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Just Who Does Charlie Williams Think He Is?
By Mike Geffner
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| Williams has developed a thick skin as UPA president, but some
wonder if he's too young or hot-headed to lead. |
Tell that to tournament director Alexandra Dyer, who
approached the UPA about sanctioning the First Annual Master Billiard
Big Apple 9-Ball Challenge. Dyer hoped to establish some credibility
for the first-time event — scheduled for Aug. 15-17 at Master
Billiard in Queens, N.Y. — and attract name players. So, she
acquired sanctioning from the World Pool-Billiard Association in hopes
of landing star players from the International Challenge of Champions,
taking place Aug. 13-14 in Uncasville, Conn. Those players would include
Efren Reyes, Francisco Bustamante, Ralf Souquet and occasional enfant
terrible Earl Strickland. But Dyer hit a snag with the UPA, which
among its conditions forebade crowd-favorite Strickland from playing.
Dyer resisted at first, but then was informed by the WPA that if the
event didn’t have UPA sanctioning, it would lose its WPA sanctioning
as well. In addition, UPA officials said that members would boycott
the event if it didn’t carry the group’s sanction, Dyer
said.
Williams defended the UPA’s stance as appropriate after tournament
organizers decided they didn’t want to meet the sanctioning
conditions.
“They said, ‘Fine, we’ll do it our own way and get
all your players anyway.’ That was a little bit of a slap in
the face to the association, and that’s why we wouldn’t
give waivers to anybody [to play in the event]. Our response to that
was, ‘You’re not going to make the players of our association
disloyal to us.’ What were trying to do is unify the promoters
and unify the sport, and having rogue and independent promoters who
are blatantly telling us they don’t want to work with the association
and that the players won’t stick by us, then that’s an
insult to any profession, I believe.”
Dyer relented and accepted UPA sanctioning, but the experience left
a sour taste in her mouth.
“As a fledgling organization, they are learning as they are
doing, and that is exposing them to making mistakes along the way,”
she says. “I think they have some high-handed tactics. …
Don’t strong-arm promoters who have every intention of paying
players. Don’t engage in petty fights with one of the luminaries
of the sport.”
The UPA has seemed dead set against sanctioning any event that invites
Strickland to participate. Williams denies this. “Nothing against
Earl, but he isn’t a UPA member,” Williams explains. “He
can’t play in our sanctioned events.” Depending on whom
you believe, Strickland either quit or was terminated by the UPA in
August 2002. After a loss to Reyes knocked Strickland from the UPA’s
Peninsula Open, The Pearl stormed out of the playing arena, then reportedly
ripped the UPA logo patch from his shirt, tossed it in the garbage,
and said, “This is what I think about the UPA. I’m through
with them and I won’t play in another of their events ever again.”
The UPA summarily sent him a letter “accepting his resignation,”
adding that they’d consider letting him back only if he signed
a code-of-conduct contract promising to behave himself from that day
forward. Needless to say, Strickland never agreed to sign such a thing.
But Strickland, along with other non-UPA members, did play in the
UPA-sanctioned Mid-Atlantic 9-Ball Championships — produced
by Brady Behrman, Barry’s son — and the Hopkins-produced
Pro Players Championship. “That’s because we sanctioned
those events late,” Williams explains. “The promoters
had already advertised those events and the invitations had already
gone out, including those to Earl. So in those two instances, we made
an exception, with the promise from those promoters they’d meet
our requirements in the future. One of the things the UPA is very
proud of is that no one player is above the others. We plan on keeping
it that way.”
More dissenting voices were triggered by the emergence of a new UPA
player contract early this year, which more than a few players thought
was way too hard-line and restrictive. For example, the contract in
one incarnation forbid UPA members from playing in unsanctioned or
unrecognized events without first receiving an official waiver. The
UPA has since revised the contract to make it more palatable. “We
agreed with some of the players and we’ve softened the language,”
Williams says. “The wording was kind of strong. We’re
not here to prevent players from making a living, or to completely
control their lives.”
Still, Williams has been accused of adopting some extreme measures
to get people signed on the dotted line, going so far as to threaten
players — most notably superstud Cory Deuel — that if
they didn’t sign a UPA contract they couldn’t play in
July’s World Pool Championship in Cardiff, Wales. Williams denies
this, saying, “The whole thing’s been twisted around.
All I ever said to people was, the WPA [World Pool-Billiard Association]
gives the BCA [Billiard Congress of America] 13 spots for American
players to play in the World Championship. Then the BCA, in turn,
gives those spots to us, recognizing the UPA as the governing body
of men’s professional pool. And those spots go to our members
according to the rankings. So if you don’t sign the contract,
you’re not a member, and if you’re not a member we can’t
submit your name for a spot. This is one of the benefits of being
a UPA member. That still doesn’t mean Cory Deuel can’t
play. He can get invited as a wild card.” [For his part, Deuel
did not return calls from BD seeking comment, and he in fact was invited
to the Championship as a wild card; see related stories beginning
on page 70.]
Other rumors charge that Williams is secretly using tour money to
cover traveling expenses to tournaments — to pay for lavish
meals, expensive hotels rooms and first-class seating on flights.
These same charges were leveled at Don Mackey. Williams counters this
with a hard, annoyed chuckle that borders on an exasperated sigh.
“Listen, my work with the UPA is totally volunteer,” Williams
insists. “I make no money from the UPA. In fact, no one gets
a salary working for the UPA. I pay for all my traveling expenses
out of my own pocket.”
Williams refuses to name the names of his enemies or get into a back-and-forth
war of words with them, but says emphatically: “If the UPA were
as bad as people say, the players would just quit and there would
be no UPA anymore — which hasn’t come close to happening.
… Bottom line, we’re trying to create strength through
unity, and I’m confident that at least 90 percent of the players
are completely behind us. Sure, we have a few loose cannons. But I’m
a realist. While we want everybody under one UPA banner, it’ll
probably never happen. If somebody doesn’t want to be with us,
I say, ‘Cut ‘em loose.’ It’s no big deal.
We don’t need people who are going to hinder us. We need to
move on.”
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