Portal:Cue sports
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The Cue Sports Portal
![A player is preparing for a shot in 8-ball](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/29/Billiards_and_snookers.jpg/225px-Billiards_and_snookers.jpg)
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b9/Billiard_Rack.jpg/225px-Billiard_Rack.jpg)
Cue sports are a wide variety of games of skill played with a cue, which is used to strike billiard balls and thereby cause them to move around a cloth-covered table bounded by elastic bumpers known as cushions. Cue sports are also collectively referred to as billiards, though this term has more specific connotations in some varieties of English.
There are three major subdivisions of games within cue sports:
- Carom billiards, played on tables without pockets, typically ten feet in length, including straight rail, balkline, one-cushion carom, three-cushion billiards, artistic billiards, and four-ball
- Pocket billiards (or pool), played on six-pocket tables of seven, eight, nine, or ten-foot length, including among others eight-ball (the world's most widely played cue sport), nine-ball (the dominant professional game), ten-ball, straight pool (the formerly dominant pro game), one-pocket, and bank pool
- Snooker, English billiards, and Russian pyramid, played on a large, six-pocket table (dimensions just under 12 ft by 6 ft), all of which are classified separately from pool based on distinct development histories, player culture, rules, and terminology.
Billiards has a long history from its inception in the 15th century, with many mentions in the works of Shakespeare, including the line "let's to billiards" in Antony and Cleopatra (1606–07). Enthusiasts of the sport have included Mozart, Louis XIV of France, Marie Antoinette, Immanuel Kant, Napoleon, Abraham Lincoln, Mark Twain, George Washington, Jules Grévy, Charles Dickens, George Armstrong Custer, Theodore Roosevelt, Lewis Carroll, W. C. Fields, Babe Ruth, Bob Hope, and Jackie Gleason. (Full article...)
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Image 1The 2021 Tour Championship (officially the 2021 Cazoo Tour Championship) was a professional snooker tournament that took place from 22 to 28 March 2021 at the Celtic Manor Resort in Newport, Wales. Organised by the World Snooker Tour, it was the third edition of the Tour Championship and the third and final event of the third season of the Cazoo Cup. It was the 14th and penultimate ranking event of the 2020–21 snooker season, following the conclusion of the WST Pro Series and preceding the World Championship.
The draw for the Tour Championship comprised the top eight players based on the single year ranking list. The event was contested as a single-elimination tournament, each match being played over two sessions. The winner of the tournament received £150,000 out of a total prize fund of £380,000. The event was sponsored by car retailer Cazoo. The defending champion was Stephen Maguire, but as a result of reduced earnings during the season he was unable to qualify and defend the title. In a repeat of the 2019 final Australian Neil Robertson played Englishman Ronnie O'Sullivan. Robertson won the event defeating O'Sullivan 10–4 in the final. There were 26 century breaks made during the event, Barry Hawkins making the highest break, a 138. (Full article...) -
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The 2018 World Snooker Championship (officially the 2018 Betfred World Snooker Championship) was a professional snooker tournament held from 21 April to 7 May 2018 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. Hosted by the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association, it was the 20th and final ranking event of the 2017–18 snooker season and the 42nd consecutive time the World Snooker Championship had been held at the venue. The tournament was broadcast by BBC Sport and Eurosport in Europe, and sponsored by betting company Betfred.
Welsh left-hander Mark Williams won his third world championship and 21st ranking title, defeating Scottish professional John Higgins 18–16 in the final. Williams' victory came 15 years after his second world title in 2003; before the start of the season, he had not won a ranking event in the previous six years. In winning the event, Williams received the highest prize money awarded for a snooker event, £425,000 of a total pool of £1,968,000. Aged 43, he was the third oldest winner at the crucible after Ronnie O'Sullivan who was 44 when he won the 2020 World Snooker Championship and Ray Reardon who was 45 when he won the title in 1978. Defending and three-time world champion Mark Selby had won the world title for the previous two years, but lost in the first round 4–10 to Joe Perry. (Full article...) -
Image 3The 1983 World Snooker Championship (also known as the 1983 Embassy World Snooker Championship for the purposes of sponsorship) was a professional snooker tournament that took place between 16 April and 2 May 1983 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. This was the third and final world ranking event of the 1982–83 snooker season following the 1982 Professional Players Tournament. Sixteen seeded players qualified directly for the event, with an additional sixteen players progressing through a two-round qualification round held at the Romiley Forum in Stockport, and Redwood Lodge in Bristol. The winner of the event received £30,000, and the tournament was sponsored by cigarette company Embassy.
