WPBA National Championship

Barbara said:
The boss of your company apologized to my husband at VF about your conduct and the inaccurate accusations you made to me. What does that say?

Barbara

It says that he is a lot more forgiving than I am. You are full of lies Barbara. No one was harrassed at all. I also have the emails to prove it as well as the taped conversations. Would you like for the public to hear the wonderful language you and your husband use? Would you like for everyone to hear how you conduct your business? No, I don't think you would. Yes, you were threatened with a lawsuit. That is what happens when you screw with someone else's business. As I said to you MANY times though in the several HOURS of conversation we had, I was only interested in working things out so that there was no need for a lawsuit. You just wanted to ***** about what YOU felt was Kelly and Val's partnership.

As for "threatening and harrassing the other player" you are so full of it. I dare you to put up the PM's I sent to the other player so the world can see that she was not threatened in any way. I dare you. This is why email is so nice - there is a verifiable trail. I asked you, I pleaded with you to discuss this with the other player so I would not have to contact her and you refused to do so. You instructed me to contact her if I wanted to. I did and explained the situation and where it was heading. I know that you and the other player are good friends so don't try and sugar coat your answers.

I extended my hand to your husband when he came to the booth and I attempted to make nice with you all. I was nothing but polite with you in an attempt to keep the issue from going to court. You are the ones who got nasty. You are the ones who said, AND I QUOTE, "Valerie should get a job at McDonalds to support herself."

Your husband is the one who made the scene at our booth 3 months later.

It is your fault that the situation ended up as it did. No one else's but your own. If you weren't being vindictive then you would have picked up the phone and tried to contact Valerie to verify her message to you rather than going around trying to find people who agreed with what you claim you heard. Besides us, there are dozens of people who knew how to contact Valerie while she was in England. Most especially, the WPBA knew how to contact her, which they did immediately when you took the invitation away and contradicted Valerie's statement of intent to them.

And as far as that goes, I have a statement from a well known person with a similar accent to Valerie's who says that she also heard "WILL" and not "WON'T", but you conveniently forgot to include her opinion in your statements to me about your "many attempts" to decipher the message.

As to your speculation of why Valerie would or would not take the spots, you also conveniently forget that Valerie has a sponsor. Furthermore it's none of your business how she will or won't pay for the tour spots. You were informed that a mistake was made and you had the power to correct it. You declined to do so, apparently out of pride and vengenance.

If you were at all sincere about finding out whether Valerie abdicated her spots or not then you would have made the attempt to contact her. You did not. Beyond that you passed over the number 2 position and offered the spots to the number three position instead using the flimsy excuse that you had been informed by the WPBA that the number 2 position on your tour had taken the invitation earned on another tour. You were ALSO informed by the WPBA that the invitation awarded for YOUR tour was accepted by Valerie Finnie and yet you persisted to attempt to deny her those spots.

If you persist in slandering Kelly and Val's names then you will find that your behavior is considered to be unprofessional and unethical at best and criminal at worst. I am sure you would be pleased if I posted the information I have but I will save it for when it can be most beneficial to our case. Your attorney can ask for it at discovery.

Yes, I suppose that a person who lives in denial would not want to have any responsibility for the result of their actions. I guess that by you saying that Valerie did not deserve the spots, that she cheated to get them would not add any pressure playing in the WPBA.

Why don't you post up the brackets of all of your 2004 tournaments? Show us how all the games went down and let the board make the judgement based ON THE RESULTS whether Kelly was any signifigant factor or not? Let us see who else DUMPED to Valerie to get her on tour.

Lastly, I would rather be pond scum with integrity, than a pair of liars such as you and your husband are. You conspired to cheat a good girl out of something she worked very hard to get. Then you continue to malign her and her partner as much as you can. You are just pissed off that you were thwarted in your heinous attempt. Count your blessings that you have some friends with integrity and honor. Maybe some of it will rub off on you both. Sorry Mike, you can erase this if you like but I won't have this woman spreading her viscious lies and slander without reply.

