Why did you START playing?

On the snap, Vincent!

CrownCityCorey said:
I started because I had mastered Super Mario Bros. at the local pool room (1 block away) and had a pocket full of quarters. So I hit balls on the bar table. Then I saw "The Color of Money"! I played a guy for a dollar a game and won! That was it!

By the way, I still like that $1 a game action ;)

Oh yeah, and spending 10+ hours a day in the pool room was a great way to smoke cigarettes and avoid high school.
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Hard to believe that this is the 1st COM reference in this thread. That is the reason I got hooked on the game.
 
I'm a poor loser

The first time I ever shot pool I was bad, I was lousy, I stunk. None of this instant natural born pool shooter stuff for me. However I am a poor loser, not an ass about it and I pay off while complimenting the winner. However it lights a fire in me when I lose at anything requiring skill.

For the first few years I played on everything from seven foot bar tables to five by tens with slow cloth and I played anywhere there was a pool table that I could get in the door, a moderately hard accomplishment when I had just turned fifteen. Somewhere along the line I started winning a lot more than I lost but it surely wasn't due to any natural gift unless you consider bullheadedness a gift.

Hu
 
I started to play becasue I thought it would impress the girls and I would get more. Far from the truth. Just drove them away and I became obsessed with pool so much that I lost interest in them because they took time away from playing.:(

Actually it was after seeing the Hustler. Went to the movies as usual on Sat. Didn't really care what was playing it was just a Sat afternoon thing. The Hustler was playing along with another movie. Didn't know anything about pool hustling at the time. After seeing Fast Eddie hustle that bartender in the opening I was hooked. Never have hustled though.
 
Just after I turned four my parents bought a new house that came with a (very low-end) pool table. At first I "played" by being held up to the table and I tried to hand roll object balls towards the pockets. Soon I had progressed to being able to stand on a step stool and using a small cue to rake the balls towards a pocket in hopes something would go in. At some point I was taught a closed bridge and actual stroke.

When I was about ten, my dad bought a better table for my brother and I to play on. It was still low end, but by comparison, it may as well have been a new diamond. It had a slate bed and rubber bumpers, and was pretty straight and level. Plus, it came with a newer set of balls with a cueball that wasn't badly pitted. (To this day I've never come across any cueball in as bad of shape as that first cueball I played with for years.)

I played for about ten years against mostly my older brother or by myself before I ever stepped into a pool room. Imagine my surprise when I hit my first long shot on the better tables, and the cueball went up and down the table 2-3 times. It took a little while to get used to faster cloth.

Since I never had any real players to learn from, my learning curve was different than most people's. To this day, some of the shots I consider difficult others consider easy, and vice versa. I also still prefer to shoot centerball (vertically and horizontally) whenever possible, since I played for years without ever needing english draw or follow.

When I moved to Florida in 2000, I pretty much gave up the game because none of my friends played, and there was no real need to have a winter hobby. Only recently have I begun to play again, and now I take it much more seriously with respect to improving my game.
 
when my dad was younger than i am now, and in military school, him and his friends would skip school/ formation and go to the local tavern and play snooker all day long cause the tavern owner would cover for them - after he got married he bought a 10' brunswick snooker table from the tavern for their house when the tavern closed.

that was before i was even a thought ... well they changed houses and mom changed the plans in his billiards room and screwed it all up and he sold his 10' and bought an 8' snooker table and hated it and didnt play much. He eventually sold that before I was born.

Growing up my grandparents had a 9' regular table in their rec room but i was never tall enough to play on it before they moved from their farm to the city.

When I was 16 though a friend's parents bought a table as the family christmas present. It was only a 7' table from Sears with Slatron but it was something. After a couple months of playing I bought my first cue ... a graphite cue from Wal-Mart. :rolleyes:

I got better playing those friends on that table but then the kid that lived in the house got into it with his step mom and she kicked him out of the house and we no longer played. I started playing in one of the sports bars after school that year and eventually asked my dad if he wanted to go play pool one sunday. He certainly obliged and we went to that sports bar and played 8-ball on the bar box for a couple hours. He hadn't picked up a cue in 20 years but he still beat my ass but I loved every minute of it.

