Playing Off the Rail: A Pool Hustler's Journey

By David McCumber

Categories: Biographies & Memoirs, Sports & Outdoors

Playing Off the Rail, first published in 1996, is journalist David McCumber's account of bankrolling professional pool player Tony Annigoni on a road trip. Acting as stakehorse, McCumber puts up the cash while Annigoni, a skilled nine-ball player, hustles opponents in bars and pool halls back and forth across North America, sometimes joined by his mentor, Bucktooth. McCumber portrays the gamblers and road players they meet, among them Cornbread Red, in places from Akron, Ohio, to Bellflower, California.

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• Joe Rogan: “There's a great book about that place. There's a break great book uh called Playing Off the Rail by this guy David McCumber. ... And he took my friend Tony Anagoni who was a worldclass professional pool player and they traveled around the country gambling and wrote this book. It's a great book.”