jrhendy
Verified Member
Tuesday morning before the tournament started, I was talking to "Machine Gun" Lou Butera who came to play in the tournament, & I was telling him about the new One Pocket website and wanted a picture of him to put in. The guy practicing on the table next to me said "That's my website". Steve Booth, the Director of this site was in California & playing in the tournament. 38 players paid $100 entry fee to go along with the $5,000 added for this event. Scott Smith is the tournament director, and the field includes many of the top one pocket players in the country. It is a race to three, double elimination event that has quite a few on the hill matches because of the short race, alternate break format. There are always a few new faces, and some of the 9-Ball players who are entered in the $10,000 added 9-Ball tournament that starts today, play in the one pocket tourney. The best young players I saw were Ian Costello, who is in the final four of the winners group, and Mark Davis, who knocked out Jose Parica before going down to a good local player, Paul Barros. Steve had a tough draw and played two of the better players in the field, but it looked like he had a great time & he took pictures and I'm sure you will hear more from him about this tournament when he gets back from California. Lou Butera ended up knocking me out of the tournament. We went down to the last two balls in the hill match. Although we both missed many chances, he made a bank and ran eight & out in about two minutes to win one game, and made his out ball by caroming off a ball I had hanging in my pocket. Old age & treachery did not work against the "Machine Gun", he can still bring it when he has to.
