apa news

Beaverton, OR – January 21-23, The Amazon Sports Pub graciously hosted our OPAL-APA Fall Session 9-Ball Tri-Cup with a couple of rounds being exported to Ringo’s when we needed 4 more tables on Saturday. Amazon manager, Elina Chin and her crew did a fantastic job as hosts, as did Doug & Brian over at Ringo’s. The food and drink service was excellent and the sites accommodated our event extremely well.

We had 38 division 9-ball team finalists competing in the Modified Single elimination format. It was a weekend of close competition with the majority of all matches going down to the last rack to decide a winner. However, if a team reached 51 points, the match was declared over.

Two new records were historically set at this event. Danny Turner’s “Engine Engine #9” team set the Tri-Cup record for the quickest and most dramatic win ever, taking three straight match races (20-0, 19-1, 18-2, score 57-3) from John Blue’s “Table Scraps” team. “Engine Engine #9” apparently used up all their marbles because they lost in the next round knocking them out of the tourney. The final results are as follows:

FINISHING 33rd and winning $150 were: White Horse Saloon’s “Just Horse Playing,” The Wichita (Kings) “Fox & Hounds,” All Star’s “Hide Your Daughters” Beaverton’s “Ringo’s,” Horseshoe Pub’s “Horseshoes” and Dr. John’s “Underwater Predators.”

FINISHING 25-32 and winning $200 were: Club Underground’s Summer’s Tri-Cup Silver Medallists “Get ‘er Done,” Mousetrap’s “Mousetrap,” Halftime’s “Death Stroke,” Club Underground’s “Menagerie,” Rodder’s “Table Scraps,” Amazon’s “Magic Orbs,” Milwaukee’s “Jo’s Saloon” and Elks Lodge #1862’s “BSE Elks.”

FINISHING 17-24 and winning $300 were: Sam’s “Good Tryers,” Midway’s “Last Call,” Watkins Park’s “Pops & the Boys,” Captain’s “Buddha’s Bunch,” Amazon’s “Skyline Eight,” Sextant’s “Engine Engine #9,” Midway’s “Car Bombers” and Midway’s “We Need Frosting.”

FINISHING 9-16 and winning $400 were: Ringo’s “Soul Papaya,” Aloha Station’s “Crazy Eights,” Ickabod’s “Monday Night Shots,” Midway’s “Guys & Dolls,” Bushwhacker’s “Outlaws,” Corner Spot’s “Stick It In,” Ringo’s “Breakaways” and Camas WA’s “Adams Street.”

FINISHING 5-8, winning Bronze Medallions and $550 were: Nelson’s Extreme’s “Logan’s Heros,” Boiler Room’s “Old Town Junkies,” and “Spring Break” and O'Malley’s “Southeast-Hustlers.”

FINISHING 3-4, winning Silver Medallions and $750 were: Aloha’s “Patty B’s” and Blue Parrot’s “Not Yet.”

FINISHING 2ND, winning Gold Medallions and $1100 after being kicked into the Loser’s side by “Pops & the Boys” on Friday night, then fighting their way back into Sunday’s finals was Midway’s “Buddies.”

FINISHING 1ST, winning bragging rights, the coveted Platinum Medallions and the top money of $1500 by going totally undefeated was Downtown Portland’s Silver Dollar’s “Team Your Team.” This team played with a lot of heart and often just barely escaped to move on towards the finals. They started out with a “Bye” on Friday night, then sent future Bronze Medalists “Logan’s Heros” to the one loss side Saturday morning. Saturday afternoon they defeated “Buddah’s Bunch.” Sunday morning they took out “Guys & Dolls” to move into the medal rounds. There, they upended Bronze Medalists “Old Town Junkies” and Silver Medalists “Not Yet” Sunday afternoon to get into the 5pm finals against Gold Medalist “Buddies,” which was so close that it came down to the very last rack.

