Allison Fisher - Part 3 (From Snooker Glory to Pool Dominance)

Let's go back to 1991 now, because you're going to win your first World Masters Women's Doubles title with Stacey Hillyard. 6'2 over Karen Corr, her from Northern Ireland, and perhaps we'll have her on the show sometime.
And we've heard this name again, Anne-Marie.
Oh, yeah, they were partners up. Yeah, that makes sense. Anne-Marie is from up in Nottingham, and Karen obviously from Northern Ireland, but lived in England, up in the North of England.
And then Stacey and myself, even though we were rivals, we became friends a bit later on, but great rivals in the beginning. And we partnered each other in that.
I didn't feel like we could lose partnering each other because we were two of the, you know, one and two in the world probably at the time. And that was a good partnership, so.
Yeah, and then later that year, I think you would have won the mixed doubles championship with Steve Davis.
Always a player. I always learned from Steve. Steve, the thing about the very top players like Stephen Hendry, Steve Davis, John Parrott, was they were respectful of me as a player.
And they treated me like one of them, so to speak, in the sense of I'd sit next to Steve and I would, I didn't feel intimidated at all, and I didn't feel like he was disinterested.
If I looked over at some of the other men, partner in the other women, I could see they weren't really that bothered. You can see that sometimes in doubles anyway, whether you're the same sex or whether you're opposites playing together.
But he was into it and did his best, and that made me perform my best because in that, I had my first century break by a woman on TV, partner in Steve, so that was a big deal, and that's the one that you see on YouTube now.
That's the first ever century by a woman on television.
Yeah. You won over Jimmy White, and then you also won another mixed doubles championship that same year, playing with Steve over Stephen Hendry and Stacey Hillyard. Yeah.
Well, like I said, he was a great partner, and I would ask him things.
We'd chat in between about practice and what he does when he practices, and he would say, I would only take one thing into practice. You know, today, it might be, I'm not going to play with any side spin.
I'm just going to use vertical axis of the ball. You know, try and give me pointers like that. And that when you're in a match, you can only think about one thing.
You can't have multiple things going through your head. And I told you the other day, and Mark mentioned it, the emphasis on winning the first game of a match. That was Steve Davis' big thing.
And I don't know what his percentages were in his career, but that was a massive thing for Steve Davis, winning that first game.
I have to ask you this. Did you feel at all bad in 1991, beating Karen Corr for another Women's World Snooker Championship on her 22nd birthday?
No. These yes and no answers now.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. These will go quick. These will go quick.
Stick with us.
Yeah, no, not at all.
Little 103 run was the first century banked by a woman in the history of this championship. Good. That wasn't a yes or no.
Yeah, no.
I broke records and it's always wonderful to be the first. And Stacey actually made the first ever century by a woman in competition, which was a league match in her hometown of Bournemouth. So I was gutted about that.
I always wanted to be the first one to break the 100, but she beat me to it. I think she was 15 at the time. But I was the first to do it on TV, so I'll take that.
Yeah.
Well, Mandy Fisher played in this event four days after becoming a mother. That's pretty impressive.
Not bad. I tell you what, I've played Laurie John when she was heavily pregnant about Jew in New York playing Paul. And it was two against one.
It's not fair. Certainly kept her weight forward, Mark.
Yeah. This would have been about the time I think that Matrim came along, right? In terms of the invitation to play in that league?
Yes.
And they did the Women's World Championship too. So the money went up. They got Trust House 40, which was a big hotel chain to sponsor it.
And I think the money went up to a lot more to the winner, 20,000 maybe to the winner. So a couple of times we did have big money like that, but that was it.
Yeah. Well, let me mention just a few other world championships. You can comment on these as you wish.
But as we said at the top, we're probably not going to have time to talk about all 80 plus of your wins worldwide. But you won the women's title again, snooker title in 1993 over Stacey.
And I guess you were the defending champion because for some reason, they didn't contest that in 1992. What was that all about?
I don't know why they didn't, but they didn't hold a world championships in 92. I'm not sure. I can't really recollect.
Maybe it was a lack of sponsorship. I'm not really sure.
Yeah. And then they probably threw you guys a curveball because in 94, you went off to New Delhi for this championship.
Yeah. We went to India. My dad came with me on that trip.
And it was a great, really, really good trip. Five-star hotel, really nice. Sponsored by Jinn Company.
