 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.
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March: What About Willie? March 2026 [Reprinted from September 2007] If your love of straight pool runs deep enough — and your accumulated birthdays are many enough — it’s all but impossible to attend a prestigious tournament such as the World 14.1 Championship without pondering, “How would Willie Mosconi have done here?”
That question can actually be answered in at least a couple ways. If you’re the pragmatic sort, and brevity is to your tastes, here’s the briefest possible answer: He wouldn’t have played in the first place. He’d have demanded appearance money, and there he’d have had some case. There just plain wouldn’t be anything to pay him with; the tournament these days is run on a mostly not-for-profit basis out of pure commitment to 14.1. In his last competitive appearance, the celebrated invitational meet in Burbank, California, in the early 1960s, Mosconi demanded — and received — $10,000 before the first ball was struck. What would he ask for today? An aircraft carrier?
But that’s a cynical view, and, besides, the original question clearly seeks a response that speaks to the actual playing of the game. Now, I saw the man play at least a dozen times; not all that much, admittedly, but still more than I’d seen any one of the contemporary competitors. And my answer is that he would undoubtedly been right up there at the top — probably nowhere near as dominant as he used to be, and maybe not even a mortal lock to win, but still awfully close.
When this question comes up, which is fairly frequently, the conversation almost immediately segues into playing equipment, yesterday’s vs. today’s. “He had those big bucket pockets to shoot at!” is usually one of the first things heard, and it’s pure hogwash. Mosconi was running hundreds well into the 1960s with only slightly more effort than breathing, and almost exclusively on new Gold Crowns and in rooms that proudly bragged about the stinginess of their pockets. What we can be absolutely certain of is that he’d have raised a mighty stink about any tinkering with the equipment, such as the angled pocket jaws and deep shelves at a recent event. The champion was not only a traditionalist, but more than a bit of a diva; he wanted everything just so, including the ability, or lack thereof, of his exhibition opponents, and as he remained a terrific box-office draw all his playing days, no one cared to test what would happen if he didn’t get what he wanted.
But those pockets wouldn’t have slowed him down much once the balls were broken. It must be understood that there have always — always — been better pure shot-makers than Mosconi around, even during his dominant era. That’s not to say he was anything less than stellar; of course, he could “come with one” if he had to, but others were better at the one aspect. His dominance began in the early ’40s, when the game was run with an iron hand by the old Brunswick-Balke-Collender company, and even their very own tournament programs and publicity releases proclaimed his peer (and fellow Brunswick endorser) Jimmy Caras as “the game’s biggest daredevil” and “greatest shot-maker alive.” In later eras, it would be widely contended that Hall of Famers Joe Balsis and Luther Lassiter both held that same edge over the champion, although there was not a great deal of head-to-head with him for either man. (He played Lassiter just a few times in tournaments and never lost to him; his only encounter with Balsis that I know of was in that Burbank tournament, and Balsis did win a game from him in the double round robin format.)
So, Mosconi’s advantages playing against the field of today would begin with his pattern play. The champion always claimed he was playing six balls ahead. The lion’s share of today’s stars play only three. And with even a modest bit of straight pool knowledge, you could watch Mosconi play and recognize what those six shots would be. He rarely broke all 14 balls open; on any break shot, it was equally rare to see him send an object ball to rest beyond the side pocket. He would no sooner take on a secondary break shot without an “insurance” ball than he would without his pants. Most of the time, the ball he targeted was within 18 inches of the cue ball. It looked like no one else’s game on the planet.
And his greatest edge by far would have been between the ears. I’m not saying he was smarter than anybody else, and I’m not just talking about the meticulous patters he visualized and executed to perfection. I’m talking about his well-known indifference to the game, as well as his hated of losing that exceeded his love of winning by far. His only appreciation for pool was that it enabled him to earn a fine living; that’s a matter of public record. His oponents back then, and the vast majority of tournament players today, were of the mindset, “I’d rather win than lose, but I’m still happy to be competing at the top level of the greatest game on earth.” For his credo, Mosconi simply settled for the first three words and stuck to it.
In this year’s World Championship field, there were probably dozens of competitors who could have run a hundred on him in opening-round play. Depending on whom you ask, there were arguably six to eight who could have given him all he wanted in the longer races, too. But in addition to producing their best, they’d have had to get by his aura too — and that would not have been easy. Sixty and more years ago, most of Mosconi’s tournament peers were silently hoping he’d snap an ankle en route to the meet. It might not be gracious, but as the song says, you can’t go to jail for what you’re thinkin’. I can’t imagine anyone today who’d be eager to see the man at his peak.
If there were some way to bring him back, the tournament would have been better for it. |