Alex Higgins was the defending champion, having won the 1982 championship, but he lost 5–16 to Steve Davis in the semi-finals. Davis, the 1981 champion, won the event for the second time, defeating Cliff Thorburn 18–6 in the final. A total of 18 century breaks were made during the tournament. The highest was made by Thorburn in the fourth frame of his second round match against Terry Griffiths, where he compiled a maximum break of 147 points, becoming the first player to make such a break in a World Championship match. (Full article...) -
Image 4The 1987 World Snooker Championship (also referred to as the 1987 Embassy World Snooker Championship for the purpose of sponsorship) was a professional snooker tournament that took place between 18 April and 4 May 1987 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. It was the sixth and final ranking event of the 1986–87 snooker season. The championship was the 1987 edition of the World Snooker Championship, first held in 1927, and had 32 participants. The highest ranked 16 players were awarded a place in the first round draw, whilst a pre-tournament qualification event for 104 professionals was held between 26 March and 4 April at the Preston Guild Hall for the remaining places. The tournament was sponsored by cigarette manufacturer Embassy and had a prize fund of £400,000 with the winner receiving £80,000.
Since his 1986 victory, Joe Johnson had experienced a disappointing season leading up to the 1987 Championship, and bookmakers considered it unlikely that he would retain the title. Johnson did reach the final, a rematch of the previous year's final against Steve Davis. Davis won his fourth championship by defeating Johnson 18 frames to 14. A total of 18 century breaks were made during the tournament, the highest of which was 127 made by Davis in first frame of the final. Stephen Hendry, aged 18, became the youngest player to win a match in the tournament's history since it moved to the Crucible in 1977, whilst it was the last time that six-times champion Ray Reardon appeared. (Full article...) -
Image 5The 2002 World Snooker Championship (also referred to as the 2002 Embassy World Snooker Championship for the purposes of sponsorship) was a professional snooker tournament that took place from 20 April to 6 May 2002 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. It was the final ranking event of the 2001–02 snooker season. This was the 26th consecutive year that the World Snooker Championship had been held at the Crucible, marking the 25th anniversary of the first staging of the event at this venue. The championship was sponsored by cigarette manufacturer Embassy.
Peter Ebdon won his only world title by defeating seven-time winner Stephen Hendry 18–17 in the final. Ebdon defeated Matthew Stevens 17–16 in the semi-finals, and Hendry defeated the defending champion Ronnie O'Sullivan 17–13 to reach the final. This was Hendry's ninth and last appearance in a World Championship final. There were 65 century breaks during the tournament. The highest break of the tournament was by Stevens, who achieved 145 in his quarter-final match. Hendry made 16 centuries during the event, a record for any individual tournament, equalled by Mark Williams in 2022. A total prize fund of £1,615,770 was awarded at the event, the winner receiving £260,000 (Full article...) -
Image 6The 2019 Champion of Champions (officially the 2019 ManBetX Champion of Champions) was a professional snooker tournament that took place between 4 and 10 November 2019 at the Ricoh Arena in Coventry, England. It was the ninth Champion of Champions event, the first of which was held in 1978. The tournament featured 16 participants who had won World Snooker events throughout the prior snooker season. In 2019, the Women's World Champion competed at the tournament for the first time. As an invitational event, the Champion of Champions tournament carried no world ranking points.
