WHILE there are, admittedly, figures more deserving of sympathy than unemployed pool players, the demise of the hustler is an occasion to be mourned. As recently as 10 years ago, it was possible for a pool player to earn a living hustling, provided he was armed with the requisite chops and disposition. Plenty of “roadmen” made plenty of money with scores at Chelsea Billiards in Manhattan or Mikey’s 24/7 in Oklahoma City or the Sports Palace in Columbia, S.C. Odds were good that there was at least one unsuspecting local in the joint with an inflated impression of his talent for pocketing balls, and thus a willingness to throw down “big timber” against the out-of-towner.

Today, pool hustlers have joined American heavyweight boxing champs, complete-game pitchers, hockey goons and drug-free cyclists as relics in sports. Endearing bit players in the cast of American culture, hustlers have been written out of future episodes. “It used to be that you had to turn down action; then you had to look hard for action; and now there’s no action,” Bucky Bell, a Cincinnati-based pool wizard, lamented to me. “A lot of guys who play real good pool are having to look for real jobs.”

The pool hustler wasn’t murdered by any single suspect, but the last man holding the knife was Kevin Trudeau, the bestselling author of the “Natural Cures” series who once served a prison term for felony larceny. Mr. Trudeau out-hustled the hustlers — and killed off a national archetype in the process.

But even before Mr. Trudeau, hustling was on its deathbed. The Internet didn’t help. Time was, a player would score big in, say, Cheyenne, Wyo., and by the time word got out over the pool transom, the hustler was already in Lexington, Ky., or Laredo, Tex. But then came the popular online forum AZBilliards.com. Suddenly a player would score big and his exploits would be publicized by sunrise.