Jeremy Jones Pays a Visit To Cuetec DFW 9-Ball Tour And Goes Undefeated To Claim Title

Miguel Hernandez, Jeremy Jones and Tim Larson

Conventional pool wisdom has always been that a player’s primary opponent in any game is not human; that it’s the table and balls that you’re battling, with just a dash of your own state of mind and the skills you bring to a table when you get there. That said, 74 competitors who signed on to this past weekend’s (March 25-26), $2,000-added Stop #3 on the Cuetec DFW 9-Ball Tour at Rusty’s Billiards in Fort Worth, TX could have been forgiven for a moment of doubt about their chances of taking home the top prize when they learned that the captain of the 2022 USA Mosconi Cup Team was the 75^th player – Jeremy Jones, who had told tour director Monica Anderson that he just happened to be in the neighborhood for the weekend and thought he’d drop in to compete. By a lot (748), Jones was the highest Fargo-rated player in the event; 27 points above Gus Briseno, who finished 4^th, 34 points ahead of Tim Larson, who finished 3^rd  and 32 points ahead of Jeremy Vulgamore (7^th/8^th), rounding out the only four players above 700.

The 74 were, of course, afforded a degree of optimism offered by the handicap system which forced Jones to win 10 games before they chalked up the number they had to win, which ranged among Jones’ six opponents between 9 (Briseno) and 5 (his first opponent, Chance Willis).  Runner-up Miguel Hernandez, whom he faced twice, hot seat and final, was racing to 6. Jones did face Briseno, but the average Fargo rate he faced among his six opponents was 605, while the average number of games his opponents had to win against him (including his two matches versus Hernandez) was 7. Supporting the potential ‘in play’ of the “any given Sunday” rule, three of Jones’ seven matches went double hill, including the hot seat and finals.

Once by Willis in the opening round, Jones ran into Tara Williams, who’d captured the event title at a stop on the DFW Ladies 9-Ball Tour the week before. He got by her 7-2, advancing through Kevin Frauenberger (3) and in his first double-hill match, Tony Loeper to arrive at a winners’ side semifinal against Briseno.

Hernandez, in the meantime, sporting his 585 Fargo Rate (racing to 6) and on his way to the hot seat and finals, faced an average Fargo Rate of 646, while squaring off against six opponents who needed to chalk up, on average, 8 against him. No one, except Jones, did so. He got by Nitin Malik (4), Paul Villanueva (2), Blake West (1) and Jeremy Vulgamore (6; Vulgamore racing to 9) to arrive at his winners’ side semifinal against Steve Smith.

Jones sent Briseno loss-side packing 10-5, as Hernandez downed Smith 6-5 (Smith racing to 8). Hernandez had paid his dues against all but one opponent racing to a higher number, but it’s hard to know who was more surprised with the double-hill fight he put up against Jones in the hot seat match; himself, Jones or any of the spectators. Jones dropped the last 9-ball and claimed the hot seat.

Arguably, though hardly certain, Briseno was the most likely candidate to come at Jones from the loss side. When he arrived to compete in the matches that would determine 5^th/6^th place, Briseno drew Jeff Sullivan, who’d dropped a winners’ side semifinal match to Steve Smith and then defeated Frauenberger 8-3 and Vulgamore 8-5. Smith picked up Tim Larson (still in the hunt, so to speak), who’d lost his opening round match to Trent Stith 7-7 (Larson racing to 9) and set out on an eight-match, loss-side winning streak that included two double-hill wins and the recent elimination of Juan Parra 9-6 and Jason Borrell 9-3. 

Briseno spoiled any hopes Sullivan might have been entertaining about a rematch against Smith by eliminating Sullivan 9-3. Smith, in the meantime, put up a double hill fight (Larson’s third on the loss side), but to no avail, as Larson advanced to face Briseno in the quarterfinals.

It was a straight-up race to 9, with loss-side momentum more or less on Larson’s side as he battled for his 10^th straight loss-side win. He prevailed in those quarterfinals, eliminating Briseno 9-6. 

One would assume that Hernandez, going into the semifinals against Larson, was paying more attention to the conventional wisdom of the table/balls-as-opponent idea than he was to the 10 straight loss-side wins his opponent had chalked up (three more total wins than Jones would end up recording). It worked. Hernandez won his deciding sixth rack before Larson, racing to 9, had won his sixth.

One could also assume that the potential double-elimination final was going to pit two opponents against each other who were both invested in the truth of the same conventional wisdom. Fargo Rate odds calculations gave Hernandez a slightly better than 1-in-10 chance of winning the matches (13.3% versus Jones’ 86.7%). It should be noted that the calculations take into account the ratings and races, with no consideration of the players themselves. Jones prevailed, but for the second time, had to play a 15^th deciding game before he could put Hernandez away. He won the only set necessary to claim the event title.

Tour representatives thanked the ownership and staff at Rusty’s for their hospitality, as well as title sponsor Cuetec and Associate sponsor, Fort Worth Billiards Superstore. The next stop on the Cuetec DFW 9-Ball Tour (#4), scheduled for the weekend of April 22-23, will be hosted by Tailgaters (formerly, Snookered) in Frisco, TX.

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