Ronnie O'Sullivan was the defending champion having defeated Kyren Wilson 10–9 in the final of the 2018 event. O'Sullivan lost 5–6 to Neil Robertson in the semi-finals. Robertson defeated reigning world champion Judd Trump 10–9 in the final to win the championship, having required foul shots in the penultimate frame to avoid losing the match. There were 20 century breaks during the tournament, eight of which were made in the final. Mark Allen compiled the highest break of the tournament, a 140, in his semi-final loss to Trump. The tournament's total prize fund was £440,000, the winner receiving £150,000. (Full article...) -
Image 7The 2021 Masters (officially the 2021 Betfred Masters) was a professional non-ranking snooker tournament that took place between 10 and 17 January 2021 at the Marshall Arena in Milton Keynes, England. It was the 47th staging of the Masters tournament, which was first held in 1975, and the second of three Triple Crown events in the 2020–21 season, following the 2020 UK Championship and preceding the 2021 World Snooker Championship. The top sixteen players from the snooker world rankings were invited to compete in a knockout tournament. The World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association organised the tournament, which was broadcast by the BBC and Eurosport in Europe. The event was sponsored by sports betting company Betfred. It was played behind closed doors because of COVID-19 restrictions in the United Kingdom. Two players, world number one Judd Trump and Jack Lisowski, withdrew from the event after testing positive for COVID-19.
The defending champion, Stuart Bingham, had defeated Ali Carter 10–8 in the previous year's final. Bingham lost 6–5 to Yan Bingtao in the semi-finals. Yan (one of three debutants at the event, alongside Thepchaiya Un-Nooh and Gary Wilson) met John Higgins in the final. Yan completed a 10–8 victory to win his first Triple Crown tournament. As the winner of the event, Yan was awarded £250,000 from the total prize pool of £725,000. The highest break of the event was a 145 made by Higgins in his quarter-final win over Ronnie O'Sullivan which earned him £15,000. (Full article...) -
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The 2015 World Snooker Championship (officially the 2015 Betfred World Snooker Championship) was a professional snooker tournament which took place from 18 April to 4 May 2015 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. It was the 39th consecutive year that the World Snooker Championship had been held at the Crucible, and was the final ranking event of the 2014–15 snooker season. Sports betting company Betfred sponsored the event for the first time in three years, having previously done so from 2009 to 2012. The top sixteen players in the snooker world rankings were placed into the draw, and another sixteen players qualified for the event at a tournament taking place from 8 to 15 April 2015 at the Ponds Forge International Sports Centre, Sheffield.
Mark Selby was the defending champion, having defeated Ronnie O'Sullivan in the 2014 final. Selby lost 9–13 in the second round to event debutant Anthony McGill, and became the 16th first-time champion unable to defend his title at the venue. Shaun Murphy, the 2005 winner, met Stuart Bingham in the final. Bingham, who was given odds of 50–1 to win the tournament by bookmakers before the start of the tournament, defeated Murphy 18–15 in the final to win the first world title of his 20-year professional career. Aged 38, Bingham became the oldest player to win the title since Ray Reardon in 1978. (Full article...) -
Image 9Masako Katsura (桂 マサ子, Katsura Masako, listen; 7 March 1913 – 20 December 1995), nicknamed "Katsy" and sometimes called the "First Lady of Billiards", was a Japanese carom billiards player who was most active in the 1950s. She was the first woman to compete and place among the best in the male-dominated world of professional billiards. First learning the game from her brother-in-law and then under the tutelage of Japanese champion Kinrey Matsuyama, Katsura became Japan's only female professional player. In competition in Japan, she took second place in the country's national three-cushion billiards championship three times. In exhibition she was noted for running 10,000 points at the game of straight rail.
