buddha162 said:
John,
Please just tell us your side of the story, since Barbara apparently got cold feet.
-Roger (very very curious)
Okay, here is the very short version.
Valerie Finnie ended the 2005 NEWT Tour season as the number one player. According to the WPBA guidelines this gave her an invite to all the WPBA tour stops in 2006, guaranteed (not paid) spots on tour. Valerie Finnie told the WPBA that she would accept the invitation to the tour for 2006. Valerie was told by the WPBA to inform Barbara Stock, the director of the NEWT tour of her intention to take the spots as well which she duly did via telephone message on Barbara's answering machine.
On the 24th of December while in England for Christmas, Valerie was informed that her spots had been given away to another player. Valerie then contacted Barbara and was told that her message said she would not be taking the spots and that since she was unavailable to confirm the spots were given away to another player. (I am being a little obtuse here with the timeline and the details because I don't want to drag anyone else's name into it nor establish facts that may yet be used legally). Barbara claimed that she clearly heard Valerie say she "won't" be taking the spots and since time was of the essence, according to Barbara, she HAD to make a decision that was irreversible. Although the WPBA said to Valerie that they would accept Barbara's decision to nominate Valerie instead of the other player Barbara refused to budge.
When Valerie came back to the United States in early January she asked her sponsor, Sterling Gaming, to intervene on her behalf. I contacted Barbara immediately via voice mail, email and private messaging through the boards. I received no response at all until we sent a letter threatening legal action. Then and only then did I finally get a phone call to initiate dialog. During this time Barbara played the voice mail that Valerie left and while I heard "will" and not "won't" I conceded to Barbara that I could understand how someone unfamiliar with Valerie's heavy Scottish accent could hear it as "won't."
At this point all Barbara needed to do was to give Valerie the spots and the "mistaken" interpretation could have been erased with no harm, no foul. But Barbara was adamant that she had made her decision and that it was firm and that was that.
During the course of investigation it came out that Barbara felt that Valerie's number one spot was due to Kelly Fisher's participation and "help" on the tour. During further conversation it came out that taking the invitation away from Valerie was a form of punishment and retribution for this perceived collusion.
In the end, Barbara forced me to contact the player who had been given the invitation and that player abdicated her spots for Valerie. Barbara would have rather seen it all end up in court rather than to do the right thing and reverse the mistake she made.
Since then she has had a grudge against me, Kelly Fisher and Valerie Finnie. Her husband accosted me publicly in Valley Forge at the Fury Booth. She has slandered me to mutual aquaintenences in the billiard industry and continues to slander Kelly and Val's reputations as she has done here.
Valerie Finnie has the game to beat any female pool player on the planet at any give time. On the NEWT Tour and other tours she beat many top players. The record shows that there were only one or two places during the NEWT touraments where Kelly could have possibly been of any "help" to Valerie by dumping a match. And IF she did, so what? Kelly has been beaten by a lot of players that are clearly her inferior on the regional tours and the WPBA tour. Did she dump to them? No, she did not, nor did she dump to Valerie. Barbara Stock may feel that Kelly and Valerie colluded on her tour but she never once addressed them about it, she never once mentioned it in any player's meeting, nor was it ever a part of the rules of the tour. Not to mention that such collusion would be nearly impossible to actually prove, it is also a true non-issue. Both players paid their entry fees and as such are allowed to participate or not as they see fit. But, this is not a debate on whether such practice is right or wrong, it is a situation where one promoter siezed on the slimmest of excuses to punish a player severely to satisfy their own sense of justice.
And that is the situation in brief. During the investigation much interesting information was uncovered about how Mrs. Stock conducts her business with the NEWT tour. Apparently the issue with Valerie is not an isolated occurrence so I am confident that it was not an innocent mistake but rather a deliberate act of vengeance.
Because of Barbara's actions, Valerie had had a tremendous amount of added pressure to perform well this past year. Sadly, she has fallen somewhat short of her goals and our expectations. I put the responibility for this added and unneeded pressure squarely on the shoulders of Barbara and Pete Stock. Were it not for their accusations, hurtful actions and hateful comments then Valerie could have started the year on a positive note and perhaps her results would have been different.
As it stands though, Valerie will be on tour this coming year and she will prove that she belongs there. Her fellow professionals know it and her fans do as well.
Sincerely,
John Barton
