Why is Caroms not so popular in America?

my 2c

well coming from a country where the view of a 3c carom table is not as rare (the place I play back at home as 12 or 14 heated 10 ft I can't remember exactly now). the main thing I belive its that pool (wich I also enjoy very much) it's more visual and has more appeal to the new commer, let's face it it's a lot simpler for a guy that knows litle about stroke, stance..... to pocket a ball ,99% of the times by pure luck, than to be able to calculate the path of a ball after 3 cushions. also the small games wich could be more appealing to the new commers, and a great fundation to later jump to 3c, at least in mexico don't have enough promotion (when was the last time you saw a balkaline or free carom video on the web...). So what i belive we should do is every is promote the small games, and try to promote the game to the pool crowd maybe cowboy pool could be usefull as a bridge.

Francisco
 
I just got it the other day, still have to 'region-free' it before I can watch it. Oh well, I am interested in seeing him play the small games. Never get to see anything like that here.
I got his book, too. I've only leafed thru it so far, but it looks pretty good. You need to know passable french, though.

seven said:
sorry...dont get your hopes up... I have the Caudron video.. I would definetly not classify it as an instructional.. Its basically him shooting shots.. Nothing...if very little is even said about the shots..speed..hit...english... nothing.. It is pretty
cool just watching him rack up points at the various "Short" games though :)
Click to expand...
 
Hernan7 said:
This question came to me after I noticed that very few people make comments in the "carom billiards" section of the forum. In Mexico it's very common to see carom tables but in the US I have not seen one yet. I go to school in San Diego, CA (SDSU), and I don't know of any place where there is a carom table. I hope to read what you guys think.
Click to expand...

I suspect the main reason was due was to the fact that the game was dominated from the 1930's to the early 1950's by a couple of players, and mainly by Willie Hoppe. At that time the game was promoted by Brunswick through these top players publicly, and a great deal of money was spent to this end. Then in the middle to late 1950's all forms of billiards fell out of fashion, and were replaced by Bowling. Do to the size requirements of billiards tables 5x10 space became limited, and the number of Billiard / Pool halls never equaled the number that closed during pools recession. When the resurgence of pool occurred due to the movie the Hustler, people did not show any interest in Billiards, and the size of pool tables began to shrink for use in taverns and homes. Fast forward to the middle 1980's and the movie the Color of Money was all the rage and now 9 Ball was the game of choice. Also about this time Pool Leagues began to pop up all around the country sponsored by Alcohol interests, which meant that their focus was to have pool played in Bar's and taverns. This in my opinion greatly effected the down fall of all the Billiards games, IE, 3-Cushion, Straight Rail, Balk Line, and others
 
cuetable said:
I am not sure whether College Billiard is still around. I remember seeing 2 or 3 tables there. Robert Raiford lives in San Diego and he might be able to tell you more places.

The other useful source is USBA site:
http://usba.net/html/california.html
Click to expand...
I was at college billiards 6 or 7 months ago and they had 3 tables, I believe. They used to have only 2 when I played there years ago, but I think they just added 1 because it has gotten to be busier. (I think the demographic of the clientele has changed to be more Latino.)

Similarly, there are a couple of pool halls out in the LA area that have 3 cushion tables. Again, they tend to be in ethnically diverse areas. 1 pool hall on Lincoln has 8 heated tables, but they maybe the 4x8 size. (It's a Korean Pool hall.) Then there is the place in Mayfair where the championships were held. Hard Times also has 2 tables.
 
why is caroms not so popular in America

I thought I would throw my 2 cents in. Most everyone has already listed reason for 3c's lack of popularity. I do think it is on the rise. And I wanted to mention a few people that are making a difference. We should be thankful for their efforts. We all need to do our part.

