Billiards: Carrillo taking lifelong hobby to next level

To a random person on the street, Rick Carrillo may appear to be just your normal, blue-collar Midwesterner. But once he has a pool stick in his hand, that all changes for the 52-year-old owner of Carrillo Lawn Service in Rock Falls.

There is nothing average about Carrillo’s pool skills.

“I’ve got at least 100 trophies,” Carrillo said. “They’re not all first place, but a majority of them are.”

It all started when Rick was 12-years-old, playing on the family table in the basement.

He played for hours with his father, his two brothers, and his uncles. By the time he reached high school, he was already an advanced player. While most kids his age gravitated toward football and basketball, Rick stuck to pool.

“I just enjoyed it so much as a kid that I didn’t pursue anything else,” Carrillo said. “I played quite a bit through the high school years, and that’s how I came to be pretty good.”

Once he felt ready, he took his talents to leagues around the Sauk Valley, including Sterling, Rock Falls, and Dixon.

“The first year that I got into the league, they asked me to play with the Latin American Club in Sterling, and I ended up playing with one of my friends, Tony Morales,” he said. “He picked me up, and we got first place that year. That’s what sparked me to think that ‘Hey, I’m not bad. I’m a pretty good player. I want to continue this.’”

Carrillo progressed so much that he became an area commodity for teams looking for a skilled player. His advanced level of play would boost average teams to the top.

“I was winning all the time,” Carrillo said.

Even though his pool game was strong, he wanted to be there for his family, especially his daughter, Rita.

“She looks up to her dad,” he says. “She believes that he’s the best no matter what. She pushes me.”

Pool wasn’t a way of life for Rick at that point. He took time off from the game, working factory jobs to try and provide for his family.

In 1997, he started the lawn care service. At the same time, Rick jumped back into the area pool circuit. His skills never left.

The trophies piled up for Carrillo. He was going to the LaSalle-Peru to play part-time in addition to the Sauk Valley area leagues.

The next step was to see how good he was compared to the best in the U.S. and the world. For the last 9 years, he has played in both singles and team competitions in Las Vegas.

He’s gone with local legends, Jim LaFavre, Keith Helfrich, Kenny French, Jeff Hawks, Wayne Wright, and the man who got him started in the leagues, Tony Morales.

“I’ve gone out with a couple different teams and won the hard-luck division three times,” he said. “We got knocked out in the open division, but came back and won the redemption division. It’s hard enough to win one. The ones out in Vegas were pretty special because it’s international competition. Those mean the most to me.”

Carrillo has also gone to Las Vegas and done well in singles competition.

In 2008, he placed 13th out of 600 players. He says that his performance then has elevated him to another level.

“I’ve just been advancing ever since,” he said.“My confidence is there. You have to have confidence, and I do have that.”

His mindset is helping him in what has been a great 2015 thus far. Two weeks prior to competing in Las Vegas, he won a miniature Stanley Cup lookalike trophy at a tournament in LaSalle-Peru. Once he arrived in Vegas, his skills were immediately put to the test.

Rick faced off against the best from Australia. After a bad start of five consecutive wins in the Aussies’s favor, Carrillo came back as the underdog, defeating his opponent in a second match to win the Men’s Classic 9-ball singles championship.

Immediately following his 9-ball match, without a moment to soak up his win, Rick was thrown into a head-to-head match with the 8-ball champion to compete for second place. Rick placed 3rd, bringing home the bronze medal out of 66 players in the international 8-ball championships.

His two trophies from Las Vegas in 2015 have the Rock Falls native optimistic about the future.

He’s been competing part-time in Sterling this summer, as well as running down to LaSalle-Peru, Ottawa, and Streator to play with friends.

The fall season will be much busier, as he has three teams in Sterling, Rock Falls, and Dixon that he competes in. He says he does what he can to try to hold tournaments around the area taverns. However his biggest influence on the community has been his willingness to teach.

“A lot of people of people come up to me while I’m playing, and ask me how I did a certain shot,” he said. “I tell them that after I’m done, I’ll show them some things to work on. A lot of people tell me that it was a pleasure watching me play. To me that’s something else.”