And because I remember it very well, being there and the trophy and everything. And India, what a place. What they would do is play down to the final eight and then take those eight over to India.
So that was the first time there and it was a big eye opener, watching cows in the middle of the road, a sacred creature and going to a country that's poverty stricken, yet you're in a nice hotel.
It's like two different worlds, you're either very rich or very poor. I got to see the Taj Mahal. I went on trips to see things and it was a great experience, that first one, and I ended up winning the tournament and wonderful.
We had a great time.
Yes, I'm going to fast forward now probably a year or so hence, this after seven or eight more additional titles of note. You played again in the Women's World Snooker Championship held in India.
A little different experience that year and you came away from that with a feeling.
Yeah, that was the end for me. So I qualified for the last eight in the early part of the, probably right April and we were supposed to go back to India, I think in May, maybe a month later. So I was very ready.
I was very prepared and ready and then months went by where they were prolonging it. It wasn't being held.
So I kind of went through the summer and lost a bit of interest because I was one of those who got ready for a tournament and then was mentally prepared. I was kind of losing interest and lack of motivation.
I think part of it was I couldn't see the next five years. I don't want to be on this train still doing the same thing. I couldn't see the future and I went over to India and they weren't even prepared.
My mum came with me on that trip. We had such a great trip the one before that. We stayed, it wasn't as nice a hotel.
It was the venue wasn't even prepared. It was a room with no air conditioning. It was like 120 degrees.
They put a red sheet up around the room and then hung up an air conditioner. It was just a lack of planning and preparation on the matrooms part and during that tournament, I was in the semi-final. I got through, no, I was in the semi-final.
I turned around to my mom and I just said, you're never going to see me play snooker again. That was it.
That was it.
It was weird, but that was what happened. I said, I can't, I don't want to do it anymore. That was the day I quit.
I lost in the tournament, came home, found out how to get on the Pool Tour. It didn't quite work exactly like that, but it felt like that.
Yeah, so help us with the sequence of events, right? Because it probably wasn't, I'm done with snooker. Oh no, I got to think about what I'm going to do.
I got to learn how to play pool.
Yeah, and what you're saying is how did the pool come about even? It was really like, I played it a couple of times. In fact, if you cast mine back to 1988, I think it was, we did a challenge.
Steve Misrach and Ava Lawrence, Ava Mattia at the time came to England, and Stephen Hendry and myself played in a mixed doubles challenge of pool, straight pool, nine ball and snooker.
Of course, Ava recollects that we didn't play snooker because there was no point. It was just a one-sided, she'd never played it before. Misrach lost to Hendry, of course.
Then I beat Ava at nine ball, and she might have won the straight pool or vice versa. It was just a made for TV challenge, which went over to America, was shown in America, and I didn't really think much more of it, playing pool.
And then in 1992, I entered a tournament in Munich, which was a bit random, really. But I don't know why I did it, I can't recollect why it happened, but I decided to play in it, and I said to Stacey, why don't you come with me?
And this was a lot of money we were outlaying, much more than we played in a snooker tournament. So I can't remember why we did it, but we did it. And we went to Munich and I met everyone.
I met, that was my first meeting of Gerda, Hofstetter then, Gregerson now, Ava, Laurie John, Robin, Vivian. I met all these great players from around the world I'd never even heard of actually.
And these were the top, and the top European pool players at the time. And the men as well, the men were there, top men in the world. So it's a really big deal.
It was called the Munich Masters. And I was blown away by how it was put on. It was just such a professional event.
And the prizes were, you've got trophy probably, I don't really recollect that, but you've got a Blaupoint pen, a nice pen, German pen. And then you've got a nice gold seal, real silver, I think it was key ring thing.
So just really nice gifts that are very unusual. And I came in third and Stacey ended up winning it. We borrowed cues the day before we left to go there.
And we ended up coming first and third, and we were over the moon. I had a great time with all the people, really enjoyed the people, and then went back to England and carried on playing snooker. I wasn't ready for a transition at that point.
Then Mark, we played the Moscone, the 1994 Moscone, didn't we? And then I met Jeanette and Vivian, and they said, Vivian said, why don't you come over to America and play the tour?
You know, we've got a good tour going, which you regretted that after that. But anyway, we've got this really good tour going. And Mike Massey had said the same to me.
You know, I'd met Mike Massey, you know, in different places. And for some reason, you know, we were playing some snooker and pool stuff. So he said, come over, there's a great tour in America, you should be a part of it.
