HomeAbout Billiards DigestContact UsArchiveAll About PoolEquipmentOur AdvertisersLinks
Tips & shafts
By George Fels
Consulting Editor George Fels has been writing for Billiards Digest since 1980, and his "Tips & Shafts" column is usually our readers' first stop when they crack open the magazine. For better or worse, pool has been his only mistress for 40-plus years.


Archives
• March 2024
• February 2024
• January 2024
• December 2023
• November 2023
• October 2023
• September 2023
• August 2023
• July 2023
• June 2023
• May 2023
• April 2023
• March 2023
• February 2023
• January 2023
• December 2022
• November 2022
• October 2022
• September 2022
• August 2022
• July 2022
• June 2022
• May 2022
• April 2022
• March 2022
• February 2022
• January 2022
• December 2021
• November 2021
• October 2021
• September 2021
• August 2021
• July 2021
• June 2021
• May 2021
• April 2021
• March 2021
• February 2021
• January 2021
• December 2020
• November 2020
• October 2020
• September 2020
• August 2020
• June 2020
• April 2020
• March 2020
• February 2020
• January 2020
• November 2019
• October 2019
• September 2019
• August 2019
• July 2019
• June 2019
• May 2019
• April 2019
• March 2019
• February 2019
• January 2019
• December 2018
• November 2018
• October 2018
• September 2018
• July 2018
• July 2018
• June 2018
• May 2018
• April 2018
• March 2018
• February 2018
• January 2018
• November 2017
• October 2017
• September 2017
• August 2017
• July 2017
• June 2017
• May 2017
• April 2017
• March 2017
• February 2017
• January 2017
• December 2016
• November 2016
• October 2016
• September 2016
• August 2016
• July 2016
• June 2016
• May 2016
• Apr 2016
• Mar 2016
• Feb 2016
• Jan 2016
• December 2015
• November 2015
• October 2015
• September 2015
• August 2015
• July 2015
• June 2015
• May 2015
• April 2015
• March 2015
• February 2015
• January 2015
• October 2014
• August 2014
• May 2014
• March 2014
• February 2014
• September 2013
• June 2013
• May 2013
• April 2013
• March 2013
• February 2013
• January 2013
• December 2012
• November 2012
• October 2012
• September 2012
• August 2012
• July 2012
• June 2012
• May 2012
• April 2012
• March 2012
• February 2012
• January 2012
• December 2011
• November 2011
• October 2011
• September 2011
• August 2011
• July 2011
• June 2011
• May 2011
• April 2011
• March 2011
• February 2011
• January 2011
• December 2010
• November 2010
• October 2010
• September 2010
• August 2010
• July 2010
• May 2010
• April 2010
• March 2010
• February 2010
• January 2010
• December 2009
• November 2009
• October 2009
• September 2009
• August 2009
• July 2009
• June 2009
• May 2009
• April 2009
• March 2009
• February 2009
• January 2009
• October 2008
• September 2008
• August 2008
• July 2008
• June 2008
• May 2008
• April 2008
• March 2008
• February 2008
• January 2008


Best of Fels
 
December: Geezerball
December 2019

By George Fels
[Reprinted from October 1997]


The aging spectators stretch their creaky limbs and groan in the delicious agony in the sparsely populated bleachers. And the main reason this is considered no great breach of etiquette is that the pool players they behold, especially the ones in the seated position, are doing the same thing. Welcome to the Magical Mystery Tour of Steve Mizerak Senior Events, described by one enchanted patron as “the best idea Steve’s had since he decided to play pool.”

While major tournaments are held periodically in the Chicagoland area, I can’t remember the last time I attended every single day of one. Although the hippie generation redefined the word “mellow” for decades to come, there remain some of us who remember what it originally meant, and what a blessed marriage it is with pool. The only perceptible falloff of play among the seniors is that you will see very few jacked-up, end-rail-to-end-rail showstoppers — not that the players are incapable, but simply that they have become too patient to even consider such a thing. Your trade-off, in exchange for those highlight-reel shots, will take the form of near-total player accessibility, no attitudes, no temperaments, hardly any matters of ego at all, and a superbly run meet where players and followers are in a tight photo finish to see who has more fun.

