Once-dominant games like straight pool and three-cushion billiards have lost ground to eight-ball - the game of choice for millions of tavern league players - and nine-ball, the preeminent tournament game.

A game is great, in my view, only if it can be played happily by a sane person of at least average intelligence for several hours a day for fifty years. Both pool and billiards qualify.

If the numbers keep mounting, newspapers will eventually have to admit that pool exists and give it some coverage.

Robert Byrne Quotes