Bob Jewett
Jim Shovak
Professor Qball aka - Paul Frankel
Robert Byrne
Sang Lee (just as effective as when he was alive)
and all the rest of us that have a real passion and love for the game that may not get noticed

Respectfully,
Steve Andersen
 
A few more thoughts on this subject. 3-Cushion is definintely on the rise, particularly on the West Coast and East Coast. I live in Santa Monica, and for the past approximately two years have been running a monthly 3-Cushion tournament at the room where I usually play (House of Billiards--two heated European tables). We generally have between 16 and 25 players per tournament (we use a creative format to make this manageable, which I would be happy to share with anyone that cares to know), and the list of those who have participated or are interested in participating in the future keeps growing--if they all participated at once, we would have between 30 and 40. One very heartening thing is that several people who normally play pool in the room have taken an interest in 3-cushion and now participate in our tournaments.

I offer free 3-cushion lessons to anyone who wants them (the student just pays the table time), and several people have taken advantage of this as well.

In the Los Angeles area, there are 6 rooms that have approximately 40 carom tables among them. If you go a short distance out of town, you can add at least another 2 - 4 rooms and another 15 - 20 tables.

One other thing. In the past two years USBA has been very proactive in promoting the game--and I believe that effort is showing results. As a USBA Director I can tell you that the best is yet to come. If you are not yet a USBA member I hope you will join. We need your support, and by joining you will benefit directly (free subscription to Professor Q-Ball [which includes USBA Newsletter], ability to participate in USBA sanctioned tournaments, etc.) and indirectly by helping to re-grow the game in this country. Just go to www.usba.net and click on "Join".
 
If USBA members can Post here. They surely could keep their own website
up todate. Example you won't find USBA 2007 Newletter supplement at USBA site [ see http://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?t=73577 ]nor information on the Junior 3 Cushion Tournament???

I do support 3 Cushion Billiard, but the USBA will have to improve alot more before I renew my membership. This my 2 cent input.

As I stated in an earlier post I will alway support Dieckman Junior and Ladies Tournaments or Paul Frankel.
 
billiardshot (Bob Watson) said:
If USBA members can Post here. They surely could keep their own website up todate. Example you won't find USBA 2007 Newletter supplement at USBA site [ see http://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?t=73577 ]nor information on the Junior 3 Cushion Tournament???

I do support 3 Cushion Billiard, but the USBA will have to improve alot more before I renew my membership. This my 2 cent input.

As I stated in an earlier post I will alway support Dieckman Junior and Ladies Tournaments or Paul Frankel.
Click to expand...
The USBA is run by volunteer help. This is usually at considerable cost in money and time to the volunteers. In the particular case of the web site, the current version was put together by the previous Secretary. He resigned his position rather unexpectedly, and the current Secretary (Jim Shovak) has stepped in and done far more work than any Secretary I can remember since Gale Johnson. That includes organizing and providing significant funding for the USBA Tour events. Jim is not a web site guru, but he has someone who works for him as a webmaster on a different site and they are working on a new web site that should get updated more frequently. Unfortunately, the software system used for the current site is not easy to use and will need to be discarded.

The plan is to make the USBA supplemental newsletters available even to non-members. Having open newsletters was much of the motivation to have Paul Frankel put the main newsletter in his magazine. Updating the newsletter index page is a problem, so I posted the link to the latest supplement noted above.

The results of the Junior Championship -- as complete as they were reported to Jim -- are in the supplemental newsletter linked above.

Bob, I regret that you feel that you cannot support the USBA at this time, but it is more or less the only 3-C organization in the US. If you do decide to help in the future, please be aware that we need your help in organizing tournaments and promoting billiards in your local rooms far more than we need your membership fee. We need helpers right now far more than we need money. I'm sorry you choose not to be one of those helpers.

Bob Jewett
President, USBA
president@usba.net
 
billiardshot said:
If USBA members can Post here. They surely could keep their own website
up todate. Example you won't find USBA 2007 Newletter supplement at USBA site [ see http://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?t=73577 ]nor information on the Junior 3 Cushion Tournament???

I do support 3 Cushion Billiard, but the USBA will have to improve alot more before I renew my membership. This my 2 cent input.

As I stated in an earlier post I will alway support Dieckman Junior and Ladies Tournaments or Paul Frankel.
Click to expand...

