You'll never get better...

[pwd72s]

At pool unless you play for money. Don't know how many times I've been told that by people wanting to "play for cheap". Like $5 or $10 per game...then it's "double or nothing?". I've never done that, but I have seen it happen a few times.

I tell them, that's okay, that I enjoy being a low level recreational player. Then I add if they really want to play for money, I could call my honorary nephew. (He's no pro..but has a high amateur rating and is pretty well known in this area.)

When I tell them who he is, it suddenly seems they really don't want to "get better".

Why is that? I mean, I'm sure their motives are entirely altruistic and they only want to help me get better.

What I can't understand is why they wouldn't want to use the same method themselves in order to "get better"?

Just one of those mysteries of life, I suppose...

[KFC911]

Look man...I suck, I know I suck, and I have no intention of sucking less than I do now...

Rack 'em up

[pwd72s]

Originally Posted by KC911

Look man...I suck, I know I suck, and I have no intention of sucking less than I do now...

Rack 'em up

Good one...tells me you may have played some.

[Rickysa]

Look man...I suck, I know I suck, and I have no intention of sucking less than I do now...

Rack 'em up

I swear to you, and please believe that I mean this as a complement, but as soon as I read the OP, I just knew you'd have a response

all the best!

[KFC911]

LOL...I've been post ho'ing as of late....it pays the bills !

Hope yer good too !

[RKDinOKC]

Played pool going to college many years ago. At the bar I played at the owner told me whenever I wanted a beer to order one and change for the table and pay with a ten. I would get a beer, my change and and my ten back. He said he had been watching me and said I was good for his bar because no matter how good or bad the other player was I played at their same level.

Called "The Stick" because when playing pool with the local PCA guys I brought my own cue and it had a laser pointer built in.

[Drbraunsr]

My dad had bought an 8' - 25 cent coin slot used table from a local bar.
When I had a few friends over for beer and pool, when I'd get $1.25 I'd drive down and buy a six-pack of Coors Banquet beer. Good times
(at $1.25 that gives away my age...)

[island911]

Originally Posted by KC911

Look man...I suck, I know I suck, and I have no intention of sucking less than I do now...

Rack 'em up

Wait, what kind of bets are you making?

Never mind. TMI.

[GH85Carrera]

One of my friends was the basic hustler. He was naturally left handed. He would play for the cheap table stakes right handed and knew how to beat the opponent but just a little. Finally the stakes went up, and to sucker the opponent he would tell them he will play left handed to give them better odds. He got into a lot of bar fights for some strange reason.

[Jeff Higgins]

Before I got married, my room mate (we're still good buddies) was one hell of a pool player. He absolutely refused to play for money, though. The "problem" was that he didn't drink. When he beat guys who had more than a few beers in them, and they noticed he was only drinking water, some of them would get really pissed off. He just never wanted to add fuel to the fire by taking their money.

[pwd72s]

There's a long thread on AZB..."How much did he lose"?....John Barton, has a small biz in China Making some good cue cases...JB cases. Well designed cases that have a following. He has a pretty big ego, thinks he's a pretty good player. Some years ago, he & another guy started woofing at each other on AZB. Ended up with each of them bringing $10,000 to a one pocket matchup that was live streamed. I watched part of it...believe me, if the money wasn't on the line, nobody would bother watching two mediocre talents playing pool.
Anyway, John lost. Did he learn anything?

Nope. Some sort of sick gambling code and ego...is in him. Wants badly to be in with that crowd, show that he has heart. Maybe it's gambling addiction, maybe it's ego. Recently he "went off" (pool lingo) and got sucked into losing $40K. Made a pair of long videos crying about it while saying he can't pay right away. Here is part one:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljc7IhaE-xw

Here's the thread on AZB:

https://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?t=511239

I feel sorry for the poor schmuck...knowing that despite this lesson, it'll happen again. I also feel sorry for his wife and kids. He's reached an age where he shouldn't want to hang with these guys.

I don't play for money...period. Don't mind being called a no heart nit. I do it for the love of the game, take delight over anything new I discover as I work at getting better...while being amazed at the skill displayed by today's top players because I know how they're making those difficult shots look easy.

[Jeff Higgins]

When I was still in my late teens I started hanging out and riding with one of the bigger motorcycle "clubs" (which is a really stupid story in and of itself, for another time...). There were four local taverns that us younger guys could get into, as long as we rode up with the club guys. One of them was in the town in which I now live - the Lynnwood Tavern, affectionately known as "The Lynnwood Knife and Gun Club". Really, really seedy place, a true "biker bar". I saw some really, really ugly fights there, like the kind where you leave, having not seen everyone get back up...

Thankfully, I wised up fairly quickly, seeing no future in that kind of "fun". So I drifted away from that crowd and quit going to those places. Fast forward about fifteen years, and I was married, two kids, career, home, etc. We found ourselves working nights to support some far-flung project so, after work, one of the guys suggested we stop by the Lynnwood Tavern for a beer and a round of pool.

Ruh-roh. The alarm bells were ringing - I wanted nothing to do with it. Well, they talked me into it. When we arrived, much to my surprise, the old building was gone, replaced by a very swank new pool hall. Inside were really nice tables - not the kind with the slots for quarters, you paid for the balls and rack at the counter. Very upscale, compared to the old "knife and gun club".