And Barb, before you try and use the WPBA Amateur Nationals as an example I would like you to tell me how it is possible that Valerie Finnie literally destroyed all of her opponents by huge scores until she played Kelly where she won by two games if she is such a bad player who needs help from Kelly. That day both of them were playing BRILLIANTLY and they would have made the top two spots no matter what.

John Barton
 
I am sorry about the delay in posting pictures. There was no Internet in the hotel.
I have posted more pictures on the photo gallery. There are pictures of Sarah Rousey and her very unique hair style, along with Debbie from Florida, and some pictures of Ga Young Kim.
I have also taken some videos of Tiffany N, Jennifer B, Jennifer C, Karen Corr, Megan M, Kim W, and Kim S shooting and breaking.
I will post a few more pictures of the after party tonight, I am having problem connecting my phone to my computer for downloading pictures.
For those who do not know where the photo gallery is, please go to www.xtremebilliard.com, then click photo.
Thank you very much.

PS, I am too busy to read the posts so I have no idea what the argument is all about. My humble opinion and observation from watching Val played a few times is that she is a great player and also very nice and fun to be around. I think the players on the WPBA tour have represented our sports very well and they all seem to take a lot of pride and integrity in themselves and their games.

Richard
 
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Since you won't do it Barbara, I will. Here are the two PM's that were sent to the player whom you gave the spots to. As you can see she was not threatened or harrassed. Sadly, because YOU refused to even discuss it rationally, you forced me to contact her.



Val Finnie - WBPA spots

Sent to: --------

Dear -----,

This is John Barton, formerly of Instroke. Please email or call me about the Newt Tour and the WPBA spots for this year. We have a very bad situation right now because of a misunderstanding on Barbara's part. I did not want to approach you but after a long conversation with Barbara and her husband last night I feel as though I must. This situation is going to get very bad very quickly unless there is some resolution.

I am going out on a limb privately here. I do not know how familiar you are with the situation but here it is in a nutshell.

Val informed Kelly Oyama that she was accepting the spots for this year. Kelly asked Val to also inform Barbara. Val did so three minutes later via voice mail on Barbara's phone. Barbara interpreted the voiemail as Val saying she won't be accepting the spots instead of Val saying she will be accepting the spots. So, thinking that everything is fine Val gets an email from Kelly Oyama on Christmas Eve asking what is going on since Kelly was told by Barbara that Val wasn't getting the spots. Val calls Barbara on Christmas Eve and gets told that her voicemail has been interpreted as "won't" instead of "will". Barbara is firm that the spots have been given away and there is nothing she "can" or will do about it. Then Val calls Kelly on Christmas Eve and Kelly tells her not to worry that it will get sorted out.

Well, here we are in the middle of January and it hasn't been sorted out. I spent almost an hour on the phone with Barbara and her husband last night and they are adamant that they are right and the spots are given away and tough cookies for Val. I listened to the voicemail and I admit, from listening to it over the phone, that it is difficult to hear one way or the other. Basically, the attitude from Val's husband is "shit happens." -----, I stand two feet away from Valerie and am constantly asking her to repeat what she said because I can't understand her, we all do here. There is no way that Barbara should have given up those spots based on whether she couldn't understand Val's heavy Scottish accent.

After long consideration and analysis here is my perspective. If there was doubt about the intent, and Barbara admitted that there was considerable doubt on her part, then the tie should go to the shooter. In other words there was no harm at all in giving Val the spots by default because if she had truly declined them then she would have said so when she returned and the spots would have then gone to you anyway. Neither the WPBA nor Val would have been affected in the slightest under this scenario. As it stands however Barbara is in a difficult position of having chosen you to the detriment of Val making the situation very difficult because Valerie insists, swears, that she did in fact say she will take the spots and not getting the spots affects her tremendously financially and personally. There was no logical reason, none in the world for Val to decline the invitations.

