By Ruel S. De Vera

Associated Editor

ASIDE from being a fantastically funny TV show, the Big Bang Theory, I’ve always found, was best represented by the break in a billiards match. First, all those super dense particles forming a solid mass before suddenly expanding and flying apart, flying into each other and then flying in all directions.

The billiards break is, in my mind, one of the most powerful, violent moments in sports. The player leans in, throws the cue forward with such ferocious velocity that the spinning balls seem to want to get into the pockets to hide there.

I was never good at it. Growing up in the 1980s, billiards was not the global, made-for-TV spectacle that it today. It was the street smart man’s game, burdened with connotations of illegal activity, the kind of thing played in dark, smoky places where money changed hands. We all wanted to be the kind of man who played it.

The popular place to play back then was literally a bahay kubo. It was a cogon-roofed structure that was perpetually dark. The bad boys already played there regularly. I went once and discovered that I have absolutely no aptitude for it. Today, that hut is gone, replaced by a Jollibee and a Greenwich.

But even back then, Efren Reyes was a legend, just not as big as he is today. That distinction went to Amang Parica. But even then “Bata” was beloved for his crooked smile, his winning humility and of course his wicked table manners.

When billiards exploded as a sport, the speed with which it spread would give you whiplash. This secret craft of the rogue had gone mainstream.  It was on every TV it seemed. Countless billiards halls sprouted all over. Countless more people learned to play it. I actually believe at this point that most Filipinos under 40 are pretty good at it. Whoever is adept at it may surprise you.

But that unique skill set and ironclad concentration required to be truly transcendent remains ever so elusive. Those who do have it have emerged from the shadows and into the floodlights to become household names: The aforementioned Reyes, Django Bustamante, Alex Pagulayan, Dennis Orcullo, Ronnie Alcano, and so on. They have their legendary quirks (Reyes, for example, known for removing his dentures for matches) and their tales of adversity (Bustamante valiantly making it to the finals of the World Pool Championships after finding out his daughter had died back home).

In many ways, billiards is a sport that Filipinos truly have dominated like no other country. With the emergence of some guy named Pacquiao, boxing has returned to being the Filipino’s preferred sporting spectacle. But it is in billiards where we not only have had a long tradition of beating the world, it is a sport where we continue to do it regularly and will most likely continue doing so. Rubilen Amit’s ascension to the title at the Women’s World 10-Ball Champion means we have a new world to conquer.

I remain useless with it. I know it’s not genetic because my youngest brother is an astonishing player.  There’s no telling if boxing will remain as hot as it is now once Pacquiao retires but it’s clear that billiards as a sport is now ubiquitous and here to stay. Everyone knows the top talents and naturally expect them to do well. Like music, it’s become something Filipinos are synonymous with, even as the world keeps on spinning.

Read about the newest Pinoy billiards phenomenon in the July 26, 2009 issue of the Sunday Inquirer Magazine.