Cue sports (sometimes written cuesports), also known as billiard sports, are a wide variety of games of skill generally played with a cue stick which is used to strike billiard balls, moving them around a cloth-covered billiards table bounded by rubber cushions.

Historically, the umbrella term was billiards. While that familiar name is still employed by some as a generic label for all such games, the word's usage has splintered into more exclusive competing meanings in various parts of the world. For example, in British and Australian English, "billiards" usually refers exclusively to the game of English billiards, while in American and Canadian English it is sometimes used to refer to a particular game or class of games, or to all cue games in general, depending upon dialect and context.

There are three major subdivisions of games within cue sports:

More obscurely, there are games that make use of obstacles and targets, and table-top games played with disks instead of balls.

Billiards has a long and rich history stretching from its inception in the 15th century, to the wrapping of the body of Mary, Queen of Scots, in her billiard table cover in 1586, through its many mentions in the works of Shakespeare, including the famous line "let's to billiards" in Antony and Cleopatra (1606–07), and through the many famous enthusiasts of the sport: Mozart, Louis XIV of France, Marie Antoinette, Immanuel Kant, Napoleon, Abraham Lincoln, Mark Twain, George Washington, French president Jules Grévy, Charles Dickens, George Armstrong Custer, Theodore Roosevelt, Lewis Carroll, W.C. Fields, Babe Ruth, Bob Hope, Jackie Gleason, and many others.

Joseph James "Joe" Rogan (born August 11, 1967) is an American martial artist, stand-up comedian, actor, writer and color commentator. He is best known for playing Joe Garrelli on the NBC sitcom NewsRadio, commentating for the Ultimate Fighting Championship, hosting the NBC reality show Fear Factor and The Joe Rogan Experience podcast.

Rogan was born in Newark, New Jersey. His paternal grandfather was Irish and the remainder of his ancestry is Italian.

In 1981, at age fourteen, he became a practitioner of Kenpo Karate before transitioning to Taekwondo. He eventually gained a 2nd dan black belt. A four-time state champion in Massachusetts, in 1987 he was the USA Taekwondo U.S. Open Champion. In 1996, he began training in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu under Jean Jacques Machado, eventually earning his brown belt. In addition, he holds a brown belt in 10th Planet Jiu-Jitsu under Eddie Bravo.

He also practiced and competed in kickboxing.

In 1994, he co-starred on the Fox comedy Hardball as Frank Valente, the young, ego-centric star player on a fictional professional baseball team. From 1995 to 1999, he co-starred on the comedy NewsRadio. He portrayed Joe Garrelli, the electrician at WNYX, a news radio station in New York City. In 2002, he appeared on the episode "A Beautiful Mind" of Just Shoot Me as Chris, Maya Gallo's boyfriend. In 2011, Rogan played his first major character in a movie in the Kevin James movie Zookeeper. He is slated to play himself in an upcoming action-comedy starring Kevin James called Here Comes the Boom, set to be released in the summer of 2012.

John Parrott MBE (born 11 May 1964 in Liverpool, England) is an English professional snooker player and television personality.

Parrott won the World Snooker Championship in 1991, defeating Jimmy White in the final. Two years earlier he had lost 3–18 to Steve Davis, the heaviest final defeat in modern times. He repeated his win over White to add the UK Championship title later that year, and is one of only five players to win both championships in the same calendar year. He spent three successive seasons at number 2 in the world rankings, and having compiled 221 centuries is one of several players to have compiled more than 200 competitive centuries during his career.

Until the age of 12 Parrott was a keen bowls player but then discovered snooker and has been a keen player ever since. At the age of 15 his talent was spotted by Phil Miller who would become his long-term manager in 1980. Parrott was successful at an early age. He lost in the final of the English Under-16s Championship in 1980 and won the Pontins Junior Championship in 1981. He was Pontins Open Champion in 1982, Junior Pot Black champion in 1982 and 1983, and turned professional the following year after winning a record 14 tournaments in his last year as an amateur player.