With a new system forming to bring tours together and build a great ranking a qualification system for pool why use a antiquated and far too easy game like 9-ball whose days are numbered? Eventually 9-ball is going to have to go, that is a given because currently the cream has no chance to rise to the top in 9-ball on the mens pool scene. Alternate breaks become hill hill flips of the coin, non-alternate break formats usually see one player sitting twiddleing his thumbs as another player steamrolls through him. Skill does not matter in the top 50, they are all good enough to break and run a rack and luck on the break is alot more important then the skill because on a table where one pro can run out another can do it just as easily. Matches are like flips of the coin, who gets no bad rolls off the break, who gets the momentum, or in alternate break who has the break at 10-10. Just this weekend we see Mika lose a match to Bustamente 11-10, and last week we saw Efren win, next week it will likely be someone else because no one player can dominate a game that everyone has mastered to the same point where luck is the deciding factor.
We need a new game. Not 8-ball, not straight pool, not 1-pocket, a new game. All those games are great but they are all flawed. 8-ball will be no different then 9-ball in that top pro's will all have it mastered to the point of luck being the difference, TheOne showed us that (no offense man, you clearly shoot great but if you can put pressure on Efren like that then how is the game going to stand up to the top 20 players doing battle, it will be a runoutfest). 1-pocket I love but it is clearly too slow a game to use for TV and to interest the crowds, it is also not a game that would be taken up by the majority of Joe Public in the pool halls and familiarity of the common player is an important part of a sport becomming huge in viewership. Straight pool had it's moment in the sun, and again it is a game where the top 20 players would be a flip of a coin once they all played it for a few years. It is a game where one player gets hot and the other player gets to watch. I watched the 150 of Sigel against Rempe, I cannot say if Sigil was actually shooting better that day because Rempe never shot. A good competition needs sparing back and forth by top players, not whitewashes of one against the other.
1 point per a ball rotation would work as the game, it would be siffuciently difficult that no player could master it. Races to 75 points or whatnot also gives is a scoring that is alot more accepted by Joe Public who more times then not find 9-ball stupid in that the last ball is the only one that matters. 15 ball Rotation pool would also bring back the big break as a important feature and yet give the finesse players a playing ground where moving the cueball with skill is critical. The added bonus of such a game is it's possiblity of being played in the bars as a past time, as it uses all the 15 balls and is simple (a point per a ball, 8 points wins) to adapt to bar-pool.
That is one possible game, there could be others invented that would be alot better then 9-ball. Sooner or later 9-ball is going to be history as the premier game for pool, by making it sooner and testing out new games on a tour with the pro's and seeing how they work we could be saving ourselves 10 or 20 years dragging 9-ball along on life support that is destined to sooner or later simply fail. It is only going to get worse, 16 year old kids are playing as good as any pro in the world in 9-ball now, they can beat anyone because of the nature of the game. It has to go and people like you Mike Janis are the ones with the chance to try new things and get the shift into a better direction with a better game.
We need a new game. Not 8-ball, not straight pool, not 1-pocket, a new game. All those games are great but they are all flawed. 8-ball will be no different then 9-ball in that top pro's will all have it mastered to the point of luck being the difference, TheOne showed us that (no offense man, you clearly shoot great but if you can put pressure on Efren like that then how is the game going to stand up to the top 20 players doing battle, it will be a runoutfest). 1-pocket I love but it is clearly too slow a game to use for TV and to interest the crowds, it is also not a game that would be taken up by the majority of Joe Public in the pool halls and familiarity of the common player is an important part of a sport becomming huge in viewership. Straight pool had it's moment in the sun, and again it is a game where the top 20 players would be a flip of a coin once they all played it for a few years. It is a game where one player gets hot and the other player gets to watch. I watched the 150 of Sigel against Rempe, I cannot say if Sigil was actually shooting better that day because Rempe never shot. A good competition needs sparing back and forth by top players, not whitewashes of one against the other.
1 point per a ball rotation would work as the game, it would be siffuciently difficult that no player could master it. Races to 75 points or whatnot also gives is a scoring that is alot more accepted by Joe Public who more times then not find 9-ball stupid in that the last ball is the only one that matters. 15 ball Rotation pool would also bring back the big break as a important feature and yet give the finesse players a playing ground where moving the cueball with skill is critical. The added bonus of such a game is it's possiblity of being played in the bars as a past time, as it uses all the 15 balls and is simple (a point per a ball, 8 points wins) to adapt to bar-pool.
That is one possible game, there could be others invented that would be alot better then 9-ball. Sooner or later 9-ball is going to be history as the premier game for pool, by making it sooner and testing out new games on a tour with the pro's and seeing how they work we could be saving ourselves 10 or 20 years dragging 9-ball along on life support that is destined to sooner or later simply fail. It is only going to get worse, 16 year old kids are playing as good as any pro in the world in 9-ball now, they can beat anyone because of the nature of the game. It has to go and people like you Mike Janis are the ones with the chance to try new things and get the shift into a better direction with a better game.