Indeed, one of the most intriguing aspects of 50-and-over pool is to see just how the competitors regard their own playing misdeeds. The atmosphere surrounding a seniors’ tournament is very different; although all combatants would welcome the highly respectable $6,000 top award, or even something lesser, hardly any is dependent on that, and the resultant relaxation can be felt all over the room. Not only are the players receptive to a good-natured heckle now and then, but usually the most high-strung tantrum to be found is a single mid-air, two-handed shake of a cue. A good 80 percent of the time, players react to their misses or position gaffes with a head shake and an ironic grin, as though to say, “Look what you went and did now, you old doofus you!”

The seniors’ top echelon, of course, can play with anybody. Larry Hubbart, Danny DiLiberto, Billy Incardona and others are renowned for booking few losers in unsanctioned competition; the latter two, besides possessing perhaps the only flat bellies in the field, have beaten Efren Reyes. Yet to the last man, all participants express relief at being away from players where three or four balls automatically fall on the break and players knock out five and six racks as though they were mere stretching exercises and coming back to the game more as it was meant to be played. The break box is a great equalizer for the seniors; on some of the slower tables, the break ceases to be much of a weapon and even turns into something of an iron boot. There is generally far more defensive play to be seen than in the professional mainstream, and 9-ball defense is captivating when you’re not used to watching it. One reason for that is that the seniors, between their experience at reading the angles and their total calm at facing the challenge, rarely miss their kicks. It’s not uncommon at all to see the player who is hooked respond with a kick that buries his opponent even deeper.

The only concession to age to be found anywhere, in fact, is that some of the players’ mannerisms are definite throwbacks to another era. Claude Bernatchez, a perennial Canadian winner, keeps his personal cube of chalk in his pocket the entire match as though it were the Hope Diamond, an idiosyncrasy I haven’t seen since the ’50s. Genial Milwaukeean George Pawelski, whose 28-year layoff from pool makes the late Joe Balsis’ 17 years away seem like a weekend retreat, combines a near-perfect part in his hair with a classic, sweeping, side-wheeling stroke for a look that suggests he arrived at the tournament through time travel. And nobody captures that old-time religion better than the fabled Larry “Boston Shorty” Johnson, who, with his every-present stogie and porkpie hat, recalls the great old song, “Small fry, struttin’ by the poolroom…”

The players’ low-keyedness doesn’t mean their personalities have melted away. Hubbart, as serene as Thoreau’s “Walden Pond” whether the score is hill-hill or 1-10 against him, made an interesting contrast with the chatty DiLiberto, who at one point explained to the crowd that his successful bank shot “rolled off,” and also fashioned the tournament finest expletive. Consoled after his hill-hill match with Hubbart, lost when he failed to score on the break in the climactic game, Danny opined, “Awww, borscht!”

Nice touches are the order of the day here. Tournament director Scott Smith is the best in America, and perhaps beyond, at what he does; although the player dress code calls only for collared shirts and slacks, he is tuxedoed for the last two days, providing illuminating player profiles, calling spectators’ special attention to hill-hill matches, and unfailingly asking for their applause for the vanquished. Discipline and grit are in attendance, too; Canadian Paul Thornley, winner of the new tour’s sixth event, endures a heartbreaking hill-hill loss to Incardona in which he led, 9-4, gets thoroughly drilled by DiLiberto in his debut on the one-loss side and promptly takes out a table and practices for four solid hours.

The Steve Mizerak Seniors Events tour is one of the best feet pool has put forward in many, many moons. It’s nothing more than incidental that one qualifies to play by having been born in 1947 or earlier. Everyone I saw there was utterly ageless.

MORE VIDEO...