As Bob Jewett explained in his post, we expect that the USBA website will be substantially improved in the near future--and that should meet the criticism you raised about the website. But since that is the only specific thing you mentioned in your post, as a Director of USBA I am also curious to know in what other ways you would want to see USBA "improve alot" before you would renew your membership. We want to serve our members and attract new members. If you have specific suggestions about things you believe we should be doing that we are not doing, or vice-versa, please spell them out.
 
Since my earlier post I have received some private messages inquiring about how I go about running our monthly 3-cushion tournaments in the room I play at in Santa Monica which has only 2 carom tables. Here is how I do it:

1. The key is to be able to communicate with all the players by e-mail. Over time, I have put together a list of all the potential players in the room--and I keep adding to it all the time. For each player I have his or her full name, phone number and e-mail address. There are one or two who do not have an e-mail address, and for those I make an exception, but unless you have nearly all the players having e-mail addresses (they usually do), running a tournament using the method I will describe will be very difficult.

2. Each tournament is single elimination and handicapped. All games are played to 25 points. Currently our handicaps range from +14 to -4. Each player starts with his/her handicap on the string and plays to 25. A player with a minus handicap has to play beyond 25; e.g., a player with a -4 handicap has to play to 29. I adjust the handicaps each month based on performance and my knowldege of each player's current ability. Before I publish the handicaps I also run them by one of our other players for a check on my judgment. So far (and as I have said, we now have been running about two years), the players believe the handicpas are fair. I should add that in setting my own handicap, I always err against myself. I strongly believe that if the players do not believe the way I set the handicaps is beyond reproach, the whole mechanism of the tournament will break down--and I cannot sustain that belief if they do not see clearly that I am dealing with my own handicap with at least as much scrutiny/objectivity as theirs.

3. Prizes are paid for 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th places, and high run. If there is a tie for high run, a winner is picked by blind draw.

4. We use shot clocks on the Final Day, which are operated by persons other than the players. Each player has 30 seconds to shoot, and can ask for 2 extensions during a match. If the shot clock expires, the player's inning is ended.

5. There are no referees. We do not keep track of innings.

6. The objective is to only have 8 players left in the tournament by the Final Day, so that on that day only Quarter-Final, Semi-Final and Final matches are played. This can usually be accomplished in approximately 5 hours.

7. At the beginning (or shortly before the beginning) of the month I announce the Last Date of the tournament, which is generally the last Sunday of the month. This announcement is made in an e-mail I send to everyone on my list (which now is well over 70 players, including some pool players who I also keep informed on the theory that they are interested and may participate from time to time, and some of them do). The same announcement gives a deadline by which any player who wants to play must sign up by notifying me. The sign-up period is usually 5-7 days. I also make up copies of a flyer announcing the tournament and my contact information, and leave them in the room.

8. Once I have the names of all the entrants, I send out another e-mail to the entire list (even those who have not signed up), which gives the pairings for the First Round, and all e-mail and phone information for the each participant. I say the "First Round" because if we have more than 16 entrants, and we usually do, the objective of the First Round is get down to the 16 players who will play in the Second Round. So, for example, if we have 19 entrants, the First Round will have only 6 players in 3 matches and all other players will have byes. The winners of the First Round then go on to the Second Round of play. This e-mail also gives a deadline by which the First Round matches are to be played scores and high runs and reported to me. The deadline is usualy about 7 days out.

9. Once I know who has won the First Round matches, the next day I send out another e-mail which gives the scores from the First Round and gives the pairings for the Second Round, and a deadline for those matches to be completed and with scores and high runs reported to me. This deadline has always been 4pm of the day preceding the Final Day.

10. The evening before the Final Day, I send out another e-mail containing the pairings for the Quarter-Finals. Since we have two tables, we have two matches beginning at 10am, and the second group beginning about 90 minutes later. The winners of those matches go on to the Semi-Finals, and the pairings and the tables they play on are determined by those players blindly drawing slips of paper--two marked with the number of one of the tables and two marked with the number of the other table. The winners of those matches go on to play the Final match and the losers a match for 3rd/4th place--here I give the Final match players the right to select the table.

