Tino "The Barber" Barbieri Lands Televised Interview

Historically speaking the last boom for pool was immediately after the release of the "Color of Money" in 1986. It had two of the biggest names in Hollywood at the time starring in it, combined with a great script it brought a lot of hype to the game. This lasted until the mid 90's when the game began to fall back into obscurity losing T.V contracts and tournament purses getting smaller and smaller and then the death spiral ended in the mid 2000's with the failure of the IPT tour.

Since the IPT tour ended seeing pool played or even talked about on television has been non-existent besides trick shot competitions or replays of tournaments from decades ago on ESPN Classics. However 2014 has signified a slight shift as our biggest name in pool Earl Strickland has had a successful documentary made by Sky Sports, followed up by an interview that went viral by the New York Times. This has given the game a little hype back and has provided opportunities to promote the game. 

Tino "The Barber" Barbieri a Semi-Professional Player from Montreal and occasional broadcaster for Billiard Quebec  has been given an opportunity to continue this positive trend on Monday at Le Skratch in Laval. City TV/Connected an affiliate of the national broadcasters Sportsnet , hosted by Kelly Grieg will discuss the state of our game with Barbieri who came highly recommended by Steve Cooper and Luc Paquette to do this interview. 

A modest but very focused Barbieri promises to keep the discussion about what our sport needs in order to break through to the mainstream, and less about his own self promotion.  He feels it is important to get people away from focusing on hustling and the stigma's of the past that have crippled this game for so long especially among the youth. Who's parents have been wary about allowing their children to play pool because of the negative perception it has. Thus Barbieri has made it his goal to demonstrate the thousands of hours and dedication it takes to become an elite player, as well as to highlight leagues and circuits such as the SCAB federation and its players. 

"The Barber" understands that in order to get this sport out of the shadows we need to educate people on its intricate details and what makes it such a great sport. He will also be discussing the necessity of Pool becoming an Olympic event and how we need to ban together as a community to lobby the IOC. This interview will be recorded on March 31st and I will be sharing the link on The Pool Scene Facebook page when it airs . Barbieri has already proven to be a fantastic ambassador and  look forward to seeing the final result