Because Barbara won't budge it becomes a legal issue that will go to court and I don't want to see it go there. I firmly believe that if this goes the legal route then it will have ramifications that are very negative and may cause the demise of the Newt Tour. Maybe I am being presumptious but I understand that Barbara does this for the love of the game and that love is going be seriously tested here if this gets ugly.

The blame really lies with the fact that there is no formal, written policy on the WPBA or the Regional Tour's parts on how to get or accept invitations to the WPBA Tour. I believe that this will definitely change over this, court or not.

That still leaves us in this sorry position. So I am asking you personally as a friend, as Barbara's friend and as a player who wants to win the right way, to give the spots back to Val. Barbara said she would not approach you and I sure as hell don't want to.

My boss is ready to go to the mat on this, our attorney sees grounds for a suit. Valerie is totally screwed up over it. I have just taken over the marketing for Sterling Gaming which means this falls squarely in my lap.

Please give me your thoughts on this and tell me if you think it can be worked out without litigation. I am so sorry that you are being involved but I see no other recourse to keep it civil right now.

Sincerely,

John Barton


and 2 - having not heard from the player at this point.

Val

Sent to: -------

------,

This is going to go to court. Barbara will not budge. I have begged her to reconsider. I know that you know in your heart that Val deserves these spots. You know that she earned them. You know that she had to play her heart out to come in the top spot.

Her and Kelly came here with about $600 in their pockets. They have done what every player dreams of through the system that was in place.

My boss, Scott Taylor, is not going to let this go without a serious legal battle. He hates injustice more than anything and this is quite unjust.

If you want to protect Barbara from litigation you can abdicate the spots. Or, I guarantee you we will all be in court over this to the detriment of everyone involved. This is the last thing you will hear from me on this issue.

I hope to at least hear from you on this before it blows up.

Best regards, too bad about the circumstances.

John



Now, I told the player later that I could see how she might interpret #2 as a threat against her. It wasn't meant that way at all and we are cool with each other. I knew that her and Barbara are friends and was appealing to her sense of fairness about the situation. I meant that everyone would be in court and there would be a lot of negativity going around and wanted to avoid it at all costs.

So there you have it. There are other factors and details here that cannot be talked about in case of legal action. When the entire story with timeline is revealed however it becomes very clear that this was a case of pure vindictiveness.

John
 
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nipponbilliards said:
PS, I am too busy to read the posts so I have no idea what the argument is all about. My humble opinion and observation from watching Val played a few times is that she is a great player and also very nice and fun to be around. I think the players on the WPBA tour have represented our sports very well and they all seem to take a lot of pride and intergirty in themselves and their games.

Richard

Richard,

I'm sorry about the hijacking and have decided to cease answering to John's posts.

Barbara
 
Barbara said:
Richard,

I'm sorry about the hijacking and have decided to cease answering to John's posts.

Barbara

How about apologizing to Kelly Fisher and Valerie Finnie for your slanderous comments?

John
 
Richard, thank you so much for posting these wonderful photos.

It warmed my heart to see Vivian smiling after such a heartbreaking loss. I especially love the pic of her and Ga Young hugging and smiling after the final. Ga Young is such a doll! :)
 
GoVivian said:
Richard, thank you so much for posting these wonderful photos.

It warmed my heart to see Vivian smiling after such a heartbreaking loss. I especially love the pic of her and Ga Young hugging and smiling after the final. Ga Young is such a doll! :)

Vivian had a pretty solid year with several TV appearances and has a lot to smile about.

GYK is showing that she can rise to the occasion in the biggest events. To have already won the World Championships, the US Open, the Challenge of Champions and the WPBA Nationals so early in her career proves it. If she can capture the Amway Cup and the BCA Open down the road, she'll match a feat only accomplished by Allison Fisher, winning all six of the most prestigious titles in the women's pro game.