We became regulars, at least for the duration of the project. At one end were three tables that never got uncovered. Full size, regulation tables, where the others were smaller. Then one night we came in and there was a crowd at the big tables. There were stacks of bills on the rails. Hundred dollar bills. Most stacks over the course of the night were maybe a quarter inch high, maybe a half inch - a fair amount of money at any rate. Then, towards the end of the night, holy cow - the stacks got tall. Like two to three inches tall. Tens of thousands of dollars tall. Yikes...

The guy behind the counter told us they came in about once a week, maybe every two weeks. "That guy - you will see him on T.V...." "The other guy - you will never see him on T.V."

There were three or four that were playing for that kind of money by the end of the night. They each had an entourage with them, and I bet most were armed. Kind of surreal, really.

It seemed like a friendlier atmosphere when it was the old "knife and gun club"...

[pwd72s]

Aren't the wild scene Jeff described. Usually pretty quiet and staid affairs. Very purposely limited number of people watching at the event itself to reduce distractions. Often put on a live stream so the gamblers can watch and bet. A portion of the cash paid goes to the players,,depending on their skill level. Many players have backers who get a huge cut for assuming the risk.

But some do back themselves...I've been told that Shane Van Boening, aka The South Dakota Kid, doesn't use backers..so in this money match, he brought $15K of his money to the battle. His opponent is Jayson Shaw of Scotland. He was probably backed by one or a group. It was a race to 100 games won over a period of several days. This appears to be on a 7' bar table, video showing the last 3 games. You won't see the cash...but it's there.

I'd have felt completely safe being there in person...
Make no mistake...considering who is playing, this video is a glimpse of what to the pool world is a heavyweight championship. Think Ali/Frazier in their prime..the two best going at it.

No sound...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqbZnhyN4wk

[Jeff Higgins]

Funny, we never felt unsafe, or threatened in any way by those guys. It was actually a lot of fun to watch them play, and to just b.s. with them when they weren't. Very laid back crowd. I would imagine the "staff" were there more to put on a display for anyone who might consider jumping them when they left in some ill-advised attempt to get some of that cash. I wouldn't call any of them "thugs", or "tough guys" by any means. They did, however, have a lot of cash on hand, and were just trying to make sure some stupid thug or tough guy didn't get any ideas.

It's kind of sad, but now, another 20 years on, even that place has been torn down and replaced by a little strip mall. I wonder where that crowd, and their successors, wound up. It's not like they stopped playing.

[Jeff Higgins]

So, my favorite "pool hall" (more like another dive bar with tables) story comes from when my buddy and I were riding with the club. The two of us had ridden out by ourselves to one of the places that let us in, where we had become "regulars", so we didn't need to be with the club guys anymore to get it.

We were enjoying a pitcher and shooting some pool when about 20 guys from another club arrived. We didn't wear anything identifying us as "hang arounds" for the other club, so we thought we were good. Well, upon walking in, one of those ass holes grabbed out pitcher and our glasses and said "thanks". Pissed us both off, but what are you going to do? We just got another one and went back to playing.

About an hour later, another club arrived. These clubs were not exactly friendly with one another. By now, the guys from the first club had pitchers sitting on several tables, so I grabbed one while they were distracted with the arrival of the other club. About ten minutes later, the ass hole who grabbed our pitcher came over, pissed as hell, accusing us of stealing his beer.

"Oh no", I countered, "that guy over there took it" (pointing at one of the newly arrived bikers, who had just put a pitcher down on his table). "I didn't say anything because I thought you were all together".

That's all it took. It was on - full on melee with both clubs pounding one another to oblivion. My buddy and I snuck on out through the kitchen and back door, hoping to high heaven our kick start only Sportsters would cooperate before they figured it out. They did, thank God, and we got the hell out of there, but not before pool balls and chairs and tables were starting to come out through the windows. This brawl actually made the local news, with a huge police response, and several club members being hospitalized in critical condition, some with "life threatening" injuries from stab wounds and the like.

It wasn't long after that that John and I began to understand that this probably wasn't a lifestyle worth pursuing...

[pwd72s]

Jeff, back in the day, these "staff" were known as "Tush Hogs"...sort of informal body guard who didn't mind putting a world of hurt on someone who acts up. Generally a true tough guy...may have had a "day job" as a collection agent for loan sharks and bookies. They've been written about in pool books, and posted about on pool sites.

They were people one didn't want to mess with. However, like the true road player and hustler, they've mostly faded into history. The internet pretty much destroyed those roles. Instant recognition when a really good player walks into a pool hall. A hustler has a hard time flying under the radar these days. The old timers love to post tales & pics of those days, though. Some of it damned entertaining. Almost makes me wish I was in the scene then. But really, it's best for the game that those days are gone. The really big money matches are pretty much like the video I posted above...everything worked out long before the players show.

I lifted a pic from AZB that showed a Tush Hog at work back in the day. Just his presence was enough to keep most from thoughts of rolling that player.

[DRONE]

Growing up in Eastern Michigan we had Pool halls and we also had Snooker halls, we would go play a couple games of snooker to sharpen up our shots then go to the local Beer joint and put our quarters in line, win the table. Played for beers and when we had enough free beer we would let them have the table back. Fish in a barrel. Still play at friends homes and have a Reputation they like to play for money I just play for fun. Looking for a Snooker table in San Diego is tough but there are some.

[pwd72s]

No pocket cheating on a snooker table...that's for sure. The hell I play in has a snooker table and a heated 3 cushion table. The snooker table often has a group of guys playing "golf" for low stakes.

So, you're probably familiar with Ronnie O'Sullivan? Here's a fun episode of a travel thing he made for the BBC...visiting some USA cities, and playing pool with the locals.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrrOFZN6pUI