The next sunday I asked if he wanted to go again and he said alright, but i'm going to teach you a real game this time. He took me to the local pool hall and introduced me to the 10' brunswick snooker tables. He told me the jist of the game and we played for a few hours. By the time we went home I was so upset because I think I made 3 balls in those 3 hours. From then we were stuck - every Sunday we went to the Golden Q and played snooker. I went through several cues and now have quite a little collection. :p But now, I've improved immensly and can beat him usualy 3 to 4 out of 5 games ... more if i'm really in dead stroke. Wow can that damn near 60 year old man leave you hooked like a mofo...

I went off to college at Kansas State in the fall of 2004 and was almost giddy when I first went to the Student Union and saw the place filled with 9' tables and 1 10' table. I found out the kid that lived across the hall from me in the dorm had a 8' at his house and kind of played - but not seriously. I met another kid on our floor that went once and was hooked and we taught him to play and he has gotten quite good ... he holds his own with everyone. The 3 of us still are always playing. The 3 of us got an apartment for this fall and were going to buy a 8' table for the place until the landlord told us we couldn't. :mad: Oh well, back to the Union. :)

This past semester, one of those 2 guys and myself played in the ACUI 9-ball qualifer for KSU and took the top 2 spots and went to regionals where out of a field of 21 players from 4 states I finished 5th and he finished 3rd. He went on to play at nationals this summer but didnt do so hot.

To this day, whenever I'm back home my dad and I still play snooker every sunday and play in a local 8-ball weekly tournament on friday night. Mom doesnt much agree with us and say we play too much (i usually end up playing atleast 5 nights a week for endless amounts of time) but she just doesnt understand how addicting this damn game is ....


wow... sorry for the long post ...
 
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21

I started playing pool about 3 months before I turned 21 in January of 1997. I needed something cheap to do as my truck payments were so high that I didn't have much money left over.

There were only three pool halls in my town at the time now there are 9, and I chose the one that had free pool most of the time. So 3 of us went down and played pool about 4 nights a week.

Then I had a buddy of mine that was an awesome bar box shooter (hustler) he took me under his wing and showed me how to actually play.

Then I joined that Army about 3 months later in May, and pool was my hobby all through the Army.

About 2 years ago I finally joined a league and bought my own table for the house. (although I had been asked to join several before, my job didn't permit me to be there every week.) Once I joined the league I learned BCA rules, and Texas Express rules, and my love for the game increased.

Now I have taken lessons at Pool School, and I am going to continue to do so. I am also about to take private lessons. I figure since the oldest world champ was 67 I have about 37 years of practice before I break that record!!!! LOL

I need something to do when I retire, right?
 
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The year was 1965. It was a hot July day, off from school and visiting in a friend's neighborhood a mile or so from my own. Mike Dupuy had been given one of those "cardboard" pool tables which was probably a 7 footer or maybe even six. He placed the table outside on his parent's side driveway which was two narrow strips of concrete running from the street to the back yard. I was walking and I remember it was the clicking of the balls that first caught my attention. I had not quite reached the driveway to see what was making this noise but remember that sound as if it were yesterday. My ears told me that was something I should investigate and when I saw my first pool table with all of the colored balls, the click noises the balls made as they collided with one another, I knew I had to learn more about this intriguing game. After watching for a very short period of time I realized that if you hit the balls hard enough they would find a pocket to fall into. The table was so unlevel that any ball would find its way to the hole if hit hard enough. None of us could run two balls but that day we started playing Kelly Pool for nickels and I think I made twenty cents or something close to that. That old table took a beating with me slamming the cue ball into the named object ball at the fastest speed my little skinny arms could move the cue. Gambling was always a way to make a fast buck for a poor guy growing up in New Orleans and I have few regrets of taking my friend's money. None of us had any money and we were all a desperate lot, seeking easy revenue not earned by slaving away on the newspaper route, peddling half our weight in newspapers all around the neighborhood, getting rewarded by customers who didn't think twice about telling you to come back later because they didn't have any money right now and earning few dollars of profit to boot. Nevertheless, I could see that playing pool for money had to be a part time business as you could never depend on friend or stranger to have money that they were mad at. I gambled off and on (mostly on) and still do, although it is still only a hobby. About 12 years ago I decided to give up the hustling (though, not the gambling) and concentrate on trying to improve my level of play and it has been a blast.....far more rewarding than those nickels and dimes I managed to squeeze from the hands of friends and strangers. :-)
JoeyA
 