As well as they are playing now, I'm sure both Vivian and GYK are sad to see the WPBA season end.
 
Ga Young Kim is going to the All Japan Championship next week. She just won $41000.
I will be in the All Japan Championshiop and I will try to take some pictures of her and other players for all the fans here.
I had the pleasure to sit very close to Ga Young during the dinner party after the finals. She said that it costed her about $14,000 per year to come over to the US to play in the WPBA, and most of the people back home told her she would never make any money doing it anyway.
Ga Young said she was broke sometimes but she did not want to give up. She has been playing on the WPBA for two years now. In her own words, she said in English, "if I don't try, I will never know...right?"
I am very glad Ga Young has found herself a sponsor, Westwood Billiards, which is a pool table company from Florida. I am sure there will be more sponsors approaching her in the near future.
I also want to take this opportunity to thank Vivian V for her hospitality. And yes, it was a real class act to see her and Ga Young being so friendly with each other after the match.
I am trying to learn how to take better pictures. Hopefully, I can post better pictures next time.
Richard
 
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nipponbilliards said:
Ga Young Kim is going to the All Japan Championship next week. She just won $41000 by winning the last two tournaments, plus $16,000 for the Nationals.

I also want to take this opportunity to thank Vivian V for her hospitality. And yes, it was a real class act to see her and Ga Young being so friendly with each other after the match.
I am trying to learn how to take better pictures. Hopefully, I can post better pictures next time.
Richard


I always really admired that in the ladies especially GYK who had never ever won a match vs Allison til Sunday yet she always had a hug and a big genuine smile for Allison on and off the table so to speak.
 
AzHousePro said:
Wow, this one flared up in a hurry. Sounds like there are more issues involved here than just Kelly and the ROY award.

I am not going to close the thread, but I am going to ask that we stop the name calling.

"I don't agree with you and this is why" is fine. "I don't agree with you and you are an idiot" is not.

Mike

Hey Mike,
Sorry if my post got this word fight started.
I believe this would be a good time for a valid rep from WPBA to advise qualifing rules, "Rookie of Year" award.
"Have a nice day",
Lamar
 
Lamar,

You are right in being proud of Tracie for winning. She is awesome and one of my best friends. I have known her for many years and she is definitely deserving of this award. The award doesn't have any set rules or requirements. Vicki Paski picks who she thinks was the rookie of the year. Kelly Fisher would be the obvious choice for the award if it was based on performance. I told Tracie when we sat down at the banquet that she was going to win. She looked at me like I was crazy. She definitely deserves it for all that she has gone through and played through in the past two tournaments. She has been completely consistant all year and will only get better.

In 2003 when they brought the Rookie of the Year award back, Vicki said it was a player that inspires her and someone that she thinks inspires others. I'm positive she meant no disrespect to Kelly Fisher in anyway. In 2003 I was up against Ga Young Kim, who was the obvious choice for that award. There could have been the same argument there, Ga Young is the better player and also a great person. So the best player doesn't always win. Hope that clears things up a little bit.

So congrats to Tracie, she deserves it.

Sarah
 
sarahrousey said:
The award doesn't have any set rules or requirements. Vicki Paski picks who she thinks was the rookie of the year. Kelly Fisher would be the obvious choice for the award if it was based on performance.

Fair enough. Rookie of the Year is something we all seemed to reckon was voted on objectively, and who'd have guessed it wasn't performance based? Anyway, Vicki sure made an excellent choice in 2003 for Rookie of the Year........that choice was Sarah Rousey, so she obviously knows what she's doing.

