Lee Vann Corteza
Ten years ago, as the Philippines’ Lee Vann Corteza was jetting around the world, scooping up enough cash to become the #2-ranked competitor (behind Van Boening) on our 2013 AZBilliards Money Leaderboard and recording his best earnings year ever, Germany’s Moritz Neuhausen was 10 years old, about four years away from starting to record wins in European events. The two of them met in the hot seat and finals of a somewhat star-studded 10-Ball tournament on Long Island this past weekend (Sept. 9-10). Vann Corteza won both matches, double hill, at the $2,500-added event that drew 42 entrants to Raxx Pool Room Bar & Grill in West Hempstead, NY.
There were a number of viable loss-side threats to Vann Corteza’s claim to the title who didn’t make into the first money round (7th/8th), including, among others, Pat Fleming, Caroline Pao, John Francisco, Jeremy Sossei, Pascal Dufresne, Mike Salerno, Sean Morgan and Raxx owner Holden Chin, to name just a few. The final eight had its share of recognizable players as well, many of them with plans to hang out on the island for a while, as others join them to compete in this coming weekend’s (Sept. 14-17) event at Racks, the $10,000-added Mhet Vergara ProAm (MVP) Tour Open.
After being awarded an opening-round bye, Vann Corteza got by Patricio Hiedra 8-4 before, in order, defeating former junior competitor Lukas Fracasso-Verner and Mika “The Iceman” Immonen, both 8-3, to arrive at a winners’ side semifinal against Mhet Vergara. Neuhausen, also with an opening-round bye, shut out Patrick Byrne before defeating Vishan Shiwcharran 8-3 and Del Sim 8-1 to arrive at his winners’ side semifinal versus the winner of this past spring’s Open 9-Ball ProPlayer Championship at the Super Billiards Expo, Jonas Souto Comino. At the time, Comino had given up just a single rack in two of his first three matches; one to Mike Callaghan in his opening-round match and none at all to Jeremy Sossie in his third-round battle. Fellow countryman Jose Alberto Delgado had come within a game of double hill in their second-round match.
Vann Corteza sent Mhet Vergara to the 5/6 matches 8-3. Neuhausen (likely) surprised Comino by allowing him only a single rack, sending him over while he joined Vann Corteza in the hot seat match. In their first of two, double-hill matches, Vann Corteza claimed the hot seat.
Comino moved to the loss side and ran into a rematch against Delgado, who’d followed his loss to him with wins over Carolina Pao (0), Pascal Dufresne (2), Max Watanabe (2) and then, melted the “Iceman” (Immonen) 7-1. Vergara drew Fracasso-Verner, who was working on a modest, four-match, loss-side streak that had recently eliminated Del Sim 7-5 and Hunter Lombardo 7-4.
Delgado avenged his earlier loss 7-4 versus Comino and was joined in the quarterfinals by Vergara who stopped Fracasso-Verner’s loss-side streak, also 7-4. Delgado advanced one more step, defeating Vergara 7-5 in those quarterfinals before he was stopped by Neuhausen in the semifinals 7-4.
Second verse, same as the first, except a little longer. Fargo Rate odds had given Vann Corteza a 68.8% chance of winning the race-to-8 hot seat match and slightly better odds (71.8%) for the longer finals. Though not available, one has to wonder whether the odds of winning the deciding game in either of the two matches would have been different. Corteza closed out his undefeated run with a second double-hill win over Neuhausen to claim the Raxx 10-Ball Open.
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