And I hadn't really thought much about it, but it was starting to sort of become more in the forefront of my mind because I couldn't see where I was going in snooker. I didn't see more years of this going on.
You know, and I had a mortgage to pay in it. I basically, I walked into my mother and I said, I've got 11 world snooker titles and nothing to show for it. You know, it wasn't really going anywhere for me.
So I said, I'm thinking about going to America. And she said, she used an expletive. She very rarely swears, maybe a bit more in her old age.
You must be out of your mind. And I said, why? And she couldn't really answer it.
But anyway, that's what happened. But prior to that, right before that, I played in an event at the, I think it was at the Worthing Centre. So it's along the coast near where I live.
And it was an invitation of eight, I've still got a photo of it, top eight or top six men in the world, snooker players and myself being, you know, local and top female. And we had local sponsors. It was a raise money for charity event.
And one of my, my sponsor of that event was a glazing company in Brighton, owned by a guy called Phil Collins, not the singer Phil Collins, but a guy called Phil Collins. And he was my sponsor in that event.
Anyway, we got talking towards the end of the event. And he said, I'd like to sponsor you. I'm like, well, that's wonderful.
My dad and my brother, who'd had a few too many tipples in the green room, said, yeah, we've heard that before. And I'm like, oh, gosh, which we had heard it a lot before, nothing came to fruition.
But I took his number down, and I called him and we arranged a meeting. And my dad said, yeah, nothing's going to come of it being the pessimist.
Anyway, I went to meet with Phil and I said, look, Phil, I've got this interest in going to America to play on the... And he said, well, I really want to sponsor you in Snooker, to stay here and play Snooker. And I said, but yeah, I've just...
I really want to try going to America. And he said, well, all right, I'll support you in it. I'll give you a year and I will pay your airfare and entry fee in hotels.
And he gave me a credit card. But not immediately then. I went home to my dad with a thousand dollar check, right, a thousand pound check, and I said, look at that.
You know, I was like showing it to my dad who couldn't believe it because, you know, we didn't think anything would come to fruition. And this guy ended up sponsoring me in my first year on tour.
And I went back after a year and I met with him and gave him his credit card back and said, thank you very much. It was really helpful. But I'll stand on my own two feet now.
And it was really good. And Cuetec sponsored me before I went to America. They knew what I was going to do.
I went to Beijing in 1994 to play a pool match and some snooker. And my first introduction Mark to Americans was Joanne Mason Parker, Earl Strickland and Mike Massey. Think about that.
Yeah.
That was quite a team.
And I'd never heard of Earl, and I'm now meeting Earl for the first time. And I'm like, whoa, Mike Massey, of course. And then Joanne Mason Parker was quite confident too.
And so we played in this pool match. And I didn't even know you could jump the ball because it was unheard of in snooker. And I put her in this snooker and I thought, I've got her now.
And she jumped out of it. And I'm like, wait a minute, what's that? What are you allowed to do in this game?
So anyway, that happened. But on that meeting, a guy from Europe who represented Cuetec in Europe, took me over there and I got a sponsorship from Cuetec and they got hold of me for a three year contract before I got to America.
So that's how that happened. So I was already sponsored coming to America by Cuetec.
So before we get you moving to America, you brought it up and we talked about it a little bit with Mark, but we should talk about it in your story too. And that's the fact that you were invited to play in the inaugural Moscone Cup in 1994.
That's pretty cool.
Absolutely. If I think about it now, what the Moscone Cup has become, don't you wish we knew what it would have been back then? It was an incredible atmosphere.
But the very first one and they allowed two women on it from from either side. There was Vivienne and Jeanette and Francisco Start from Germany on my side.
I had dabbled at Pool a little bit before that, but not really significantly and it was a great experience. I saw a picture the other day, Mark, of the waistcoats that we were wearing.
You were covered in the American flag waistcoat and we had some stars. It was blue and gold, like blue waistcoat with gold stars on it. It's funny looking back all those years ago, but I used to love that waistcoat.
It almost looked like you could have been representing the European Union.
Yes, exactly.
That's exactly how it looked. That was the idea, I think. But anyway, it was good fun, good experience.
Nice to meet the American players because that was the first time I met some of the men, I think. I met some of them in Munich. I can't remember.
Yeah, Munich was before that. But yeah, so that was good.
