I travel around the world quite extensively with my job, and am amazed that American amateur pool players are the least knowledgeable of the rules of 8-ball and 9-ball. It is like they make them up as they go.
The three major leagues are the APA, BCA, and IPT. You can obtain copies of the rules on-line and for free. There is no reason why pool players in the USA should not be familiar with at least the major league rules.
As an example, at my local pool hall, two middle age pool players , who seemed to know each other, decided to play a race to 8 of 8-Ball for $1,000.00. Within a few minutes, they were in a constant dispute over the rules. Finally, they asked my friend and I to decide who was right and who was wrong. We both asked them by which rules they were going by. The answer was just 8-Ball Rules. Well we informed them, there were three major leagues as indicated above, and they were all different. They asked us what rules we were going by and we told them IPT, which is a call shot game. I also told them different bars and clubs have their own rules, that usually cause problems to outsiders who don't ask questions first. I pointed out since they were playing for that much money, I would be playing by BCA or IPT Rules, since APA was not call shot and much easier.
They continued to bug us to resolve their problems until I said, if you two are going to play for money, you really need to learn the rules before you wind up in a fist fight and/or enemies forever.
What do you folks think?????
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Philly Willy |
