Agree 100%. The tools in Qatar caved because they saw the writing on the wall. Had they waited much longer all they would have would be SnoozeBall,errrrrrrrrrr, Heyball.
WPA will no longer ban players who join Matchroom
- Thread starter Roy Steffensen
- Start date
As a relative newcomer to the pro pool scene, I don't know who is at fault. All I know is that the WPA was going to ban players. Not Matchroom.
That is partly why so many top players signed with MR's Nine Ball Tour. Shane Van Boening summed it up last fall for the players: "Bye bye WPA!
While all that was going on, MR was creating a million dollar prize fund for an event in Saudi Arabia.
***
It is true that Matchroom is a TV production company. So what? The offices of every professional league are essentially TV contract negotiators at heart.
MR hasn't just organized the production. They've created an actual tour and are setting some of the rules. If MR keeps going the way it is going, it will be a lot more than just a TV production company.
Would I prefer an alternative pro structure globally? Perhaps. But who exactly? The WPA has never shown it's up for the job. Nor have any other entities stepped forward.
How come? Pro pool has not shown itself to be a big money maker. As such, I sincerely doubt MR was making gobs of profits "over all those years." Nobody else was making big money. Why would MR?
The big money in sports has always been TV and advertising, not ticket sales. Pro pool hasn't been a mainstream TV fixture, at least in the U.S., for a long time. That's why prize money are peanuts in comparison to other sports. It was like pro boxing, but far worse.
It's costing a lot for MR to do what it is doing, in any case. They are making a big bet on pool. If they are wrong, well, it's going to cost them, too.
I recall an interview with the father Hearn that MR Pool didn't make a profit for something like 15 years or more. He stuck with it because it was his passion.
I'm paraphrasing, and could potentially be misremembering...
I'm paraphrasing, and could potentially be misremembering...
Pool is great because room owners control infrastructure. Pool sanctioning is democratic. Commercial pool exists. Every market of pool can grow.
Global pool is a real solution to future communities. Global philanthropy needs local laws to support their efforts. The entire pool community is self funded.
The first White House pool table was paid with out of pocket money. It was not endorsed by the budget policy.
News means invest, start a partnership tell kids if you go to college you play for free on these days and hours. Hire HS culinary students to operate the oven and microwave. A panini machine at least.
Global pool is a real solution to future communities. Global philanthropy needs local laws to support their efforts. The entire pool community is self funded.
The first White House pool table was paid with out of pocket money. It was not endorsed by the budget policy.
News means invest, start a partnership tell kids if you go to college you play for free on these days and hours. Hire HS culinary students to operate the oven and microwave. A panini machine at least.
WPA smell the money, see the money and will now follow the money $$$
C.R.E.A.M
by
Wu-tang Pool Association
C.R.E.A.M
by
Wu-tang Pool Association
I think the PGA has been good for golf….care to compare what the WPA has done for pool?
im
Im talking about on a financial level . They tried to act tough but in the end they couldn’t beat what the Saudi’s were financially offering. The wpa has been trash For players.
I think he said something like that about the Mosconi Cup, like for maybe the first 20 to 25 years. I remember the first time it was in Las Vegas and there were only about 300 seats and not full. The other invitational events may have been profitable.
I think people lose sight of what the WPA is. It’s not a tour. It’s not a promoter. It’s a structure of “Olympic Affiliation”. Their value and their leverage is whatever “Olympic Affiliation” means to pool. What it means is there are certain governments in the world (not all) that are willing to put public funds into Olympic-affiliated sports whether through coaching programs, money-added events, or athlete support. You don’t want to be Olympic-affiliated, you don’t get those perks. You want to be Olympic-affiliated, you get those perks (if you’re in a country that has those policies). Olympic-affiliation can apply to professional competition or just amateur competition. Just depends on the sport. You want to compare WPA to something? Compare it to the global “Olympic” governing body for Gymnastics and you can contrast their failings all day. But it’s not realistic to compare them to a professional tour like PGA. Maybe compare them to the Olympic federation governing golf. Now Matchroom gets to be compared to the PGA because both are a commercial enterprise seeking to maintain a professional tour.
Last edited:
Here’s what the WPA is practically. It is the mechanism upon which pool can receive government subsidization in pockets of the world. How many sports today survive on government subsidization? Only the struggling ones. The thriving ones live off of successful commercial enterprise. Pool has failed to maintain commercial success. Whether it’s the PBT, Camel, IPT, PBS, WPS, UPA or any other commercial tour, they all failed to achieve the success of commercial tours in other sports. So much so that government subsidization has been the life support keeping some very elite athletes in the game long after they should have otherwise abandoned it to sell windows. Matchroom is the latest to take a swing at true commercial success. Of course they are motivated to either disconnect from life support entirely or to operate mostly independently and then milk that structure for talent and added money to select events (Qatar?) as applicable until it’s not needed. And it may be not needed sooner than later given that IOC-affiliation means certain policies being edicted firmly like a specific implementation of WADA compliance or awkward political bans. All things a tour might need to do but would prefer to control its own execution and control its own policies for.
PGATour is still the premier golf tour and they've done a lot for golf and even more in the charitable donation area. LIV is the Saudi's trying to polish their worthless image by throwing cubic$$$$$$'s at sports. The tv #'s for LIV golf are still beyond pathetic. The format is goofy, the music in the background is insane and the courses they play are mostly unheard of tracks. Trying to compare the LIV/PGA situation to the WPA/MR deal is ludicrous. I'd say 'apples-n-oranges' but its not even that close a comparison.