11. At the end of the tournament (usually that evening) I send out a final e-mail to my list which gives all the scores, high run and prize money distribution.

12. I make all the pairings by random draw (I blindly pick the names out of a bowl), except that I guarantee that no First Round pairing will be the same as a First Rounding pairing from the last month's tournament--if that happens, I redraw.

I hope this helps those of you who want to run tournaments in your rooms that only have a couple of tables to work with. I know it has worked very well for us in Santa Monica. If you have any other questions, I'll be glad to respond.
 
Bruce Warner, Thanks for sharing your Tournament information. Maybe other Billiard Room will use it to run 3c Tournament.

To the subject of USBA and its membership. I realize sometime USBA made up membership package which is great for members. There between 345 - 600 members???

The biggest problem is what really is offer to Non Tournament Players [which what I'm]?
When/ Where does USBA advertise? [Before ProfessorQBall]
Read some of my past threads.
You hear nothing from either ACS or BCA , when it come to 3Cushion. AzBilliard forum is the best for information
I can find most of my up todate 3C information on the internet
 
Bob Jewett said:
The USBA is run by volunteer help. This is usually at considerable cost in money and time to the volunteers. In the particular case of the web site, the current version was put together by the previous Secretary. He resigned his position rather unexpectedly, and the current Secretary (Jim Shovak) has stepped in and done far more work than any Secretary I can remember since Gale Johnson. That includes organizing and providing significant funding for the USBA Tour events. Jim is not a web site guru, but he has someone who works for him as a webmaster on a different site and they are working on a new web site that should get updated more frequently. Unfortunately, the software system used for the current site is not easy to use and will need to be discarded.

The plan is to make the USBA supplemental newsletters available even to non-members. Having open newsletters was much of the motivation to have Paul Frankel put the main newsletter in his magazine. Updating the newsletter index page is a problem, so I posted the link to the latest supplement noted above.

The results of the Junior Championship -- as complete as they were reported to Jim -- are in the supplemental newsletter linked above.

Bob, I regret that you feel that you cannot support the USBA at this time, but it is more or less the only 3-C organization in the US. If you do decide to help in the future, please be aware that we need your help in organizing tournaments and promoting billiards in your local rooms far more than we need your membership fee. We need helpers right now far more than we need money. I'm sorry you choose not to be one of those helpers.

Bob Jewett
President, USBA
president@usba.net
Click to expand...

Mr. Jewett: I am very new to the game. A couple of players in our straight pool league at the Illinois Billiard Club are older 3 cushion players and they have been playing a little while we have our 14.1 games. Some of us have been staying after and learning a little about the game. A few other nonmembers have been encouraged by Jim Parker, the owner, to come in and play and we may even be able to get a league going soon. We only have one billiard table but the other ten foot table is being converted to a billiard table and maybe with two tables we will have enough to start a little league.

It seems to me that 3 cushion is making somewhat of a comeback. The pool players in our club are watching and learning and playing the game somewhat.What do you think can be done on the local level to rekindle the public's interest in the game.

p.s. See my thread on the Illinois Billiard Club in the straight pool section:

http://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?p=864960#post864960
 

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dmgwalsh said:
... What do you think can be done on the local level to rekindle the public's interest in the game. ...
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Hi Dennis,

Good luck with your efforts. We need everyone's help.

I think the main thing is to have tournaments available. In my experience that's a sure-fire way to get players on the tables. Handicapped leagues are a good way to keep the regulars coming back, but it's hard with only one or two tables. Bruce Warner's method seems like the thing to try in that case. Another main thing is to always make new players feel welcome. I've seen too many "old men's clubs" fold up because the codgers fiercely guarded "their" tables against any newcomers.

Bob Jewett
President, USBA
 
zensteve said:
I thought I would throw my 2 cents in. Most everyone has already listed reason for 3c's lack of popularity. I do think it is on the rise. And I wanted to mention a few people that are making a difference. We should be thankful for their efforts. We all need to do our part.

