The World Pool Series(WPS) is a professional pool tour based out of the United States that began in January, 2017. It was founded by multi-world champion Darren Appleton and his partner, Manny Stamatakis, the owner of Steinway Billiards in Queens, New York City.

The main idea behind the World Pool Series is to create a player-centric tour that offers regular competitive and earning opportunities for professional players from around the world. In its first season, the World Pool Series(WPS) consists of four separate 8-ball events to be played throughout the course of 2017. The WPS is organized as a tour, with rankings points from earlier events carrying over to later events and determining entrants and seeding’s, and even who qualifies for the following year’s tour. All WPS events are sanctioned by the World Pool Billiard Association(WPA), the governing body of the sport of pool.

The total prize fund for the four events is estimated to be around $425,000 with $85,000 of that being added money.

The World Pool Series has committed itself to organic growth that hopes to draw in more sponsors and fans from around the globe. After its initial event in January, the WPS decided to offer all of its events free of charge on its live stream feed online.

Also, the WPS has partnered with Internet powerhouse UNILAD, who have agreed to take the WPS stream feed and broadcast it live via their massively popular Facebook platform. Launched in 2014, UNILAD is one of the biggest global platforms for breaking news, shareable and relatable content. Unilad has a Facebook following of over 18 million fans, 32 million monthly unique visitors to the website and over 3 billion video views a month. This partnership will help the WPS to grow so that in subsequent years even more tournaments can be added to the tour schedule and more fans from around the world can enjoy top class professional pool on their mobile phones and PC’s.

The World Pool Series also aims to build a bridge to the amateur game, especially in the United States, where millions play the game on a daily basis.

“8-ball is the most recognizable game, the most global game. It’s bigger than snooker,” Appleton said. “It’s what the amateurs play. Everyone all over the world plays 8-ball. But they don’t have a tour to look up to, to follow. We want to tap into that and be that brand. They are going to be able to learn more, watch the best players. Maybe some of them can even qualify for the tour.”