Turning Stone XXIII finals: Shaw vs Shane thread

Cardigan Kid said:

9 ball, always has been and meant to be winner breaks.

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Winner breaks and bar rules pool where you have to call every little rail and ball contact both and can't play safe and all the other bar rule nonsense both started the same way. "Well I won the last game so I should get to break again." "Well a really good player should be able to call every contact and go for every shot." They both sound macho and seem to make sense on the surface when you don't give them much thought, which is how they were able to catch on, but when you examine them with some logic beyond how they sound at first impression you end up seeing that they don't actually make great sense and that another way is better. The guy that loves and is incredibly used to and stuck on winner breaks pool is often going to be about as easy to convince as the guy that loves and is used to and stuck on bar rules pool though, and for the same reasons.

You are also going to have to forgive me for not accepting “because that’s the way it’s always been” as a good reason for something. In fact it is a rather stupid reason that always stifles advancement and improvement no matter what it is you are talking about. Only the ignorant or the lazy adopt an “because that’s the way it’s always been” reasoning over an open minded critical examination using logical reasoning.

Cardigan Kid said:

Have to respect the game first before we can enjoy it.

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I get wanting to respect tradition but on the flip side I don’t think that being unwilling to make improvements in the name of “that’s just the way it has always been” is respecting the game either. A change that would allow for more accurate results in competitions, a higher percentage of exciting matches, and still keeps the packages is one that shouldn’t be dismissed simply because “that isn’t how it was done before”.

And whether winner breaks is even tradition any more would be debatable although it certainly used to be. It is still the most used format but it's use is declining, and alternate breaks has gotten pretty common these days both locally and nationally and with that in mind I’m not so sure winner breaks even rises to the level of tradition any more, not that tradition is a good reason for doing things that don't make the best sense anyway.

PoppaSaun said:

Well, Jaden doesn't think we are being logical.

Thus I will counter that in every other sport, the team that scores relinquishes the scoring opportunity to the team which failed to defend.

Thus logically, playa and jaden should be arguing for loser-break format.

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Actually you are using bad logic yet again. They are just alternating the offensive opportunities so both sides get about an equal opportunity to compete. To see it more clearly, try to think of the sports and games similar to 9 ball where each side participates back and forth, even in the same games, but never with the opponenst making shots/moves/etc at the exact same time. One pocket and chess are a couple that have been previously mentioned, and as you can see they alternate based on who last started with offensive possession. They do that to even out the advantage that starting the game with offensive possession causes which in turn can deprive one side the equal opportunity to compete. They don't alternate based on who scored last because it wouldn't accomplish that important goal.

If you analyze it carefully you will find that each sport has intentionally put rules in place that allow both sides about the equal opportunity to compete and score, but they are all forced to go about it in different ways due to the differences and intricacies of formats and rules involved in each sport. Their goal is never simply to have the scoring team always get the next possession or the non scoring team to always get next possession, although depending on the sport that may in fact be what they have to do to ensure that each team has about an equal opportunity for offensive possessions, whereas in other sports the differences in format and rules will require something a bit different to accomplish the same goal.

Cardigan Kid said:

Pool to football was kinda silly.

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You would only think it was silly if you aren’t capable of understanding the point being made which is that a format that doesn’t allow both sides about an equal opportunity to compete doesn't make much sense in a competition to see who is better--which is the main reason no other sport has a format that would allow that. I used football to illustrate that point by having you imagine another sport (in this case football) using the same type format as pool where whoever scores gets to retain offensive possession which may not allow the opponent a chance to compete much or even at all. Obviously you wouldn’t like that at all in football or any other sport because one team can be kept from competing and might lose the game without having had the ball much or even at all, yet you blindly accept that exact same silliness without a second thought in pool simply because you have the “that’s the way it’s always been and that's what I'm used to” bias blinding you.