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SHARKING
Are You SHARKING? or are you being sharked?
THE SKY IS NO LIMIT BY: DON AKERLOW
Most of the time sharking occurs between one player or another. For instance: Player A is down shooting what would appear to be a difficult shot, Player B moves himself or walks into the line of site, then stops and moves off. There are many ways to shark but I won’t go into them for obvious reasons. A lot of time you don’t even know that you are being sharked. It is done with a lot of subtleties.
want to win or lose on my own merit. Good luck to anybody else that this is happening to. Leagues are all about competition and having a good time and it shouldn’t be ruined by a few intellectual midgets.
I recently witnessed some sharking that just blew me away. Asking the player who is done on a shot, ready to shoot, where they are going when the player has already designated a pocket and been acknowledged. Laughing, carrying on in front of the player when they are shooting. What can you do? In the old days you threw down and beat the crap out of the guy. In today’s world that is frowned upon and no doubt the person who is sharking would call the cops. So what do you do? Here is something that has worked for me on occasion - do the exat same thing as they are doing. If they walk in front of you and stop - you do the same. If they yell and scream - you do the same. If they clap loudly when you miss clap even louder when they miss. What I observed that night was the whole team or at least most of them on a league night doing the same thing. Can you say conspiracy? Not so fast - how about the term cheaters, losers, because maybe they are doing this to other teams because they can’t win. They aren’t good enough or they don’t think they are. It just occurred to me another way to get to them - technology. Why not use technology?! Now here is what I mean - don’t get back at them by dong the same thing as they by sharking. Everyone today has a cell phone. Most cell phones have video capabilities. Video tape them sharking/cheating and take this to your league operator. File a complaint. Word of advice, get two or three different videos from different people from different nights. Make your case strong. This was the advice I gave to the league players when I saw this. Hopefully it helped. I like to have a good time and joke around but when I get down on the pool table, I
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March 2014
page 17