Year: 2004

The World Pool Championships have announced the prize breakdowns for this year’s event, to be held July 10-18 in Taipei, Taiwan. They have added $50,000 this year’s prize purse, bringing to total purse to $350,000 and pushing last year’s $65,000 first-place prize up to $75,000. Last year’s runner-up…

[caption id="attachment_2652" align="alignright" width="150"] Ewa Laurance enjoyed a moment with special guest Jerry Orbach at Laurance's Hall of Fame induction ceremony.[/caption]After speaking with actor Jerry Orbach, star of NBC's Law & Order, Billiard Congress of America Executive Director Steph…

Mark Griffin, a poolroom owner and partner in table manufacturer Diamond Billiard Products, has agreed to purchase the Billiard Congress of America’s 60,000-player amateur league system, despite the efforts of a group of regional league officials to form their own association in opposition to the sa…

Johnny Archer won the Brunswick Men's Professional Players Championship, held March 25-28 at the Super Billiards Expo in Valley Forge, Pa. Archer took a surprise second-round loss to Frankie Hernandez, 10-2, and then charged through 10 straight matches in the left bracket for the win. Notable vic…

Continuing his recent run for the top, Mike Davis won the Joss Northeast 9-Ball Tour stop held March 20-21 at Renaissance Billiard Club in Quincy, Ma. Other Davis wins of note in the past season include a third-place finish at an early-March 111-player Planet Pool Tour stop, ad a top-place finish at…

Hall-of-Famer and BD columnist Nick Varner is recuperating nicely from aorta femoral bypass surgery performed on Jan. 29. Although currently in the midst of an anticipated two-month recovery, Varner hopes to return to competition as early as the BCA Open 9-Ball Championships in mid-May. Varner wa…

The first event for the 2004 season of the San Miguel Asian 9-Ball Tour is happening this weekend, at Pool Haven in the city of Clarke Quay, Singapore. A field of 32 top Asian players, headed up by pool stars Francisco Bustamante and Efren Reyes, will vie for the $50,000 prize purse, as well as a…

BD is saddened to report the passing of Billy Joe "Cornbread Red" Burge, 72, on Friday, Feb. 13, of natural causes. He lived in Prestonsburg, Ky. Burge was born on Dec. 17, 1931, in Paducah, Ky. As his nickname suggests, "Red" was one of the more colorful personalities in the "hustlers era" of po…