MARYLAND OPEN 14.1 STRAIG
BIG DADDY’S
Players and fans began arriving into the Baltimore area as early as noon on Thursday July 22-24, 2011 This event has become one of the most prestigious straight pool tournaments of the year in the U.S. and for the third consecutive year has been held at a new family billiard venue, BIG DADDY’S BILLIARDS, 7954 Baltimore-Annapolis Blvd., Glen Burnie, Maryland. Under the ownership of Richard & Cynthia Molineiro “ Big Daddy’s” has become the premier east coast mecca for the beautiful and imaginative game of 14.1. Previously the Maryland Straight Pool title has been won by Danny Harriman - 2010, Danny Harriman - 2009, Bob Maidhof - 2008, Mika Immonen - 2007, Ed Hodan - 2006, Ryan McCreesh - 2005 This year a 35 player field of the top Straight Pool players in the country began to filter into Maryland for Friday afternoon warm-ups, check out the venue, the tables and equipment, new Simonis 860 cloth, Centennial balls. Players were anxious to get in a few hours of practice, as competition this year was going to be one of the strongest fields ever. The Friday evening pre-tournament reception also serves as the tournament payers meeting. Format this year was slightly amended with a 35 player field, 7 balanced flights of 5 players each for the initial Round Robin session. Everyone playing a 100 point match vs. the other four players in their flight with the 24 top players advancing to the Sunday single elimination round. The 7 flight winners, plus the best 2nd place player were rewarded with a first round bye in the knockout on Sunday. Good idea! Zion Zvi finished 2nd in his flight and was the top 2nd place player based on his W-L record and ball differential, so h took the 8th spot and a coveted a first round bye on Sunday morning. The 35 players were listed in an approximate pecking order and then balanced flights were randomly drawn. Encompassed in the informal reception & cocktail party on Friday night was the Players Meeting which Director Peter Burrows believes is always a welcome opportunity for players to voice their opinions of format, rules and anything else on their mind. After an evening of companionship and an hour of practice the action got off to a bright and early start 10 a.m. on Saturday morning, using 14 Pro Diamond & Brunswick Gold Crown tables and 35 players each playing the other four in his flight on pre-assigned tables and time slots, with an attempt that each player would play two of his matches on Diamond tables and two on Brunswick tables. The day consisted of five rounds and each player would have one round during the day when he had a bye. Some tough scheduling but meticulously managed by official scorer & statistician, Dave Nangle. Bob Maidhof raced through his four Sat. games winning all with only a tight match 100-88 vs. Maryland’s Ed Deska to reach the bye round on Sunday. As luck would have it Bob again faced Eddie Deska in the second round on Sunday, following Ed’s lengthly and tight win over Rick Molineiro 125-101. But this time Maryland’s own Eddie prevailed over Drexeline Bob winning a tight match 125-101. Former Maryland and now Fla. pro Mike Davis, won his flight and so got to sleep in
on Sunday morning with a bye before matching up against Earl Herring. Mike seldom misses and pulled away with a 125-37 win. Davis then moved on to play Zion Zvi and pulled far ahead needing only 4 balls before allowing Zion back to the table. Given the chance and with a favorable roll at a key juncture Zion came back with a 50+ to run out the match with a 125-121 win. Brandon Shuff won his first round match vs. local Big Daddy’s player, Tom Lyons, and then faced up to the great Jose Parica. Jose pulled way away with early long runs as Brandon sat. But not intimidated the young Virginia sharp shooter knuckled down and started to grind reminiscent of a seasoned veteran. A couple of good runs and gradually Brandon pulled it close. Still Jose needed only 11. Suddenly he was stuck on a ball and Brandon was back at the table with a chance to get out, and he did wining an exciting match 125-114 vs. one of the era’s great great 14.1 players. Johnny Archer, moved easily through most of his matches with wins over a really solid PA player and room owner at Cosmos Billiards, Scranton PA, Kevin Clark. What an impressive player. But Johnny prevailed 125-74 and then got past Deska 125-60. Bob Hunter had a good Saturday not allowing an opponent to reach 50 before Bob got his 100, and so reached 3-0 in the round robin before finally losing his last Sat. match to Archer 100-68. And so the great World Champ and top cue maker from Chicago moved to Sunday where he eliminated Amsterdam Billiards own Chris Lynch in the first round to set up his match with Dave Daya who had a bye. Daya is always a crafty and tough opponent, and just doesn’t miss; seems he almost knows the game of 14.1 too well. What a player. Dave eventually managed to draw slightly ahead and finally pulled out a see-saw battle of safeties to win the match 127-77. In spite of his motor cycle ride from West VA over to Baltimore on Friday, the hottest day in Maryland in recent memory, John Schmidt had two 100 and outs on Saturday. Not paying attention to manners, John made one of those vs. Tournament Director Peter Burrows. Just no respect for his elders! None of Mr. 400’s opponents on Saturday reached 50 points. And then in the Sunday 2nd round John faced an always tough opponent, Bob Chamberlain . . . same result, Schmitty winning 125-26. When would someone get up and run some ball against Mr. Schmidt? Really tough to do, as John has 200 ball runs in his sleep! His opponents just cannot afford to miss . . . ever! The beauty of straight pool. The two semi final matches began about an hour behind schedule,. . . so what is new! A live stream mini-cam picked up the most of exciting action about 7 p.m. on Sunday between Dave Daya & Johnny Archer on one table and NY’s Zion Zvi vs. John Schmidt on the other. No surprises here. Daya came in 2nd last year in Maryland losing to Danny Harriman and Zion has been well known to 14.1 players for half dozen years. But upsets were not to happen and Daya held on vs. Archer before The Scorpion finally go into stroke and raced out to a 125-52 win. On the next table Mr. 400 open a huge lead and never looked back, keeping the young NYC phenom in his chair for a brief hour as he cruised through an 82 ball
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7954 Baltimore Annapolis Blvd Glen Burnie, MD 410-760-1332
4 Stroke Magazine - August 2011