Jay and I did the One Pocket Ghost the last year the DCC was at the Executive West in Louisville.
We shared the room with Bob Jewett doing the straight pool challenge. After we saw how tough the tables were playing for the ghost Greg Sullivan offered $500 out of his pocket for the first person making 50.
Well don't you know, the last night of it Bob wants to shut down the room early (I think he was a little upset because we kind of took over the room and more people were interested in the one pocket ghost than the straight pool and I can't blame him because he always puts up a lot of money out of his own pocket for it) so we had to finish somewhere else because we had about 5 more players paid to give it a try. We had two choices, the AZ/OP room or the TV table. Jay wanted the TV table because there was more room and I wanted the AZ/OP room because the table was tougher like the ones it was already done on.
For the people that don't know, the TV table always plays easier than any of the tournament tables because the cloth is always the newest, it's always the cleanest table, the balls are always the cleanest and it's always dry from the lights so balls roll better and slide easier into the pockets.
Anyway, after a little bickering between us we go to the TV table and Gabe is first up and don't you know the balls just open up beautiful each break and he pops off a 60. The other few guys all get in the 30's and there's a 40 something thrown in and we're all done with it except for the shit the next day.
Gabe wants the $500 Greg offered and Jay wants to give it to him and I said no, it was an offer on the other tables because they were tougher than the TV table. We get with Greg the next day and explain everything and he agreed with me about it being for the other tables but he paid Gabe the $500 anyway. Gabe was relentless all day about it, "Did you see Greg?, did you see Greg?, did you see Greg?". He was acting like it was a matter of life and death. The more he asked, the more I was hoping Greg would agree with me and not give it to him but he almost had to, just not to look bad.
So now, everybody else is mad because they didn't get to play it on the TV table and have a better shot at the money, Mika and John being the most vocal, My buddy Alex didn't care either way, that's why he's so well liked.
I go to Greg and tell him what's going on and ask if I can use the table that night and he says whatever you want to do go ahead. I tell the top 5 players to meet that night and they can all take a shot on the TV table and the top score gets $500. This didn't include Gabe. The money came out of my pocket because I was involved and it didn't sit right with me how everything happened.
The guys appreciated what I did, they took their turns and made a couple of savers (lol) and the crowd enjoyed it. So in the end everybody was happy except Greg and I, lol.
That's the whole story about it. Make no mistake, the 60 he shot was incredible and I really thought it was going to be more than that because he actually got a couple of bad rolls where he could have got more but if everyone was playing on that table there would have been a few 60's because of the talent that was there.