Snorks said:
Through work I sponsored a charity pool event. Each year they would ask if I wanted to play and I always said yes. We'll after losing to the same girls two years in a row, I figured I'd practice two weeks before the tournament to beat them and win.

Well, after losing three years in a row, I practiced 10+ hours a week for a year. Didn't lose to those girls (they were both bumped up a division), but I still lost the darn tournament. I'll get them next year. Rarr...
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HaHa Snorks, would you just happen to be talking about myself and Monique?
 
For some reason I do not understand, I 'wanted' to play pool from the time I was about 15 or 16, but there was no opportunity for me to do so. I know my Dad, who I only lived with for two years, had lots of trophies laying around, maybe that was part of it. I entered the U.S. Army in 1993, and while waiting in the hotel to ship out to basic training the next day, I decided to go out and find a pool hall. It was kind of hard finding a decent place that would allow a 17 year old in. I don't remember getting to hit more than a few balls that night.

After basic, I went to my military job training for 7 months, and got started playing for real on the barracks table. Funny thing was, they had those aluminum sticks with screw on tips, and the trainees would keep playing with them when the tips fell off. This caused the front edge of the aluminum shaft to peel back. I quickly realized that the best way to run balls was to shoot softly. And luckily, I had a halfway straight stroke right out of the box.

After training, I was based in S. Korea. There, I met my first good player. Sergeant Major Paul Seto. He was a run out player, and beat on me mercilessly with a smile for the entire year I was there. I got my first decent cue there, a Steve Mizerak. I still think Miz endorsed a good starter cue with those. The day I left S. Korea for my next duty station, I told Paul, "The next time I see you, I'm going to be good enough to beat you." He laughed at me. I didn't like that.

Fort Lewis, WA, I started practicing no less than 4 hours a day, every single day on the barracks table, an 8 footer in fairly decent shape. I practiced 8 hours on weekends, before going to the NCO club on post to play. I like going there, because the fact you put up one game's quarters, and if you lost, you waited over an hour to get back on, so many people waiting. I started playing bar table tournaments, and picking up a little cash on the side. Got thrown out of one bar/tournament when the Bud Lite girls came in for a promotional, and one said to me, perhaps somewhat flirting, "You look so young to be in a bar." and me being unexperienced in the ways of the world told her I was 19.. While a dude I had just beat in the tourney was sitting on my other side. They kicked me out with no more than just enough to catch the bus back to the Army base. That experience helped to put a harder edge on my game.

After doing well in local podunk bar tourneys, I found City Lights Billiards in Tacoma, WA. Tried to play the owner, (an awesome bar table player) for 5 a game. Lost 7 out of 8 games, and only won the one game by kicking three rails at the 8 to win. Seems I had a whole new world to explore. Started practicing on the 9 footers there, left the barracks table generally alone, as the owneer had a players deal: 60 bucks a month open till 6, another 120 bucks 6 till closed. I lived there once I got my car. Before I got my car, I once accidentally missed the last bus to the army post on a Saturday. Slept on a bench until morning.

Started doing well in the Wednesday 9 ball tourney, arguably the toughest in the state. Made the mistake of bragging to some of the players on the army post. One ratted to the owner of City Lights that I was underage, as City Lights started serving beer. Noone seemed to notice before that that Russ looked a little young. Got kicked out of the only pool hall I had access to for another year until I turned 21. Back to the barracks table.

After I turned 21, I came abck, and took off a month to entirely devote to the game. 12 hours a day for a solid month, including tourney play. I got to where I was capable of running out in 8 ball one handed on a 9 footer. Met my wife. Game tanked due to lack of practice.

