Billiards Digest editor Mike Panozzo Joins Billiard Congress of America Hall of Fame

Mike Panozzo was inducted into the BCA Hall of Fame on Nov. 31, under the Meritorious Service category. He has devoted the entirety of his 40-plus year to chronicling and promoting American pocket billiards.

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Editors Note: This article originally appeared in the December 2024 edition of Billiards Digest and is reprinted with permission.

By R.A. Dyer

The sandy-haired kid was tall and lanky, all arms and elbows and smiles. Into the magazine’s inner sanctum the 22 year old ventured, upstairs in Chicago’s John Hancock building. The kid extended his hand; told the middle-aged man behind the desk he’d come for a job. Can you take pictures? the older man asks. Absolutely! You can’t drag a camera out of my hands! What about layout? No problem!

It wasn’t that he was lying, not exactly — just exaggerating a bit. Because in 1980, on that fateful day when he first walked into the 37th-floor offices of Billiards Digest, the then wide-eyed Michael E. Panozzo had no professional experience or any kind, journalistic or otherwise. Right out of Marquette University, Mike had hoped for an entry writing position. What he got instead was the opportunity to run the whole show.

And now, all these decades later, he’s still running it.

On Nov. 29 the Billiard Congress of America inducted Michael Panozzo into its Hall of Fame, honoring him for his long years of meritorious service. Mike continues to manage BD, the nation’s only print magazine devoted exclusively to pool. In that capacity he has written hundreds of profiles and editorials, spent countless hours on design work and handled advertising. You name it he’s done it. But Mike also has spent years supporting and promoting the pool industry in general and has been instrumental in maintaining the BCA Hall of Fame itself. In fact, Mike founded and manages the United States Billiard Media Association, the coalition that took command of the Hall of Fame banquets 15 years ago. And Mike also is considered one of the sport’s leading voices, a man who’s opinion matters.

“When it comes to meritorious service, I can’t think of anyone more deserving than Mike Panozzo,” says pro Jeanette Lee, a longtime friend. She said she wasn’t sure about the editor at first, but eventually he won her over. Just like Mike does with everyone.

“I’m so thrilled for him, beyond words,” said Jeanette. “I’m so grateful that the Hall of Fame committee has given Mike his just due.”

HISTORY OF SERVICE

So who is Mike Panozzo?

By his own count, he has written nearly 400 editorials and interviewed 55 Hall of Fame members. He has attended every BCA Trade Expo, 20 Mosconi Cups and 20 U.S. Opens. He has written three instructional books with Steve Mizerak, one of which sold nearly 100,000 copies.

What else is on the résumé? He served on the BCA Board of Directors for the 1991-1992 and 1998-1999 terms, contributing his time and hard work both to the BCA’s Promotions and Hall of Fame committees. And in 2009, when the BCA decided to discontinue the Hall of Fame banquet, Mike stepped in with the United States Billiard Media Association, a group he himself founded. He also served as a member of the board of the Billiard and Bowling Institute of America, and was its President in 2001. He was honored with the BBIA Industry Service Award in 2017.

Self-confident, charming, insightful, diplomatic — all these words describe the veteran Billiards Digest publisher. But also constant. The magazine began in 1978, just two years before Mike first graced its office doors, and over the intervening years as its editor he has grown professionally from a tinhorn journalist with almost no knowledge of pool to a man now considered as its most influential thought leader.

And it all started with a handshake and a little bit of bullshitting.

“I actually got lucky,” says Mike, explaining how he came to work for Mort Luby, then the publisher of Billiards Digest and the separate Bowlers Journal. For years National Bowlers Journal and Billiard Review — that is, a single Luby publication —  served both industries. But then Luby spun off the pool magazine as a once-every-two-month publication and not long afterward Mike, a recent journalism graduate, was brought in as editor.

“My uncle knew (Mort Luby) from bowling — his family was the first family of bowling as far a chronicling the history of sport — and my dad knew Mort Luby by name,” says Mike. “So when I went to interview with him, I thought I was interviewing this celebrity publisher. And I thought the job was for a writing position. But when I got in, he handed me a list of responsibilities for editor. I lied my way through the interview to get the job. I told him ‘you can’t drag a camera out of my hands’ but I only had one half of a semester devoted to the photography.

“It was a small magazine publishing company and we had to do everything ourselves,” he continues. “We had an editor at the bowling magazine, who did nothing for five days a week except grind out copy. That’s all he did. But I was involved in layout and design, in ad sales, and subscription sales. I had to meet the retailers and the manufacturers. I stayed in touch with them on so many different levels, and so I never faced the monotony of grinding out copy. The job connected me to the overall industry and that was how I always was able to maintain my enthusiasm for it.”

In 1994 Mort Luby put the entire publishing operation up for sale and invited Mike and another long-term employee, Keith Hamilton, to make an offer. They jumped at the opportunity, and Mike took over the editorial operations while Keith began managing the business side. Together, Panozzo and Hamilton grew the publishing company and at its height it published an annual buyers’ guide, three bowling magazines and three billiard magazines. Under Mike’s leadership, Billiards Digest in 1998 also became a monthly publication.

Hamilton acknowledges that the bowling and billiard industries have had their ups and downs, with a decade-long surge of interest in pool after the 1986 release of The Color of Money, but also a devastating slowdown with the Covid epidemic. In 2020, the partners sold the bowling publications to that sport’s governing bodies. But Billiards Digest has kept on going — perhaps not in as robust a fashion as during its pre-Internet height —  but it’s still publishing some of the sport’s best photography and writing, all of it delivered directly to your door each month.

