Farewell To The Tennessee Rambler

Last Saturday, July 6th, men and women of the cloth (the green cloth, that is, preferably Simonis) gathered to bid farewell to our friend and fellow pool shooter James. Five years away from his native Tennessee was enough and he’s now looking forward to returning to all the gang back home.

More than anyone else, James is responsible for what has come to be known as the Florida Barroom Tour. He not only found the tournaments, some in little hole-in-the-wall beer joints, he also spread the word.

He’s made a zillion friends down here all of whom are now lamenting the fact that tournaments will never be the same – not as lively, not as enjoyable. He leaves here owing no one, but being owed by everyone. That’s just the kind of guy he is.

Below is a portrait of James at the party as he studies a game in progress. In the background is one of the many admirers who attended the soiree.





The party was hosted by Chris and Jim. Chris and James have been on the first place team in their pool league the last few years. I’ve had a few rule and procedural disputes with her at tournaments and therefore have always avoided contact with her or her sharp-shooting spouse. However, they proved at the party, once and for all, that they’re much better people than I am. Not that that’s anything to brag about; the way I figure it, three out of four people you pass on the street are better than I am. Check that - my wife says it's more like 99 out of a hundred. Anyway, in their case it is significant - they are much, much better and nicer. The party was great. We had a little tournament in the garage - I think I came in third – and I hear that some of those straight-shooting animals were still pocketing balls at four in the morning, long after the older fellows were home and in bed.

Perfect Alignment

The planets were lined up just right, I had a good draw, I got a few good rolls, and I might’ve been a little lucky because for the second time in about 6 weeks I won the Friday night stop on the local bar room tour. Top prize was ninety bucks instead of the usual hundred because of a sparse field, I guess.

Like I have said, my friend James is moving out of Pasco County and back to Tennessee in a couple weeks, so my participation as a regular on the bar tour is about to come to an end. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve met a lot of nice people on the circuit, as well, of course, as more than a few slugs. It’s the game they play that I’ve had enough of. It looks like pool, it even smells like pool, but to me it just isn’t pool. It’s sort of like comparing miniature golf to that game Tiger Woods plays, if you know what I mean.

I mean, sure, I’ve won a few tournaments but I’d be much more pleased with myself if I entered an ‘A’ tournament and won a match or two. If you want to be a pool player, you gotta play pool.

So, after James leaves I’ll be performing my wizardry in the pool halls of Pasco County. At least, that’s the plan. I might sneak back to the bars once in a while, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

And there are other forces at play here, like I don’t smoke. Sure, there’s a lot of smoking in the pool rooms, too, but most of the pool rooms around here have smoke eaters and other types of ventilation. This is not the case with the beer joints. They could give a shit about your lungs. I quit smoking back in 1990 and I like to kid myself into thinking my odds of getting lung cancer have gone down. It’s hard to kid yourself when after a night of pool playing you come home with aching lungs.

Then there’s the fact that I don’t drink. I haven’t had so much as a beer since I was diagnosed a diabetic back in 2000. I’ve been told I can have an occasional beer with little consequence, but, the way I look at it, if you’re not gonna get bombed why drink at all. I do feel obligated to buy something when I’m out, so I’ll usually buy myself a water or a diet cola. (Note: I didn’t endorse any particular brand of diet cola because as of now I haven’t received that $50,000 check.)

That’s about it. I’m still practicing about an hour a day, working on my stroke and my shot making, and I’m still wearing the eye patch over my subdominant eye hoping to make my dominant eye more… dominant. Is it doing any good? I don’t really think so; not yet anyway. But, I’m a stubborn mother f’er - I refuse to give up.

The Horror!

I just got back from my practice session over at the clubhouse. My sessions usually run the same – they start off with a couple of racks of straight shots, corner to corner, long-ways across the table. After I start poking them in (and, unfortunately, I do mean poke) with regularity, I switch to angle shots, placing the object ball just off the rail three diamonds up table from the corner (one diamond south of the side). After each shot, the object ball is placed back in this spot. I start this progression with the cue ball along the opposite side rail, one diamond north of the side. If I make the shot first try, I move the cue ball north one diamond and progress around the corner and along the end rail one diamond at a time till I’m shooting a straight in shot. If I miss along the way, my penalty is that I can’t move on until I make two in a row. When I complete this, I reverse everything so that I’m cutting in the opposite direction to the opposite corner… if you know what I mean. Sometimes I tell myself that I’m going to make up a chart and keep track of how many shots it takes me from day to day so that I can see if I’m actually improving, but I forget about it almost immediately. Next, I shoot some spot shots from both sides of the table varying the location of the cue ball. Then, I start playing nine ball by myself, setting the balls up in different formations, or just throwing them out on the table at random.

Of course, the most important part of my session involves practicing the shot or shots that caused me to be eliminated from the previous night’s tournament. Oh, God, I hate to think about it. I beat some good players last night but wound up missing an easy shot along the rail that would have left me with a straight in shot on the eight in the side. The Horror! Unfortunately this kind of thing is all too common. I’m pretty sure the problem lies with my stroke or with that series of spastic gyrations I call a stroke. I’m determined to make my stroke better. Today, I consciously exaggerated my follow through on every shot. I think I’m on the right track.

Anyway, my good buddy, JP, is moving back to Tennessee in a couple weeks and with him gone I can’t see myself going to very many bar tourneys anymore. I played with the A-players at DJs in New Port Richey this past Thursday. I didn’t expect much of myself and wasn’t disappointed. The eventual winner blitzed me in my first match. And after jumping to a 2-0 lead in my second match, I made the mistake of waking my opponent up and paid the price as he came back and ran three games on me. Still, I had more fun than I would have at the bar tournament down the road. Who knows, someday I might actually win a match.