I’ve been so damn busy with everything else that I haven’t had time to do much posting. So, to summarize: 2 weeks ago I played my first APA league matches. I play on a double-jeapordy team, and played 9-ball first. They started me as a 5; even after I played the local league operator and some of his “evaluators” all agreed I should probably be a 6 to start with. But, regardless – them’s the rules in the book. So, I have to go to 38 and my opponent goes to 31. I’ll wrap this match up by saying I made everything I shot at… i just never got to shoot at anything. I only made it to 20. Just couldn’t outrun the rolls.
Then I played my 8-ball match a few hours later. I win the lag, and proceed to win all 4 racks! The guy should’ve had me a few times, but he’d severely blow position on his key ball, almost every time. So, I’d run out with an open table. My first 8-ball match, and I get a “Rackless” patch!
Skip ahead to last night (no league last week). I’m still a 5 in 9-ball, and I play LIGHTS OUT! I get to my 38 in 7 innings – including 3 safeties, so for scoring purposes, I get there in 4 innings!! That’s an average of 9.5 points per inning. I’m going to go from a 5 to an 8 (at least) next week! I got all the rolls and my opponent didn’t get any. For match score, I won 20-0 for the team; which earns me the “Skunked” patch! 🙂 Then I play 8-ball – for which I was moved up to a 7. I play another 7, it’s a race to 5. We start the match around 11:30, I’ve had a few beers and a shot and had been sitting for about 3.5 hours. I win the lag, break, make a ball, but the CB is hooked behind some other balls, so I play safe. And from there, my opponent and I play a short chess match for a while. He gets the first 2 racks, then I get one, then he gets another. He needs 2, I need 4. I start to losen up at the table and the match became awesome. We played lock-up safeties back and forth on each other; it really became a safety battle because as soon as one of us made a mistake, the other ran out. Literally. I wish the CueTable software worked because I had such an amazing out I’d love to diagram. I broke dry and he overran position on his 2nd to last ball, forcing a kick. He scratched and I ran out, clearing 3 of my suite within 2 diamonds on the long rail – starting with a cross-side bank. I got it to hill-hill and he was breaking. He did the 2nd ball break and it just causes a mess, so he didn’t run out – though I thought he might. When I got to the table, I had some problems, I got a little overly aggressive and tried to a carom I didn’t think would go – and it didn’t. He got out from there, so I lost. But, 9 racks, 20 innings, 10 safeties, so even still, 9 racks in 10 functional innings, is still a 7-level score.
Afterwards, we talked about how much fun the match was – how it was really very close and how enjoyable it was. I really hope I get more matches like that. It was absolutely by far the best 8-ball match I have ever played. I honestly do not care that I lost; it was that much fun.
Tonight, I play in my first APA Masters division league. No handicaps, rack count only, race to 7, on the big-boy tables. 🙂 Really looking forward to that!
Also, last week, I had my first 9-ball league (at Cue & Cushion) and I started off really well, getting up 7-3 on my opponent in a race to 9; but after a break, I just kept missing the 7 ball and he got it all tied up at 7; then 8, then I got to double-hill. If he hadn’t froze himself on the 8-ball in the last rack, I would’ve lost the match – but the pool gods favored me this day, and his safety wasn’t strong enough, so I power-banked the 8 cross-side and got shape on the 9. So, I won my first 9-ball league match of the session! 🙂