Tevis' pool dreams were strong. In his dark fantasies The Hustler and The Color of Money, fictional pool hustlers "Fast Eddie" Felson and Vincent "Vince" Lauria took on the world's best and beat them all, baby!
Any pool crony you speak with will be happy to argue for hours that the best hustlers can beat the best pool professionals. Don't believe it! The best professionals are or were the best hustlers. When the TV camera is on, the people in tuxedos make that 9-ball for the championship of the world, when Joe Pool Player would drop his cue from perspiration, because they've made that shot a thousand times before, shooting with one hand and a house cue, winning the green paper with Ben Franklin's visage on it.
Many fine pool hustlers enter money events and come in third, or fourth or fifth purposefully, but spend "practice time" in between matches playing for a hundred to a thousand a game or more. They go home to Memphis or Miami with an itty-bitty trophy, a tournament check for three hundred dollars, and eight or ten thousand in cold cash!