After marrying a U.S. Army non-commissioned officer in 1950, Katsura emigrated to the United States in 1951. There she was invited to play in the 1952 U.S.-sponsored World Three-Cushion Championship, ultimately taking seventh place at that competition. Katsura was the first woman ever to be included in any world billiards tournament. Her fame cemented, Katsura went on an exhibition tour of the United States with eight-time world champion Welker Cochran, and later with 51-time world champion Willie Hoppe. In 1953 and 1954, she again competed for the world three-cushion crown, taking fifth and fourth places respectively. (Full article...) -
Image 10The 1985 World Snooker Championship (also known as the 1985 Embassy World Snooker Championship for the purpose of sponsorship) was a professional ranking tournament in snooker that took place from 12 to 28 April 1985 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. Organised by the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA), the event was the ninth consecutive World Snooker Championship to be held at the Crucible, the first tournament having taken place in 1977. A five-round qualifying event for the championship was held at the Preston Guild Hall from 29 March to 5 April for 87 players, 16 of whom reached the main stage, where they met the 16 invited seeded players. The tournament was broadcast in the United Kingdom by the BBC, and was sponsored by the Embassy cigarette company. The total prize fund for the event was £250,000, the highest prize pool for any snooker tournament to that date. The winner received £60,000, which was the highest amount ever received by the winner of a snooker event at that time.
The defending champion was Englishman Steve Davis, who had previously won the World Championship three times. He met Northern Irishman Dennis Taylor in the final which was a best-of-35-frames match. Davis took an early 9–1 lead, but Taylor battled back into the match and drew level at 17–17, forcing a deciding frame. The 35th frame was contested over the final black ball, with the player able to pot the ball winning the world title. After Taylor missed three attempts to pot the black, Davis missed his only attempt to leave Taylor a relatively simple pot to win his sole World Championship. The match, often referred to as the "black ball final", is commonly considered to be the best-known match in the history of snooker and a reason for the surge in the sport's popularity in the 1980s and 1990s. (Full article...)
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Image 1Carter at the 2013 German Masters
Allister Carter (born 25 July 1979) is an English professional snooker player. He has twice been a World Championship finalist, in 2008 and 2012, losing both finals to Ronnie O'Sullivan. He has won six ranking titles and briefly reached number two in the world rankings in 2010. His nickname, "The Captain", comes from his hobby of piloting aeroplanes. (Full article...) -
Image 2Trump at the 2015 World Championship
Judd Trump MBE (born 20 August 1989) is an English professional snooker player who is a former world champion and former world number one. Widely regarded as one of the sport's most talented players, he is currently tied for fourth place on the list of all-time ranking event winners with 28 ranking titles. He has also won four Triple Crown titles.
After a junior career that included winning the English Under-13 and Under-15 titles, and reaching the World Under-21 Championship semi-finals aged 14, Trump turned professional in 2005. He won his maiden ranking title at the 2011 China Open, was runner-up to John Higgins at the 2011 World Snooker Championship, and captured his first Triple Crown title at the 2011 UK Championship. By the end of the 2017–18 season, he had won eight ranking titles, but was facing persistent criticism that he was underachieving in the sport, given his talent. In the 2018–19 season, he completed his Triple Crown by winning both the Masters and World Championship, won two other ranking events, and became the first player to win over £1 million in prize money in a single season. In the 2019–20 season, he won six ranking events, setting a new record for the most ranking titles in a single season. He added a further five ranking titles during the 2020–21 season. Voted the World Snooker Tour's Player of the Year for three consecutive years from 2019 to 2021, he was inducted into the Snooker Hall of Fame in 2021. He was World Championship runner-up for a second time in 2022 to Ronnie O'Sullivan, and was awarded an MBE in the same year. He won his second Masters title in 2023, making him the 11th player to win the tournament more than once.
Trump has compiled more than 950 century breaks in professional competition, making him the third player, after O'Sullivan and Higgins, to reach this milestone. In the 2019–20 season, he became the second player, after Neil Robertson, to achieve 100 century breaks in a single season. He has made eight maximum breaks in his career. In 2022, he became the second player, after Shaun Murphy, to compile three maximums in a single calendar year, having made 147s at the 2022 Turkish Masters, the 2022 Champion of Champions and the 2022 Scottish Open. (Full article...) -
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Michael Phelan
Michael Phelan (April 18, 1819 – October 7, 1871) was an Irish-born American billiards player, manufacturer and owner of billiard parlors. He was the first billiards star in the US. In 1850, he published Billiards Without A Master, the first book published in the US on the science, etiquette, and game rules of billiards. (Full article...) -
Image 4Sean Maddocks (born 10 April 2002) is an English former professional snooker player. As a 15 year old, he became the youngest snooker player to score a 147 break in competition, beating the previous record held by Ronnie O'Sullivan. (Full article...)