All that to say.. Now I am in Iraq, with plans to buy a newer home with room for a pool table. Plan is to buy a Diamond Pro. Plan is, after coming back, to take off from 9 months to a year, and practice 8-12 hours a day, as if it were my job.

Watch for my name in 3 years in the Florida Amateur Tour.

Russ
 
I will tell my story.
It all started when I was only 5.I begged to go with my dad.I had no clue where he was going but he said I could go and I was so happy just to get to spend time with him I would have been happy to have gone any where.Well he took me to the pool hall.I begged to play so he got the table next to the one he was playing on for me,and what do you know I was hooked for life.Ok my dad was a truck driver and I never really got the chance to see him so any time I could spend with him I did.I could not even reach the table so he got a milk crate for me to stand on and I must have played for five hours.Wow I can still remember the first ball I made a cut in the side pocket.I no longer have my dad but I still have some great memories of him and the game of pool.So every time I play it is like he is there with me.I think that is why I still play the game and just can't get enough of it.I am sorry for such a long story but that is why and how I started on this great game.
 
I can't remember not knowing how to play. We had a white gold crown in our basement. I'm the youngest of 10 kids, and I'd go down there to escape the busy house. I didn't get to use a cue til I was maybe 6, before then I just stood on a chair and rolled the balls around. Starting so young, I developed that funky sidearm style. By 10 I could run a rack of 8 ball, and beat everyone in the house. My serious pool learning came 10 years later after TCOM. Thankfully I'm still learning today!

Gerry
 
Part Time

After my daughter was born, the bills piled up. I got a part time job at Imperial Billards. Hard work, heavy tables, balls and slate the worst part. Great boss and co-workers. I lost 17 lbs in 5 months! I went back the next two years. After I split up with my daughter's mother, I bought a couple of cues and cases, plus a few books and tapes since I paid only their cost. I figured, heck, how hard can it be? I have the instuctions, LOL. I found a pool hall that had an afternoon flat rate (I was off on Monday afternoons). HUGE pockets on old National Cash Register tables. I got hooked, big time.
My favorite memory was trying my Dad at straight pool in a different place at straight pool after 6 months of practice. He was 74, bad cataract in his dominant eye, hadn't touched a cue in 20 years, bum knees. When he was up 42 to 17, I asked if it was OK if I stopped keeping score. He would never play me again, saying I ain't good enough yet, keep practicing. He's 80 now and still the best player in my house, and he always will be the best, no matter how much I practice.
 
stevelightning said:
When I was a kid my grandma and grandpa always had a pool table in the basement. So every get together would end up at the pool table. It became very much a part of who won and who lost. Bragging rights to the next get together. Thats how I got hooked on the game. So I guess when they pry the cue from my cold dead hands that will be the day I no longer play.
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This is so similar to how I started. My grandparents had a table in their basement as well. During gatherings all the grown-ups would go down there and play and drink and smoke and have a good time. Kids were not allowed down there at these times, though. I guess mainly because of what they were smoking. In any case, the "forbidden fruit" nature of the game was instilled. It wasn't until I was around 16 that this behavior wore itself out of the adults and I could learn how to use a cue. One guy my aunt was dating had a great game and really inspired me with what pool could be. I liked playing him best. When my friends all started getting licenses, we would head to the nearest pool room for some fun, too.

I still consider the real pool education as coming in college, though. There is a Billiards Club that meets on Thursday nights in the rec center on campus. There are about twelve 8' tables, so there was plenty of space. Anyhow, the club would hold a little tournament for a couple of bucks entry each night, or you could just practice. This was the first time I was exposed to "real" pool rules like those of the BCA. I also learned many games, like 9-ball, one pocket and straight pool. Even snooker and 3-cushion since there is a billiards table and snooker table in the rec center as well. Through those years I was able to practice with some very good players (one won the ACUI regionals several times) and learn a lot about the game(s). Never put down a cue since, really.
 