It's too bad that after that year, they discontinued having the women participate. I think if you look at the future of the Moscone Cup and how America has fared lately, they might benefit from mixing it up a little bit.
I'm not really sure what to think of it really, because I think men should have their event, the team event, and I think you could go either way with that. If you had the women in it, it adds a little something extra, and the women are good players.
You'd have some solid matches both ways now, I think, for sure. But it's also nice for the men to do their own thing, and there's no reason why the women shouldn't have their own type of cup. It's similar to that.
I think they should have a big women event like they do the Moscone Cup.
I think that they should have a big mixed event to feature both.
And I'm just wondering, Mark, whether the Moscone Cup ought to move, just like the Ryder Cup had to evolve from United Kingdom, really, playing the United States, to Europe playing the United States.
I wonder if they'd be better off US and Europe versus the East, the way Pool's going.
Mm-hmm.
Well, you know, I have my opinions, too, but the women bring so much to the party that for the proliferation of the sport, it's going to, that's an untapped market for the most part, to having women involved, and they're certainly capable that they
can beat anybody. So I'd love to see them re-included.
Yeah, yeah. Well, anyway, pretty cool. You don't happen to recall anything about what happened in the last match or the last shot, do you, Ellie?
What about Mark?
Mark making the nine ball to win it.
Yeah, something like that.
Well, I've joined Mark's team now. We teach together, so he's the winner, and I'm on his coattails now.
You mentioned about, for both of you, don't you wish you knew what this event was going to become?
We've talked to probably, I don't know, 60 Ryder Cup players over the years that have played in just about every Ryder Cup that ever happened, and they'll have the same thing. They're playing the first one, the second one.
They had no idea what was going to become of the Ryder Cup.
Well, I think the other thing is it's always special to be the ones who first did it too. I'll take that.
They're just setting the tone for something, and it's become an amazing event, and it is a shame that they stopped women participating in it, but it's certainly evolved into a huge event.
Yeah. All right, we're back in 1995. You tell your mom, I'm going to the US.
I look back on it, and I think somebody said to me a few years later, it's interesting that your parents let you come over, and I started to think about it, and I said, you let me come over.
I got a little upset about it, that you let me go. You kicked me out, basically. The thing is, I got a one-way ticket over.
Now, why did I get a one-way ticket? Firstly, probably because it was cheap and I couldn't afford to return. Secondly, because I went over to Canada initially, so I was invited on to the WPBA tour.
My first tournament was in Charlotte, North Carolina. My second one was going to be in Florida a week later. I went to Toronto to stay there because they played snooker and pool, so I knew I've always got my snooker there, nothing else.
And I stayed with friends there because previous to that, since being a late teenager to up until the point, I went to Canada to stay for a bit. I did lots of exhibitions in Canada as a snooker player, so I was there every year playing snooker.
So I was very familiar with a lot of people and places. So I felt very comfortable there. So I did that and I went to stay with friends there.
And I went to my first tournament in Charlotte, North Carolina, and I ended up staying. I played in the event, I lost to Ava, through a little bit of ignorance and Jeanette. I lost to Jeanette because of a pushout, I think.
And then Ava was, I just didn't see the shot on the table, like a two or three ball combo that was obvious and I didn't see it. So it was a little bit of new to it, you know.
But as soon as I walked into that room in Charlotte, I knew I belonged there. That's the point. I think this is it for me.
I like it here. This is what I'm going to do. The people were really nice.
The players were very inviting. And the tour was run very professionally. That was my takeaway from that.
And then they invited me to stay on because we had the tournament in Florida the next week. So I stayed in Charlotte. I didn't go back to Canada.
I stayed in Charlotte. And then for that week, I was training with them. So I was getting familiar, more familiar with the game.
And then we all drove down together in a minibus. It was Laurie John, Robin, Gerd and myself, Kelly Oyama. I don't know if there was anybody else.
It might be Ava, of course. Yeah, I think that was it. Anyway, I'm with a bunch of the top players.
So I'm learning a lot along the way. Well, we get to Florida and I ended up winning the tournament, which was unbelievable. I ran a six pack with Laura Smith.
And I didn't know at the time, I don't know if it was six was a record or seven was a record of break and runs. And I didn't know. So I'm playing Laura.
Laura had beaten me, put me into the losers bracket, I think, and I played her again. And that wasn't going to happen again. So I run my six pack and then I have a sort of a half shot of the one and I play safe.