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Image 5Dorothy Wise (1914–1995) was an American professional pool player. She was born in Spokane, Washington. When she first started playing pool professionally, there were very few national tournaments for women. She won many local and state tournaments, so she called herself the world champion. The first national tournament for women happened in 1967. She won and kept winning for the next five years. She lost the title in 1972. She played in the final against 13-year-old Jean Balukas.
She became a member of the Billiard Congress of America Hall of Fame in 1981. She was the first woman to be made a member.
Dorothy learned to play pool from her husband, Jimmy Wise. He managed billiard parlors (where people play pool) in several cities around the western United States. He watched Dorothy win the first national championship in 1967, but died later that year. (Full article...) -
Image 6Woollaston at the 2016 Paul Hunter Classic
Ben Woollaston (born 14 May 1987) is an English professional snooker player from Leicester. His sole professional title came at the minor-ranking third Players Tour Championship event in 2011. Woollaston's only ranking event final came at the 2015 Welsh Open, in which he lost to John Higgins. (Full article...) -
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Shane Van Boening (/ˌvæn ˈboʊnɪŋ/; born July 14, 1983) is an American professional pool player from Rapid City, South Dakota. Van Boening is considered one of the best players of all time. Van Boening has won the WPA World Nine-ball Championship and has won the US Open Nine-ball Championship on 5 occasions, along with over 100 other professional titles.
Van Boening has a hearing impairment and uses a hearing aid, but it does not affect his pool ability. He has received praise for his attitude towards the sport, particularly for his behavior during matches, and for eschewing alcohol. (Full article...) -
Image 8Wakelin at the 2016 Paul Hunter Classic
Chris Wakelin (born 16 March 1992) is an English professional snooker player from Rugby, Warwickshire. He practices in Bar 8 in Rugby. He turned professional in 2013 and won his first ranking title at the 2023 Snooker Shoot Out. (Full article...) -
Image 9Massey setting up a trick shot
Michael Massey (born April 9, 1947), professionally known as Mike Massey, is an American professional pool player. From 1989 to 1991 he served as a contributing editor of The Snap Magazine. Massey was born in Loudon, Tennessee, and for several years lived in Chattanooga, Tennessee, where he owned a pool hall. He has the nickname of "Tennessee Tarzan", but he now lives in Midway, Utah.
Massey was inducted into the Hall of Fame of the Billiard Congress of America on April 7, 2005. For 2007 he was ranked as #8 in Pool & Billiard Magazine's poll of the "Fans' Top 20 Favorite Players". (Full article...) -
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Chesapeake Conference Center, site of the U.S. Open 9-Ball Championship from 1997 to 2011
The U.S. Open Pool Championship, formerly the U.S. Open Nine-ball Championship, is an annual professional men's nine-ball pool tournament that began in its current form in 1976. The U.S. Open is one of the most sought-after titles in nine-ball and in pool generally. Traditionally, winners of the U.S. Open are given a green blazer and are awarded free entry fees to all future U.S. Open tournaments.
The Women's U.S. Open is a separate event, sanctioned by the Women's Professional Billiard Association (WPBA). (Full article...)
Did you know (auto-generated) - load new batch
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/44/Nuvola_apps_filetypes.svg/47px-Nuvola_apps_filetypes.svg.png)
- ... that the Highfield Cocoa and Coffee House in Sheffield, England, sold tea, coffee and cocoa at a penny a pint and also provided billiards and reading rooms?
- ... that John Spencer won a World Snooker Championship on his first attempt in 1969?
- ... that both finalists at the 2008 World Snooker Championship made maximum breaks during the tournament?
- ... that the 1947 World Snooker Championship was the first world snooker championship where the winner wasn't Joe Davis?
- ... that after winning the 2024 Masters, snooker player Ronnie O'Sullivan is both the youngest and oldest winner of the tournament?
- ... that the 1810s reign of Ioan Caragea introduced Wallachia to carom billiards, sugar sculptures, and an eponymous plague?