The next step will be the June 2005 9-Ball Regionals where all of the pictured medal winners will compete with the other worthy finalists from Summer and Spring 9-Ball Tri-Cups for one of 5 slots into the APA National 9-Ball Team Championship at Las Vegas August 19-22, 2005.

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APA Fall Session Awards Party

by merle humphreys

Portland, OR – We closed out the APA Fall Session 2004 at Duke’s (146th & Division) on Sunday Jan. 9th from 11am until 6pm. Duke’s put together a delicious $5/plate spaghetti dinner with garlic bread and reduced beverage prices for everyone’s enjoyment. Donna Kingsbury and Kathie Miller worked the registration desk and greeted approximately 350 people with hellos and smiles before sending them off to see Boomer and Danny Bettin who were handing out the new session folders and answering all questions.

Duke’s layout comfortably accommodated everyone. There was a game room where organized pool activities were going on, a huge bar with plenty of seating where people could relax and watch one of several TVs or just quietly sit, talk and have a few drinks. The largest area had a centerstage, which we used for our trophy display and next to the stage was where the food was set up. One corner of the room had a fantastic open area in which to run the Tri-Cup Draw. In the center room was a large dance floor with several tables and chairs for dining.

Boomer had space to disburse folders and snorting around in circles was a joint venture OPAL/ Duke surprise– a mechanical bull full of juice and raring to take on all challengers.

For the first couple of hours only a handful of brave souls tried the bull, so John Blue made the motivating announcement that if 20 people rode, Merle would be #21! As the day unfolded and more liquid courage was poured, #21 came closer. Rob Cnossen took the required #20 spot, and Merle, despite his mad dash for the exit, suddenly had lots of help finding the shortest path to Mr. Bull. John Blue and Boomer looked on with “chessy cat” grins from ear to ear. Surprising to most– especially himself – Merle stubbornly managed to stay up top a respectable amount of time for an old fat man before flying ass over tea kettle to the air mat below.

Kurt Hamm and Troy Van Winkle organized and ran a “Special – $2 entry Skill Shot Challenge” where participants had to execute two of four different set up shots in as few attempts as possible.

It proved to be a big hit with the players. The winners were: Troy Van Winkle with
3 points, Scott Duvall with 4 points and Shawn Gransberry with 6 shots.
Directors Onessia Wells and Susan Stanton, with the assistance of Rob Frye and Angie Farr, organized 3 sessions of riotous rocket pool. Ten blind draw teams were drawn. Racing against the clock they had to pocket 6 balls in scotch doubles fashion, using only one cue between
them. The top three teams turning in the best time out of two tries won cash. The winning team pairs were: 1st Heat: (1) Jim Upshaw and Chris Gotchall with 60.93 seconds, 2nd Heat: (1) Bob Palmer and Rob Frye with 50.56 seconds, 3rd Heat: (1) and turning in the fastest recorded time of the day were Cedric Sloan and Jason Coomes with 47.48 seconds.

Rob Cnossen organized a 9-ball break contest. In the two heats that were documented the first heat was won by Nathan Elliot and in the second heat Troy Van Winkle came in 1st.

At 3pm Merle, Danny Bettin and sexy scribe Susan Stanton started the 8- and 9-Ball Tri Cup draws. Having a microphone where everyone could hear made it nice.

The awards went off without a hitch. Approximately 2800 Special Awards, Certificates of Merit and trophies were handed out. League play trophies included Sportsmanship, MVP, Most Improved, 1st Place Host Location, and 1st and 2nd place team trophies. Certificates of Merit were given for Shutouts, Break & Runs, Table Runs, and 8 or 9 on the Break. As the awards were handed out Merle took pictures of the winners in the game area.

Throughout the afternoon John Blue gave away lots of door prizes including 3 nice Cuetec Cues; Robert Moody, Conrad Stoddard and Mike Kennedy were the lucky winners.

Special thanks to Brad, Chris and crew of Duke’s for all their hard work in hosting this session-end party, and to all the very special people who helped out with the trophy display setup, special activities, food service and registration.

It truly was most appreciated!