simonis covered earth did *that* happen?
I will fully confess something right now: I type a much better game than I actually play. I am an amateur player who plays OK, but who is subject to go off the air at any moment, not so much because of any particular external pressure -- but because the game requires so much precision that I have found over the years that any small variation in my PSR can be disastrous. And now I am confronted with the reality of three TV cameras, bright lights, professional commentary, and my game being put on nekked display to the universe. Not surprisingly, I do not sleep well.
The next day I head over to The Cue Club and managed a few hours of practice on a tight GC and, at the point at which I feel I have things as ship shape as they’re going to get, I head to the tournament venue. It is just past 3:30 in the afternoon when I walk in and take a seat in the stands *far away* from the TV arena on the other side of the tournament room.
My opponent is at the TV table warming up.
Richard Harris looks solid and capable and is rocketing in balls from everywhere. On his web site he says that he lived off his pool game for eight years and it shows. I am despondent, but then again, it is the US Open and everyone can play, or in my case, is supposed to be able to play. Eventually Richard tires of making everything he shoots at and leaves the room. So I decide that it is as good a time as ever and I wander into the TV arena and try and warm up. My plan is to start off by checking the angles on the table. Using just the cue ball I shoot a couple of three-railers, then a couple of two-railers; some one-railers and then decide I can’t put it off any longer and throw some object balls onto the table and shoot some baby shots that I feel confident enough to pocket. These are shots that a drunk Girl Scout can make.
Mr. Harris returns and 4pm approaches. I see Watchez going into the commentary booth and I walk over to shake his hand and he deadpans, “Yeah, I’m here so that if you play bad I can tell everyone, “I’m from St. Louis too and Lou just dogs it again.” My heart rises on this assurance that I have an ally in the booth. I return to my chair. It is then that I see Jeremy Jones put on the second set of head phones.
The legendary Double J is going to commentate my match. The chair I am sitting in might as well have been “Old Sparky” at a federal penal institution because I feel this roiling charge move up from my stomach, up my shoulders, down my arms, and out my wrists. I am in a place I don’t really want to be, but there is no way out -- I have done this to myself -- I willingly sent in my entry fee, flew to this God forsaken city, and have now been thrown in the pit where untold legions will watch and judge my performance. Sitting there, bad thoughts start penetrating my brain. I can’t stop them. “Suppose you play *really* bad?” I ask myself. “Will they just stop the match and say, ‘Oh, so sorry. We can’t stream this. You suck way too bad.’” What is Jeremy going to think of my amateur-level play? How deep will Watchez stick and twist the local angle knife? I think of everyone I’ve ever had a fight with on the internet and -- whether they’re watching the PPV stream or not -- I know deep in my heart that to a man they are all fervently hoping for my demise by public disemboweling at the hands of Mr. Harris and how they will cackle if my game goes totally go off the air. I am a man in despair. But I step up and lag for the break. There is no exit door in the TAR arena.
But. Somehow. Through the good graces of the pool gods I play well. In fact I am so focused I can see every angle that helps or can possibly hurt me. I am pocketing balls well; I am able to kill my cue ball when it is appropriate; my banks are working well enough; and though my position play is a bit suspect, I pull it off and win 4-1, remaining in total control of the match. Afterwards, Jeremy Jones congratulates me saying, “Nice shooting. You only flinched twice.” And I said, “I know exactly the two shots you’re talking about. I was holding my cue too tight and I figured that out and relaxed my grip it was all OK again.” And he replied, “Right. Too tight a grip makes you too quick.”
I’m kinda of in a fog at this point. People are congratulating me left and right. Billy Incardona says, “I was up in the room watching you and you played really well.” This turns out to be a reoccurring comment for the next couple of days. Sort of a good natured ribbing thing: “You played really well. I didn’t know you played that good.” I turn on my cell phone again and there are half a dozen messages from people that watched the stream and want to congratulate me.
Legendary Middler, Artie Bodendorfer, is very complimentary. And then a really nice compliment from Frank “The Barber” Almanza who asks me to sign his copy of “Winning One Pocket.” I ask him if he has not made some kind of mistake and he laughs and says, “No. You’re on my list of players whose autograph I wanted to get here.” And he shows me the list and then the book itself with this incredible collection of signatures. I am honored to sign.
There are 8,000 bar pool players in attendance for the CSI BCAPL league events and apparently they had my match on during hotel check-in time and literally dozens of players watched my match in their rooms. They think I am a pro that they just haven’t heard of before and I am repeatedly greeted by name, “Hi, Lou.” Or I am asked my opinion about something; they tell me that they watched my match; good shooting, etc. It is amazing. I take off down The Strip to The Mirage and eat at the bar of Onda, and have an amazing osso buco and sip a couple of glasses of prosecco (Italian champagne). I call my wife to tell her how it went. Life is good and I sleep soundly for the first time in two days.
Life is short John. I have come to appreciate that and have chosen to enjoy the trip. As James Taylor famously put it in one of his most memorable songs: “The secret to life is enjoying the passage of time.”
Lou Figueroa
Kick tail! 