- ... that the final of the 2009 IBSF women's snooker championship was interrupted so that drug tests could be conducted on the players?
- ... that referee Jan Verhaas was informed of an error he made at the 2022 Masters by a member of the crowd?
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Image 1The 2009 World Cup of Pool (also known as the 2009 PartyPoker World Cup of Pool due to sponsorship) was a professional nine-ball pool, and the fourth World Cup of Pool, a scotch doubles knockout championship representing 32 national teams. The cup was played at the Annex of SM City North EDSA in Quezon City, Philippines from 1 to 6 September 2009. The Korean pair of Ga Young Kim and Yun Mi Lim were the first all-female team to participate at the event. The tournament featured a prize fund of $250,000 with the winner receiving $60,000. It was sponsored by online poker website partypoker.
The defending champions were Rodney Morris and Shane Van Boening representing the US, who had won the 2008 event 11–7 over the English team of Daryl Peach and Mark Gray in the final. The USA team were defeated in the quarter-finals by the Chinese pair of Fu Jian-bo and Li He-wen 5–9. The event was won by the Filipino team of Francisco Bustamante and Efren Reyes, who defeated the Germans Ralf Souquet and Thorsten Hohmann in the 2009 final 11–9. The event was organised and later broadcast by Matchroom Sport worldwide, and locally live on Solar Sports and CS9. (Full article...) -
Image 2The 1930 World Snooker Championship, known at the time as the Professional Championship of Snooker, was a snooker tournament held between 17 March and 23 May 1930 at various venues in England, with the final taking place from 19 to 24 May at Thurston's Hall, London. Defending champion Joe Davis won the title for the fourth time by defeating Tom Dennis by 25 frames to 12 in the final.
It was the fourth edition of the World Snooker Championship organised by the Billiards Association and Control Council. Six players participated in the tournament. One first round match was held at Newman's Club, London, and the venue for the other first round match and the semi-finals was Camkin's Hall, Birmingham. The highest break of the tournament was 79, a new championship record, compiled by Davis in the 12th frame of the final. Davis won both of his matches in the tournament by margins that meant the last day of play scheduled was not required. It was the third time in four years that Dennis was runner-up. (Full article...) -
Image 3The 2011 European Pool Championships was a series of professional pool championships that took place at the Steel Palace, in Brandenburg, Germany. The events were played between 23 March and 3 April 2011 were part of the European Pool Championships; and featured events for men, women and wheelchair players across four pool disciplines: straight Pool, eight-ball, nine-ball, and ten-ball. The tournament was hosted by the European Pocket Billiard Federation and organised by the International Billiard Promotion, with the final of the men's nine-ball event broadcast on Eurosport. Austria was the most successful nation, winning three events – all by Jasmin Ouschan. Jouni Tähti won two of the three wheelchair events, losing just one match in the final of the nine-ball tournament to Henrik Larsson. (Full article...)
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Ronnie O'Sullivan holds the record for the highest number of maximum breaks in professional competition (15), and also the fastest (5 minutes and 8 seconds, set at the 1997 World Championship).
A maximum break (also known as a maximum, a 147, or orally, a one-four-seven) is the highest possible break in snooker in normal circumstances and is a special type of total clearance. A player compiles a maximum break by potting all 15 reds with 15 blacks for 120 points, followed by all six colours for a further 27 points. Compiling a maximum break is regarded as a highly significant achievement in the game of snooker, and may be compared to a nine-dart finish in darts or a 300 game in ten-pin bowling.
Joe Davis made the first officially recognised maximum break in a 1955 exhibition match in London. At the Classic in January 1982, Steve Davis achieved the first recognised maximum in professional competition, which was also the first in a televised match. The following year, Cliff Thorburn became the first player to make a maximum at the World Snooker Championship. As of 2023, Ronnie O'Sullivan holds the record for the most maximum breaks in professional competition, with 15. He also holds the record for the fastest competitive maximum break at just over five minutes, which he set at the 1997 World Championship. (Full article...) -
Image 5Murphy at the 2015 German Masters
Shaun Peter Murphy (born 10 August 1982) is an English professional snooker player who won the 2005 World Championship. Nicknamed "The Magician", Murphy is noted for his straight cue action and his long potting.
