Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 88, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 April 1920 — YAMADA DEUBERATE AS BILLIARD PLAYER [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

YAMADA DEUBERATE AS BILLIARD PLAYER

One of Most Interesting Exponents of Green Cloth Game. Distinguished Himself on Coming This Country by Defeating Willie Hoppe—Masao Shot Is His Strong Point. Koji Yamada, the little Jap from Tokyo, the land that made the cherry blossom famous, is one of the most interesting of billiard players. He left Japan about 1910 and went to Berlin, Germany, to study medicine and bacteriology and become a doctor, but one of the germs called a billiard bug got into his blood and he became a billiard player instead. He came to this country in 1912 and entered a professional tournament and immediately distinguished himself <by beating Hoppe, much to the surprise of everybody, includingHoppe himself. Short of stature with a big mass of black hair, he moves about the table slowly, never ln z a hurry, careful and deliberate, and if he was ever nervous

in his life nobody has ever suspected it He takes his good and bad luck with an equal air of indifference that suggests a fatalist. Yamada’s general style of play is something of the Hoppe system. He does not specialize in any one thing. Yamada uses a short cue of 19-ounce Weight Hfs stroke is quick and short and snappy. He bends over in shooting so that his chin almost touches his cue. He Is a good executor. Just before coming from San Francisco, where he now makes his home, in playing red ball in an academy there he ran 63, which is a record for the academy. Rouge or red ball is a game where the player must play from the red ball each time. Yamada’s one special outstanding strong point is the masse shot. Even the other players concede him this distinction. Some of his fancy exhibition masse shots are.nothing less than wonderful. Yamada has a pleasing personality, makes friends readily and is well liked everywhere.

Koji Yamada.