Tracie is definitely playing well and has the respect of her peers. I'm looking forward to watching her continued emegence a a professional next WPBA season.
 
sarahrousey said:
Lamar,

You are right in being proud of Tracie for winning. She is awesome and one of my best friends. I have known her for many years and she is definitely deserving of this award. The award doesn't have any set rules or requirements. Vicki Paski picks who she thinks was the rookie of the year. Kelly Fisher would be the obvious choice for the award if it was based on performance. I told Tracie when we sat down at the banquet that she was going to win. She looked at me like I was crazy. She definitely deserves it for all that she has gone through and played through in the past two tournaments. She has been completely consistant all year and will only get better.

In 2003 when they brought the Rookie of the Year award back, Vicki said it was a player that inspires her and someone that she thinks inspires others. I'm positive she meant no disrespect to Kelly Fisher in anyway. In 2003 I was up against Ga Young Kim, who was the obvious choice for that award. There could have been the same argument there, Ga Young is the better player and also a great person. So the best player doesn't always win. Hope that clears things up a little bit.

So congrats to Tracie, she deserves it.

Sarah

Thank you Sarah. This is an explanation that I can accept and one that I can respect. You and Tracie are definitely inspiring players. I wish the WPBA was a little more formal with their systems, invites, accolades and awards. The vagueness has definitely caused it's share of grief this past year. Good luck to you, Tracie, Kelly, Val and the rest of the pros on tour in 2006!

John
 
Sarah,
Thank you for clearing that up. I had no idea that it was not something based on performance. As I said earlier, I would not want to take away from Tracie's accomplishments or her award. I just wanted to know what went into the selection process. You have answered my question.
I echo John's sentiments in congratulating all the players on the tour, and wishing you all the best for next year. I know the level of committment needed to play on the tour is more than most players are willing to give. I respect all of you for doing what you do.
Steve
 
Thanks

sarahrousey said:
Lamar,

You are right in being proud of Tracie for winning. She is awesome and one of my best friends. I have known her for many years and she is definitely deserving of this award. The award doesn't have any set rules or requirements. Vicki Paski picks who she thinks was the rookie of the year. Kelly Fisher would be the obvious choice for the award if it was based on performance. I told Tracie when we sat down at the banquet that she was going to win. She looked at me like I was crazy. She definitely deserves it for all that she has gone through and played through in the past two tournaments. She has been completely consistant all year and will only get better.

In 2003 when they brought the Rookie of the Year award back, Vicki said it was a player that inspires her and someone that she thinks inspires others. I'm positive she meant no disrespect to Kelly Fisher in anyway. In 2003 I was up against Ga Young Kim, who was the obvious choice for that award. There could have been the same argument there, Ga Young is the better player and also a great person. So the best player doesn't always win. Hope that clears things up a little bit.

So congrats to Tracie, she deserves it.

Sarah

Hey Sarah,
It was my pleasure meeting you at the SCO I in Duluth.
I thank you for getting this thread under control.
I would also like to thank "sjm", "onepocketchump", & "pooltchr", it appears to me that Babara spoke out of turn.
Sarah, thanks for your kind words re: Tracie

"HAVE A NICE DAY",
Lamar
 
Lamar,

It was good to meet you as well. Sorry we didn't get a chance to speak more. Congrats on your picks at the SCO. It seems like you know how to pick all the winners.

Sarah
 
Lucky

sarahrousey said:
Lamar,

It was good to meet you as well. Sorry we didn't get a chance to speak more. Congrats on your picks at the SCO. It seems like you know how to pick all the winners.

Sarah

Hey Sarah,
All I can say is I that I was just lucky.
Hope we cross paths again.
"Have a nice day",
Lamar
 
Its a small world

onepocketchump said:
Thank you Sarah. This is an explanation that I can accept and one that I can respect. You and Tracie are definitely inspiring players. I wish the WPBA was a little more formal with their systems, invites, accolades and awards. The vagueness has definitely caused it's share of grief this past year. Good luck to you, Tracie, Kelly, Val and the rest of the pros on tour in 2006!

John

Hey John,
After all said & done, it appears to me, we have at least 1 thing in common.
"Have A Nice Day",
Lamar
 
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