Pool Cue News and Review

So I was trolling on my favorite billiards discussion board, AZ Billiards, and found a pretty humorous thread. The first poster asked the question “Is Billiards the Toughest Sport?“. Come on, really? A sport? Can you really call something a sport if you can play with a Camel unfiltered hanging out of your mouth (in those bars that still permit smoking)? What about slamming down a plate of jalapeno poppers and washing it down with a 64oz growler while you wait for your opponent to miss a shot? Perhaps the greatest argument against billiards being a sport though can be seen in the picture to the left.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m sure Mr. Delicious is a good guy, but is this is not the picture of athleticism. Neither is John Daly, but I’m not making an argument about golf, just about pool. Yes, I know it takes strategy and some will say endurance but that doesn’t make it a sport, especially when so many players are using, shall we call them “performance enhancers” to stay awake and alert all night while they play marathon sessions? Doing up an 8 ball while you play 9 ball all night long isn’t exactly the traditional way to build endurance.

Setting all that aside, I want you to consider one other argument about whether or not billiards is a sport. When I open the sports section every day, I see results from baseball, basketball, hockey, football, golf, tennis, soccer, nascar and even lacrosse. Hell, there are even listings of results for pro bowling. What I don’t ever see though, is a breakdown of who took home a payday for the latest WPBA event or any other billiards news. There’s no leader board or money list. There are no stories about how Allison Fisher just won her millionth “world championship”. Now before you send me hate mail, keep in mind that I do love the game. I just want to see it cleaned up so someday it might actually be considered a sport by the mainstream instead of a pseudo sport like competitive eating.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to my training. If only I could remember where I put my bong…

Yeah, I know I haven’t reviewed any products in a while, but I’ll get back to that later. For now, I want to address what I’m sure will be spun as a “big win” for the billiards industry: The 2007 SMGA Billiards Participation Study. The folks at the BCA were kind enough to share this data with everyone and at first it looks like good news. The total number of billiards participants grew from 42,596,000 in 2005 to 46,990,00 in 2006. Pretty healthy growth and participation for our little pseudo-sport. What you don’t see is the definition of “participant”. In the case of the SMGA, a participant is someone who has played once in the past year. There is a big difference between participant and pool player and if you don’t believe me, just take a look at the flat to declining numbers of league players. Still don’t believe me? Then ask yourself why less than 1% of the almost 47 million “participants” find themselves participating in an APA League.

That being said, it is nice to see that 17.1% of the US population picked up their pool cues at some point in 2006 and at least tried the game. Too bad, they probably won’t stick with it because:

a) The game is hard and has a steep learning curve

b) More often than not, going into a pool hall is extremely uncomfortable and intimidating for a new player

c) Because of “house rules” there are always arguments which often lead to the inevitable “Man Treated for Assault with Pool Cue” headline that seems to pop up about 4 times a week on my Google Billiards News feed.

So what does this have to do with you, the regular pool player who enjoys the game and doesn’t call the local pokey their home away from home? It means that you should be introducing your non-pool playing friends to the game and showing them that its not all about fighting, hustling and gambling. Its a fun game whether you’re a pro or you just like to knock some balls around, but if the game doesn’t start cleaning up its act, pool isn’t going to be “everyone’s game”, its going to be no one’s game.

In a word… Damn! All the women previously mentioned are super foxy, but let’s face it… Shanelle is super hot. You likely haven’t seen her on any of the tours, but apparently she is the #1 women’s player in Guam, so that’s good enough for me. She also plays for Charlie Williams’ Dragon Promotions, so my guess is that she spends some time playing in Korea where pool is actually a more popular spectator sport than bass fishing.

Whatever the case, someone please teach this girl to play at the WPBA level because ESPN definitely needs to up the hotness factor the “Classic” tour and God knows that this sport is in desperate need of a Maria Sharapova or a Natalie Gulbis to get the casual viewer to start watching. For those who want to see more, check out her website at http://www.shanelleloraine.com.