That's cool. And I look back and everyone's like, why didn't you go for the one? And I said, what are you talking about?
I said, but it was a record. You might have run out the match. I said, oh, I didn't realize.
Anyway, but it was quite funny looking back. It was a killer instinct though. Like, I'm not going to let you win a game, Laura.
So anyway, I won the tournament. But it took me about a year or so to call myself a pool player. To me, I'm still a snooker player, playing pool.
Not really knowing a lot of the things like the banking, kicking. I was a shop maker, for sure, coming from a 12 to a 9 foot. So I wasn't afraid to go for anything.
Just learned a lot along the way, and had a great time doing it.
Well, it's fair to say, Mark, I think that she could call herself a pool player today.
Yeah, absolutely. I'm proud to know her, just because it's the winningest woman player of all time.
To that point, right before Allison Fisher was Jeanne Belukas, who we all thought would just dominate forever, but then maybe some disinterest, and then Allie came in, and then just assumed command, and has held that mantle ever since.
Just looking at the record for our listeners, my notes say 79 plus wins. I don't know exactly how many wins you know probably on the pool side.
I think I've hit over the 80 marks. I've won a few more tournaments since then, since I've been written.
Four WPA World Nine Ball titles. Allie was the top ranked player, except for maybe a couple of months from 1996 to 2007. Pretty significant.
We go back to that first win. We're talking about the 1995 Viking Cues Charlotte Classic at Mother's Billiards. Does that play still exist?
No, Mother's doesn't.
A light rail system is there in Charlotte now, so it unfortunately isn't there and it hasn't been there for many years. But what a great room it was. Kelly Oyama and Wesley Oyama owned it.
Kelly was a player on tour and it had a great atmosphere. The front side was more of the general public plan. At the back side of it was more of the, I suppose the gamblers and the people who took it seriously.
So I would go on a back corner table. I always like to go in a corner because I'd like to be away from everyone and just get on with what I wanted to do.
Yeah. Yeah. And then you mentioned Toddlin down to Florida.
The next week you win the McDermott Cues Orlando Classic. So it didn't take you too long. It was your first win in two weeks on the tour.
Yeah.
So I guess we'd both be interested in learning how you came to really understand the subtleties of Pool versus Snooker.
Because you had years and years to develop and learn from a lot of great players. Now you're kind of taking a crash course here in a game that's not quite as familiar to you.
Yes. I beat Jeanette in the final, I think of that one. So I obviously always had a lot of experience and I had desire.
I might not have played all the right shots. You never know if you look back. I don't know if I played all the shots the right way.
I probably didn't, because in Snooker, you use a lot of stun and draw shots, and Pool has more spins, and you're not doing that so much in Snooker. Which I think the new cloths at the time suited that type of game for me, so it was quite good.
So I was quite comfortable, but I knew that maybe kicking, I didn't have an education in that, and I didn't know banking and when to do this or that, the right shots, using the side pockets versus corners, when to do that.
So there were certain things I would think differently about. I'll give you a really good example of that, that I probably wouldn't play today, as I was playing Robin Dodson in the ESPN Ultimate Challenge, and this was to get into the final.
I think we were down to the last rack, so it was Hill Hill, and the nine ball was about a diamond away from the corner pocket, right-hand corner pocket, and a diamond towards the center of the table, so quite away from the pocket, and I had a
ball-in-hand shot, and I shot the one onto the nine. I took ball in hand and named the one, it was at the other end of the table, so it was about more than a half ball cut, probably, to play the one-nine combo.
The other end of the table, and it went in, I won on that. Now, would I play that shot now? Probably not.
But what a crazy shot. I mean, that's what I saw. I thought, oh, I'm going to do that, and cuing straight and everything, and if I get right behind it and put it in line, it should go in.
There was no question in my mind. Now, I'd be like, oh, no, that's a really tough shot. You've got throw, you've got, you know, sometimes too much information can lead to poor decisions.
Yeah.
Well, I think that's what, you know, Mark, that came through a little bit when we talked about the kids from Lindenhurst, the younger kids, no fear.
They might try stuff like that, and then as you gain experience, you realize, oh, a little risk involved in that kind of shot.
Yeah, I suppose some of that, but wait, with Allison, she's got the straight stroking mechanics and the super confidence, so it doesn't look as bad as it would to those of us that don't possess the super straight mechanics, you know, so.
That's very sweet of you, Mark, but you would probably hide your eyes if I played that and you were my coach, and I got down to shoot that.