“I have never seen anyone who works harder than Mike — he is unrelenting in what he does,” says Hamilton. “And it’s not just for Billiards Digest. It’s for the billiards industry in general, the podcasts, the banquets. And it never crossed his mind that he’d get recognized for his work — I know that for certain — because his passion is genuine. In my opinion, over the last 30 years it’s been Mike Panozzo who has become the most important person in the billiards industry.”

GROWING UP ON THE SOUTHSIDE

Mike, now 66, grew up in the Pullman neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago. His family —  he has three bothers and two sisters — are 100 percent Italian. His aunts and uncles and his godparents lived nearby. On Sunday they attended St. Anthony of Padua, “a very big Italian church” on Prairie Avenue. “We went to church together, then we went to the store to buy Italian food, and we’d have a big family dinner every Sunday at 3 p.m.. It was ravioli or spaghetti every weekend,” recalls Mike.

He also was a big sports fan, and felt fairly certain early on, even at the Catholic high school he attended, that he wanted to pursue sports journalism as a career. But he had no particular interest in billiards or bowling — he just liked sports in general. In high school he played tennis. “I think he would have been happy (writing about) anything, and pool was a bit of surprise,” said the former Ellen Kunka, Mike’s wife of more than 40 years. “He loves sports — hockey, and basketball — and his whole family loves sports.”

Ellen says it was sports that brought the two together in the first place: they met at Marquette while waiting to buy tickets to a basketball game. They began dating a couple of years later. “He’s always been confident and self assured,” she says. “He has a strong work ethic, and gosh — he’s just very devoted. … I also think he’s one of those rare people who really love what they do. I don’t think it’s ever been a grind for him. He’s always trying new things, meeting new people, coming up with ideas.”

Anyone who has followed Mike’s career or worked with him know he’s a top-notch writer and editor. He also has a penchant for attracting top talent. But Mike’s outgoing personality also contributes to his success. Mike’s an extrovert. A people person. If the billiards community were a frat, then he’d be the frat president. And over the years he has put his considerable interpersonal skills to good use, “stirring the pot to make the sport more visible,” says Ellen. “I think he has always set his sights on the betterment of the industry,” she says.

Does Mike have enemies? Probably. It’s hard not to make them after writing hundreds of editorials, calling out industry missteps and naming names. “Even advertisers” he’d call out, said business partner Hamilton with a barely concealed groan. “Mike knows his stuff editorially, and he knows the value of balance, and he has had the courage to call someone out — being an advertiser or not. It took me years to become comfortable with that, but Mike was right all along.”

Jeanette Lee, the famous Black Widow, says she felt “hated by the whole industry” when she got her start as a 20-year-old. At the time, she also lumped Mike Panozzo into that big ol’ category of haters. But Jeanette eventually changed her tune about the sport’s most famous editor after watching him in action. “It just took seeing the articles,” she said. “I didn’t agree with everything he wrote. It wasn’t always flattering. … But they were always very fair. He called it like he saw it.

Jeanette likewise expresses deep gratitude for how Mike went out this way to inquire about her wellbeing after she received a serious cancer diagnoses in 2021, and how he organized an “amazing” GoFundMe campaign to help with her medical bills. “He always gave whatever he could, whenever he could, for whatever was needed,” she said. “I have a tremendous amount of respect of him. Most people who have burned out a long time ago, and he’s still right there, doing whatever needs to be done.”

THE HOF SELECTION PROCESS

I suppose a few words might be warranted here regarding this year’s nominating process. It should be noted that while Mike has been instrumental in ensuring the long-term viability of the Hall of Fame and its banquet (and while he founded the USBMA that hosts the banquet), that the USBMA nominating committee maintained a strict firewall this year between its members and the Billiards Digest publisher. That is, the committee conducted its deliberations in private, without Mike’s involvement in any fashion. He knew nothing of his nomination before it was offered, and was not privy to any of the members’ communications about it afterward. This separation between committee and nominee was by strict design. And yet, the committee vote on Mike’s behalf was unanimous and enthusiastic, and the overall USBMA membership endorsed his selection by overwhelming numbers. None of this should come as a surprise to anybody who follows professional pool: they all understand the many contributions that Mike has made on its behalf, how he has traveled constantly to the tournaments and evangelized for the sport at every opportunity. The only surprise is that this honor didn’t come sooner.

So what’s next for the Billiards Digest editor and publisher? Well, first —  there’s sure to be more leisure traveling with his wife Ellen. He also famously loves his cocktails (and has actually penned a cocktail recipe book) and loves fine food. So also expect more fancy dining with Ellen as they explore the world. And while Mike says he has no plans to retire, he did move to Wisconsin two years ago and now runs Billiards Digest from a small office in Oconomowoc, population 18,000. He says he has more plans for the magazine, as yet undisclosed, and in recent years has helped popularize the monthly Billiards Digest Live streaming program, produced by the 250,000-member American Poolplayers Association. He flies out to the APA studios in Missouri every month to record it.

And as for whatever else Mike accomplishes in future years, be sure it will be with his hand extended and with that big ol’ winning smile. “I think this is such a greatly deserved honor,” says Ellen. “He has devoted his life to this industry. I’m so very happy for him.”

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Mike Panozzo was inducted into the BCA Hall of Fame on Nov. 31, under the Meritorious Service category. He has devoted the entirety of his 40-plus year to chronicling and promoting American pocket billiards.