Born in Harlow, Essex, and raised in Irthlingborough, Northamptonshire, Murphy turned professional in 1998. His 2005 victory at the World Championship was considered a major surprise as he was only the third qualifier to win the title after Alex Higgins and Terry Griffiths. Since then, he has been runner-up at the World Championship three times, in 2009, 2015, and 2021. Murphy has won twelve ranking titles, placing him tenth on the all time list of ranking tournament victories. He has also won eleven non-ranking tournaments, including the 2015 Masters, which completed his career Triple Crown. (Full article...) -
Image 6Wii Play is a party video game developed and published by Nintendo for the Wii console. It was released as a launch game for the console in Japan, Europe, and Australia in December 2006, and was released in North America in February 2007. The game features nine minigames, including a Duck Hunt-esque shooting range, a fishing game, and a billiards game, each of which are designed to showcase the features of the Wii Remote controller.
Developed as a compilation of prototype games originally shown off at the E3 expo in 2006, Wii Play was developed by Nintendo EAD simultaneously with Wii Sports, which also contained tech demos from E3. The featured games make use of several aspects of the Wii Remote, such as its detection of rotation and depth movement through motion sensing and its infrared pointer. (Full article...) -
Image 7George Balabushka (Russian: Григорий Антонович Балабушка Grigoriy Antonovich Balabushka; December 9, 1912 – December 5, 1975) was a Russian-born billiards (pool) cue maker, arguably the most prominent member of that profession, and is sometimes referred to as "the Stradivarius of cuemakers". His full name or last name standing alone is often used to refer to a cue stick made by him. Arriving in the U.S. in 1924, he worked at various carpentry and toy and furniture making jobs. He was an avid pool player and purchased a pool room with a business partner in 1959 and thereafter started making cues as gifts for friends, which quickly blossomed into a business when others wanted to purchase them.
Balabushka turned out approximately 1,200 handcrafted cues during his 16-year cue-making career, spanning from 1959 to his death in 1975. His cues are highly valued collectors items, made more so after being prominently featured in Martin Scorsese's 1986 film The Color of Money. Balabushka cues are generally separated into three distinct classes and time periods related to what blanks Balabushka was using in cue construction: The Titlist blank era (1959–1966), the Burton Spain blank era (1966–1971), and the Gus Szamboti blank era (1971–1975). Original Balabushka cues with verified provenance may realize tens of thousands of dollars at auction. (Full article...) -
Image 8Jean Balukas performing in an exhibition in Grand Central Terminal in 1966
Jean Balukas (born June 28, 1959) is an American pool player from Brooklyn, New York, and considered one of the greatest players of all time. At least through the 1990s, when Allison Fisher began her ascendancy, Balukas was widely acknowledged as the sole candidate for greatest female player ever. Described as a "trailblazer, a child prodigy, a loner who rebelled against dress codes for women—the pool equivalent of Billie Jean King", she is a five-time Billiards Digest Player of the Year, was the youngest inductee into the BCA Hall of Fame and the second woman given the honor, and was ranked fifteenth on Billiard Digest Greatest Players of the [20th] Century.
Balukas was considered a prodigy, coming to the public's attention first at 6 years of age at a pool exhibition held at New York City's Grand Central Terminal and thereafter appearing on television, including on CBS's primetime television show, I've Got a Secret. At just 9 years old she placed 5th in the 1969 U.S. Open straight pool championship, and placed 4th and 3rd respectively in the following two U.S. Opens. From that early start, Balukas completely dominated women's professional pool during the 1970s and 1980s. (Full article...) -
Image 9A carom billiard table and billiard balls
Carom billiards, also called French billiards and sometimes carambole billiards, is the overarching title of a family of cue sports generally played on cloth-covered, pocketless billiard tables. In its simplest form, the object of the game is to score points or "counts" by caroming one's own cue ball off both the opponent's cue ball and the object ball on a single shot. The invention as well as the exact date of origin of carom billiards is somewhat obscure but is thought to be traceable to 18th-century France.