Well, that's just an experience. I mean, it wouldn't be something that I'd be ashamed of.
The stroke mechanics is where I'd say, okay, now this girl, pure dynamite, she can do it, you know, and now we just gotta guide her a little bit on some of her decision making.
Yeah, that's true.
How much of your learning then, because we're talking about still 1995, so you think about the technology that was involved and what was available in terms of learning tools. There probably still wasn't a whole lot of video.
We were either reading stuff out of books, and there weren't a whole lot of books yet, really, at that time.
That's true.
Or you were learning through observation. How did you learn?
Observation, also, I was alongside Gerda at the time, at Mothers and Ava, and some decent players who played in the pool room.
So a lot of observation, but Gerda knew a lot because she trained with, oh gosh, Jörgen Sandman from Sweden, who's now in the WPA on the board of art. He'd be an interesting guy to have on this, actually.
But Jörgen had taught her a lot because he did training camps with juniors and different players. So she learned a lot of drills and things like that. So anyway, when I first came over, I'm shooting a spot shot.
So putting the ball on the spot, cue ball up in the bulk area. And I'm noticing even I'm making the ball, it's hitting the right edge of the pocket. You know, and I'm thinking that's, you know, why is it not going in the center of the pocket?
Because I'm a snooker player, I'm playing center of the pocket. I said, Gerda, why is my ball not going in the center of the pocket? She said, because it's throw and I said, throw.
So she taught me what throw was and I had no idea because we didn't talk about that in snooker. We got a lighter ball and that was never really talked about the transfer of, you know, English or throw. So I never knew anything about that.
So that was interesting. I had to learn that and aiming differently, either hitting the ball firmer for no friction or spinning the ball a bit. So, you know, just little things like that made a big difference.
So I actually learned that from another player and learned a lot of other things, I think, from other players and watching.
Would you force them to just tell you what's going through their mind and what they're thinking about as they approached every shot or not?
No, I think people came with information really. I wish I had met Mark then. That would have been fun to have met Mark, but then he had only run 10 balls at that point, I think.
No, I'm joking. But it would have been great to have had a mentor in Pool that I didn't have. The only time I really can say somebody, hand on heart, that taught me a lot around that time was Grady Matthews, the professor of Pool.
What was interesting about Grady was, you know, I was about 1997 or 98, so I've been here a little while. He walks into Mother's Billiard Parlor in a nice suit. He marches over to me, Allison Fisher, my name is Grady Matthews.
I would like to do a tour with you, Battle of the Sexes. I'll make sure you get paid and we discuss what the fee was going to be and we will do 31 appearances east of the Mississippi. That was it, right?
We took a couple of pictures together and he, sure enough, he put it together and we probably did 21 shows in about 30 days. Something like that. It was done pretty quickly.
In between our evening shows, which was two races to seven and then we'd play people and some trick shots. What an experience because sometimes we'd be at the table during the day and he'd show me, teach me about kicking and stuff.
I learned a lot and I put it into practice. I played at the Super Billiard Expo and I remember Gene Belukas was watching who I got to know over time. I kicked this shot and it was almost in the center of the table.
It was a real low percentage, but I kicked it and played it safe on the end rail. It kicked into the side rail and then landed on the top rail. It went exactly as planned.
I measured it the way he said. It's fantastic to do something that you would have had no clue at before and somebody's taught you something. Then it comes off in a tournament situation.
I owe a lot to Grady for those little lessons in between.
I'm sure you learned a lot over those 30 days.
Oh, I learned a lot about Grady. Some of it's not repeatable.
He's not for public consumption.
He was a colorful fellow, but he was a great guy too. I really enjoyed my time with him.
One of the most unique aspects of Grady was his capacity to just get up and extemporaneously speak or give a speech, or like a welcome type of thing to the. I was present for your show in St.
Louis, which it was at Billiards on Broadway, and I was the host pro at a game room. I thought we got to support this, so I sold 20 or 25 tickets and we all went as a group, and supported Ali and Grady. I think you beat him that night too.
I might well have beaten him that night.
You know what was funny, Mark, about those nights? Whenever I was getting ahead of him, he'd put his hand in his pocket and start jangling his change when I was playing him.
Or he would walk out middle of the game to the restroom, and I'd be like, where are you going? That's not the rule. And he'd off he'd gone.
It was so funny watching him do these things, these little tricks.
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