Well, its seems like the popularity is still soaring for the Predator tour. It was 83 players, which was improvement from last weeks 75. Cool. Again, it was a very strong field with most of the Tri-states best. In addition we also had Chuck Altomare and Jeremy Sossei who recently won the Ocean State Championships.
Unfortunately the house pro for Masters, Shin Park, got sick. Also Ginky got the flu. I hope they get better soon.
Ok, so I started out good, at as far as the the player auction was concerned. I went for a a crazy 450 dollars. I guess somebody had real good faith in me. Ha ha ha. The next two blind bids was Thorsten(250$) and Tony(200$) which were also worthy investments. It turned out to be all three of us in the Final three.
Anyways I am just going to fast forward to sunday where I had to play Jorge Rodriguez first. I came out of the gate strong running out the first couple racks. Of course its still alternating breaks but Rodriguez, on his turn, was unable to capitalize and gave me a couple of presents. So I just kept a good lead and used my opportunities well. 9-3.
Then it was time to play the young gun Jeremy Sossei. I was observing some of his play earlier and knew that I had to be sharp for this one. He has a very powerful break for one. He also has a very good pace around the table. Seems just calm and collected.
So in the beginning again I was able to break and run. I want to really stress the importance of an opening run-out with alternating break. It really can put a lot of pressure on the opponent to run the next rack. Because if he doesn't it can potentially be 3-0 without really blinking an eye. Well thats pretty much what happened, I kept the lead and kept the pressure on him the whole match and finished 9-1. For me it was an excellent match, I have to say.
Time for the winners bracket final. I was playing Tony. I had an early lead like 2-1,3-2,4-3. I had in all these situations a chance to make a 2-rack deficit, but failed each time. It was really disappointing. Tony came and evened the game and eventually cruised by me. Then it just typical: If you don't use the early opportunities, later the rolls will go the other way.
Tony played well and deserved the match.
I now had to just wait and see who would make it through the one-loss side to the b-semi's.
Looks like Thorsten was showing good stamina and cruising through. I knew I had to prepare for a strong match. And one hell of a match it was. Thorsten was breaking super strong. I managed to make a come-back after being down 4-1.
on courtesy of Thorsten you can see how the match went exactly: thorstenhohmann.blogspot.com
My friend Wei from Cuetable.com recorded the match hopefully we can make it available for public soon.
The final was really one-way traffic in favor of Tony. He was really playing well and breaking with control. He showed a good stamina considering that he has to do all the work to make the tour successful.
I, on the other hand, could not even make a good rack for myself and the match started to remind me of the earlier one on the winners side.
At 9-5, I had a chance to safe him, but it looked like the table drifted of a bit, and I sold out an easy safe. So instead of 6-9 my break, it was 5-10 my break. Big difference.
I think I managed to save a little face and ran out, but the next rack I lost a safety battle and Tony cleared the table ending with a kiss shot of the 8 to the 9. I knew he had it so I shook his hand already. The score:11-6. Congrats buddy! You deserved it.
Yeah, second place again. Grrr! But at least I am consistant.
For another angle to the story click on: azbilliards.com/2000storya.cfm?storynum=5107
Ok, so I started out good, at as far as the the player auction was concerned. I went for a a crazy 450 dollars. I guess somebody had real good faith in me. Ha ha ha. The next two blind bids was Thorsten(250$) and Tony(200$) which were also worthy investments. It turned out to be all three of us in the Final three.
Anyways I am just going to fast forward to sunday where I had to play Jorge Rodriguez first. I came out of the gate strong running out the first couple racks. Of course its still alternating breaks but Rodriguez, on his turn, was unable to capitalize and gave me a couple of presents. So I just kept a good lead and used my opportunities well. 9-3.
Then it was time to play the young gun Jeremy Sossei. I was observing some of his play earlier and knew that I had to be sharp for this one. He has a very powerful break for one. He also has a very good pace around the table. Seems just calm and collected.
So in the beginning again I was able to break and run. I want to really stress the importance of an opening run-out with alternating break. It really can put a lot of pressure on the opponent to run the next rack. Because if he doesn't it can potentially be 3-0 without really blinking an eye. Well thats pretty much what happened, I kept the lead and kept the pressure on him the whole match and finished 9-1. For me it was an excellent match, I have to say.
Time for the winners bracket final. I was playing Tony. I had an early lead like 2-1,3-2,4-3. I had in all these situations a chance to make a 2-rack deficit, but failed each time. It was really disappointing. Tony came and evened the game and eventually cruised by me. Then it just typical: If you don't use the early opportunities, later the rolls will go the other way.
Tony played well and deserved the match.
I now had to just wait and see who would make it through the one-loss side to the b-semi's.
Looks like Thorsten was showing good stamina and cruising through. I knew I had to prepare for a strong match. And one hell of a match it was. Thorsten was breaking super strong. I managed to make a come-back after being down 4-1.
on courtesy of Thorsten you can see how the match went exactly: thorstenhohmann.blogspot.com
My friend Wei from Cuetable.com recorded the match hopefully we can make it available for public soon.
The final was really one-way traffic in favor of Tony. He was really playing well and breaking with control. He showed a good stamina considering that he has to do all the work to make the tour successful.
I, on the other hand, could not even make a good rack for myself and the match started to remind me of the earlier one on the winners side.
At 9-5, I had a chance to safe him, but it looked like the table drifted of a bit, and I sold out an easy safe. So instead of 6-9 my break, it was 5-10 my break. Big difference.
I think I managed to save a little face and ran out, but the next rack I lost a safety battle and Tony cleared the table ending with a kiss shot of the 8 to the 9. I knew he had it so I shook his hand already. The score:11-6. Congrats buddy! You deserved it.
Yeah, second place again. Grrr! But at least I am consistant.
For another angle to the story click on: azbilliards.com/2000storya.cfm?storynum=5107
Rakkaat Suomalaiset,
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