There is a large array of carom billiards disciplines. Some of the more prevalent today and historically are (chronologically by apparent date of development): straight rail, one-cushion, balkline, three-cushion and artistic billiards. (Full article...) -
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The leather shake bottle used as a carom target in bottle pool.
Bottle pool, also known as bottle-billiards and bottle pocket billiards, is a hybrid billiards game combining aspects of both carom billiards and pocket billiards. Played on a standard pool table, the game uses just two object balls, a cue ball, and a 6+3⁄4 inches (170 mm) tall, narrow-necked bottle called a shake bottle or tally bottle, traditionally made from leather, that is placed on the table and used as a target for caroms. Those unfamiliar with the game sometimes mistakenly use its name as a synonym for the very different game of kelly pool. Bottle pool has been described as combining "elements of billiards, straight pool and chess under a set of rules that lavishly rewards strategic shot making and punishes mistakes with Sisyphean point reversals."
Although bottle pool's origins remain obscure, tournament records and newspaper articles confirm that the game has been played since at least the late 19th century. A mention appears in an 1894 article in The New York Times announcing a 64-player tournament to be played at a certain Hanover Clubhouse in Brooklyn, New York. The game was more well known in the early-to-mid-20th century, during which references to it appear in numerous books and publications including Sinclair Lewis's Main Street. It is also known to have been played by some notable individuals, such as quantum chemist and biochemist Linus Pauling. (Full article...)
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Image 1Ronnie O'Sullivan has won the World Championship seven times in the 21st century. (from Snooker)
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Image 3A sliding scoreboard, some blocks of cue-tip chalk, white chalk-board chalk, and two cue sticks (from Snooker)
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Image 4Historic print depicting Michael Phelan's Billiard Saloon located at the corner of 10th Street and Broadway in Manhattan, 1 January 1859 (from Carom billiards)
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Image 5A full-size snooker table set up for the start of a game (from Snooker)
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Image 6alt=Green snooker ball (from Snooker)
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Image 7Balkline table with standard markings (from Carom billiards)
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Image 9alt=Blue snooker ball (from Snooker)
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Image 10A close-up view of a cue tip about to strike the cue ball, the aim being to pot the red ball into a corner pocket (from Snooker)
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Image 11A pool table diagram (from Pool (cue sports))
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Image 12alt=Yellow snooker ball (from Snooker)
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Image 13A complete set of snooker balls (from Snooker)
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Image 14alt=Black snooker ball (from Snooker)
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Image 15alt=Pink snooker ball (from Snooker)
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Image 17Illustration A: Aerial view of a snooker table with the balls in their starting positions. The cue ball (white) may be placed anywhere in the semicircle (known as the "D") at the start of the game. (from Snooker)
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Image 19A set of standard carom billiard balls, comprising a red object ball, one plain white cue ball, and one dotted white cue ball (replaced in modern three-cushion billiards by a yellow ball) for the opponent (from Carom billiards)
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Image 20Paul Gauguin's 1888 painting Night Café at Arles includes a depiction of French billiards (from Carom billiards)
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Image 21A player racking the balls (from Pool (cue sports))
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Image 22Dutch pool player Niels Feijen at the 2008 European Pool Championship (from Pool (cue sports))
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Image 25The Family Remy by Januarius Zick, c. 1776, featuring billiards among other parlour activities (from Carom billiards)
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Image 26alt=Brown snooker ball (from Snooker)
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Image 28alt=Red snooker ball (from Snooker)
Major topics
Pool games | ||
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Carom billiards | ||
Snooker | ||
Other games | ||
Resources | ||
Major international tournaments |
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Other events | ||
Governing bodies | ||
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![]() The rules of games in italics are standardized by international sanctioning bodies. |
More topics
Early events | |
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Match-play | |
Challenges | |
Knock-outs | |
Crucible era | |
Related articles | |
Tournaments | |
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Related articles | |
Active professional snooker tournaments | |
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Ranking events | |
Non-ranking events | |
Seniors events |
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Tours and series | |
Related lists | |
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