Bob Jewett
Jim Shovak
Professor Qball aka - Paul Frankel
Robert Byrne
Sang Lee (just as effective as when he was alive)
and all the rest of us that have a real passion and love for the game that may not get noticed

Respectfully,
Steve Andersen
Click to expand...

I would definitely add Jan Carl (CaromTV.com) to your list of people that are making a big difference in getting 3-cushion billiards "out there"...

-Ira
 
tigerallenyim said:
Agreed, im very puzzled by this. I totally admire the game. And now to goto a 3C hall is a bit of a travel.
Click to expand...

Tiger, solid rumor has it that Billy, former owner of Corner Pocket in Wilton Manors, which had four heated Verhoven 3c tables in excellent condition, will be opening another room nearby very soon.

Jim
 
iralee said:
I would definitely add Jan Carl (CaromTV.com) to your list of people that are making a big difference in getting 3-cushion billiards "out there"...

-Ira
Click to expand...

I'm obviously biased, but Jan Carl should definitely be up there. As in chess, it's extremely important to study the games of the masters, and there is no greater library than what you'll find at CaromTV.com. Jan tirelessly donates his time to produce the videos and distribute them (the inexpensive Video-on-Demand downloads are his latest brainchild), and ALL profits go towards promoting the game. Jan tried to offer me some free videos once as a thank you for helping with the video commentary, but he was too late...I already own the *entire* collection, including matches from the early days that they don't even sell anymore!! (I know, I'm a nutcase 3C addict).

Now since I know Ira is not going to add himself to the list, I want to officially put Ira Lee up there too. I suspect many of you guys have no idea how much Ira has been working over the past several years behind the scenes to promote 3-cushion with his own blood, sweat and $$$. Getting billiards on ESPN for the first time EVER is only the latest chapter in the ongoing saga of crazy ideas that he figures out how to make happen regardless of how impossible they are. In fact, I'm not sure Ira even knows what impossible means - he thinks it's some kind of encouragement to work harder (he *definitely* doesn't know what sleep means). It's scary to think of what he could accomplish with more free time and resources.

And now that I've completely embarrassed both of them... :)

Robert
 
I just want to say that I am honored to even be on that "list" at all. I am still a newcomer on the scene. There are so many people who have been doing MORE than their share for many years. Ira Lee, of course, Charles Brown, Min Jae Pak, Mike Kang, Bruce Warner, George Aronek, Ken Higgins, Darrel Stutesman, I can keep going on and on. There are many people who have been doing a lot of work over the years but have not been in the limelight, so not many people know about it.

If we simply had one person per billiard room run 2 tournaments for the whole year, we would be up to our armpits in tournaments, members and excitement. We don't need a few people who will do a lot, we need a lot of people who will do just a little bit. You'd be surprised what can be accomplished.


jim
 
jimshovak said:
If we simply had one person per billiard room run 2 tournaments for the whole year, we would be up to our armpits in tournaments, members and excitement. We don't need a few people who will do a lot, we need a lot of people who will do just a little bit. You'd be surprised what can be accomplished.

jim
Click to expand...

To add to what Jim stated. Here more info :

The USBA Board of Directors has already approved a measure that will potentially set up a Room Representative for each 3-cushion room in
the country. The Room Representative will receive FREE USBA MEMBERSHIP FOR THE YEAR starting in 2008!
As a Room Representative/Delegate, you will be responsible
for at least one room. The USBA will teach you anything that you need to
know. You will not have to give up your life, just volunteer a little bit of your time occasionally. You can make a big difference in helping us to grow this sport into what it should be: a national pastime.

If you are interested you can read more in the October 2007 Newsletter, page 2. http://www.usba.net/docs/Newsletters/2007/PQB-10-07.pdf

I think Dennis Dieckman should be added to the list, not because of all the cues he have given to USBA Tournaments, but for the work he does for the Junior and soon to be Ladies ,along with the people who help,to created those tournaments.
 
what are the thoughts on this topic today?

carom is still largely unheard of to most people i introduce it to, and with little or no interest to the bangers
too bad, im still looking for someone to match up regularly with other than the occasional visit to us billiards
 
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