In defense of the Eurotards...
On the one hand, anyone claiming that Shane's failure to win the WPC means that he must not be the best is wrong -- there's just too much variance. But on the other hand, the argument that Shane is number one in the world isn't all that solid either. The real take-away, for me, is that there just isn't enough data to determine who's best. It's too bad, and it's not Shane's fault or any other player's, it's just that there aren't enough world-class tournaments to determine.
It's true that Shane has been dominant in TAR matches and long races, but even there the results are sporadic, and a lot of players don't participate. If there were an organized world ranking system based on long race challenge matches, it would be different, but there isn't.
One thing we probably can conclude is that if Shane is the best player in the world, he's not the best by much. In the US, Shane is utterly dominant, but at the world stage he's not. We can draw a comparison to golf, where there's also a lot of variance. No player has won back-to-back majors since 2008, and there are 4 of those every year, so that's 24 majors now without anyone winning two in a row. But when Tiger was in his prime, he dominated. He didn't win every tournament, but the results showed that he was the best by a comfortable margin, even with all the variance.
At the world level, Shane is not the (pre-meltdown) Tiger Woods of pool -- a player who can overcome the variance and dominate anyway. He's one of a handful of players who might be the best, but there's not enough data to tell.
My personal opinion, and that's all it is, is that Shane is probably the best 10-ball player in the world, thanks in part to his break, but probably not the best 9-ball player in the world. But I don't claim to be able to support that opinion with any kind of real data, it's just my feeling based on what I've seen.
On the one hand, anyone claiming that Shane's failure to win the WPC means that he must not be the best is wrong -- there's just too much variance. But on the other hand, the argument that Shane is number one in the world isn't all that solid either. The real take-away, for me, is that there just isn't enough data to determine who's best. It's too bad, and it's not Shane's fault or any other player's, it's just that there aren't enough world-class tournaments to determine.
It's true that Shane has been dominant in TAR matches and long races, but even there the results are sporadic, and a lot of players don't participate. If there were an organized world ranking system based on long race challenge matches, it would be different, but there isn't.
One thing we probably can conclude is that if Shane is the best player in the world, he's not the best by much. In the US, Shane is utterly dominant, but at the world stage he's not. We can draw a comparison to golf, where there's also a lot of variance. No player has won back-to-back majors since 2008, and there are 4 of those every year, so that's 24 majors now without anyone winning two in a row. But when Tiger was in his prime, he dominated. He didn't win every tournament, but the results showed that he was the best by a comfortable margin, even with all the variance.
At the world level, Shane is not the (pre-meltdown) Tiger Woods of pool -- a player who can overcome the variance and dominate anyway. He's one of a handful of players who might be the best, but there's not enough data to tell.
My personal opinion, and that's all it is, is that Shane is probably the best 10-ball player in the world, thanks in part to his break, but probably not the best 9-ball player in the world. But I don't claim to be able to support that opinion with any kind of real data, it's just my feeling based on what I've seen.