StrokeofLuck

Lots of great posts but I think ultimately when we get hooked on the game of pool it's because we realize we have the hand and eye coordination to manipulate those balls. At least that's what it is for me. There's always that argument that pool players aren't athletes but I've never met a good one that didn't have that hand/eye thing going strong. Pool captured me the same way hitting a golf ball, shooting a basketball, hitting a baseball, playing table tennis, etc. all did. There are few things more rewarding in sports than picking out a small position zone, sending your cue ball around 3 rails and having it stop right where you wanted. It's a game of touch. Playing for me started at the local YMCA at about the age of 12 and it all fell into place and what a great game it is.
 
It's all dads fault

My dad would take us to the Sons of Italy in Ashtabula Oh where he beat all the other guys.He loved to play and he had to learn fast because when he was a kid his dad would drink every night after work and my father would always have to go in and drag him out often having to finish a money game for him because he was too drunk.I loved him and it was something we could do together so I loved it by association I guess.
 
when I was in my first years of high school( 12 and 13 years old), I was going to that teenagers hangout everyday after school. I went there actually to hide from other students in my class because they just beat me up all day. So I discovered that they have a pool table in the basement that any 12-17 could play for free. How it worked is that you write your name on a board and winnner stays on the table and just keep playing against whoever name is up.
I used to lose my game and wait for about an hour before my next game. After a few months, I was the one who stayed playing for a couple of hours without losing...it became a passion

I was not a good player but I was very good at putting the balls. When I turned 14, I moved and stopped pool for a while or I would just play rarely with one of my cousin. I had lost all my skills over the time because I didn't play that much anymore.

Last winter (Now I'm 23) I wanted to get back into the game and luckily, I met a new friend who was looking for a partner for pool practice. Since that day (jan 5th) I have been playing for about 5 days a week and now I play in FQSB (Federation Quebecoises des Sports de Billard) at B speed and intend to move to A this year...hopefully.
 
I just loved it from the very first time I saw this game at 4 yrs. old. I love every cue sport and everything about them all. The only thing I don't like about our game is the gambling. Just cause of all the frowns it causes between friends and strangers. Not that I don't fall back in this trap when I need cash but, it is a bad habbit and not good for the game at all.
Jamison
 
Because my alcoholic bum of a father thought taverns were the best places to visit his son, and they wouldn't let me play the drinking games.
 
I started playing snooker back then. Discovered not much flair on the bigger tables so I switched to pool. Never look back since then.
 
In, I think, 1962, a friend on the school bus loaned me a small green paperback book. That book was The Hustler by Walter Tevis. I still have the book. Shortly after reading the book, I saw the re-release of the movie with Paul Newman, Jackie Gleason, George C. Scott, and Piper Laurie. Anyway, both the book and movie fascinated me. I pestered my grandparents until they bought me table with, I think, a plywood or chipboard top and cloth like blanket. The rails had about ½ inch of rubber on them. I played on it and got {I thought} quite good. Beat all my friends. First ever score was winning eight straight games of 8 ball at a quarter a pop. I played in poolrooms only a couple of times, once in a town several miles away and once or twice in bowling alley in San Jose, California. Started playing {and drinking} in the local bars at 16 and I didn’t lose very often. After I got married I only played in the bars for the first three years we were married. We moved to the nearest large city because we both had jobs there. I knew where the local poolroom was and one night I walked in. Sat at the counter drinking coffee and listened to two local players trying to match up. It was great!! I walked in again a few days later and this guy asked me to play 9 ball, quarter/half. We played about an hour and broke even. Not bad for a guy who had almost never played on a 9 foot table! I spent a lot, and I mean a LOT of time there for the next 25 years. I’ve quit several times over the years, swore I’d never play again. I gave up doing that a bunch of years back. I learned to play straight pool, 9 ball, billiards, snooker, one pocket, golf and a lot of others, those were the main ones. I learned to play for money long before I learned to play in tournaments. A lot of people thought I was an up-and-comer, because I knew the game well and played pretty good. But, I couldn’t progress beyond a certain level. I found out a few years after I moved to South Carolina, that I have ADD. Among other things, it kept my pool game from progressing to anywhere near my real potential. I still love the game and wish I had the time and money to pursue it more. I’m going to college full time trying to get a degree so I can get a decent job after being laid off from the textile industry. I knock ‘em around at home a bit and at the local room some times.
 
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