Pool -- More Like Basketball Than Golf

lfigueroa

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Longer than I can remember, folks have made analogies comparing pool shooting to golf, or even shooting a rifle.

But more and more, my personal experience is showing me that pool is more like basketball, in that the target is fixed and, from various locations around the court (table), if you adjust your foot and handwork just so, you get the ball to the target.

There are no systems on God's good green Simonis covered Earth that will help you. Only to the extent of what you can consistently produce and control with your body to put you in position to successfully propel the ball towards the target and control the CB AND your personal library of shots and angles and spins and speeds and swerves and squirt effects.

You see the shot, you shoot the shot. Confident in the knowledge that if you have setup correctly, you will have placed all your body parts in positions in space that will make the CB travel to the spot on the OB that will pocket it and produce the position you desire.

Lou Figueroa
 
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Patrick Johnson

Fish of the Day
Silver Member
I feel ya about stance and stroke. They become more and more important as I progress, to the point that they're the bulk of what I focus on now.

But I think systems can be helpful - I think of it as organizing the learning process.

pj
chgo
 

demartini rocks

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
i ised to play a lot of pick up basketball until my early 20's. even though pool does have the inclusion of an extra ball, i agree w/lou as there are similarities between the two.
like pool, with basketball there are slight variations with the stroke of shot, depending where on the court you are shooting from as well distance. for example my stroke for shooting foul shorts or anywhere around the key area will be more different than shooting a corner jumper. for me shooting a far away corner j - analogy for pool: executing a table length draw where object is 1 diamond away from the pocket and about a cm from the rail and the cueball is 2 diamonds away from the opposite pocket and also a cm away from the rail. both shots have to be real precise.
a stop shot in pool is like shooting a foul shot. a hanger real close to a pocket is a layup.
shots in basketball go into the hoop mostly through developed muscle memory. this type of memory we use in pool for cue ball speed control as well as getting good hits on that cue ball.
well i gave it a shot as far as the similarities goes. i've never played golf-closest is hacking away at that track ball on the golden-t arcade game years ago at a few bars.
 

BC21

https://www.playpoolbetter.com
Gold Member
Silver Member
Longer than I can remember, folks have made analogies comparing pool shooting to golf, or even shooting a rifle.

But more and more, my personal experience is showing me that pool is more like basketball, in that the target is fixed and, from various locations around the court (table), if you adjust your foot and handwork just so, you get the ball to the target.

There are no systems on God's good green Simonis covered Earth that will help you. Only to the extent of what you can consistently produce and control with your body to put you in position to successfully propel the ball towards the target and control the CB AND your personal library of shots and angles and spins and speeds and swerves and squirt effects.

You see the shot, you shoot the shot. Confident in the knowledge that if you have setup correctly, you will have placed all your body parts in positions in space that will make the CB travel to the spot on the OB that will pocket it and produce the position you desire.

Lou Figueroa

Not exactly. The "target" in pool is not fixed. Unless you are referring to the CB as the target. But when it comes to aiming (sending the CB to a predetermined location), I would consider the CB to be part of the stroke arm and cue stick, one unit like the basketball and hand/throwing arm. The target is in the distance, the rim and backboard. Not holding the ball properly would be the equivalent of not striking the CB properly or precisely.

So if the target is the distant ghostball location, or the contact point or the aim point, etc... it's not in a visually-fixed location like a basketball rim. Depending on the shot perspective (ref the OB), the "target" could be anywhere from the center of the OB to more than an inch from the outer surface of the OB. The target is always shifting (visually) from one shot to the next.

As far as the basketball throwing arm and alignment, yes that is the same as the stroke arm and the cue stick (the two elements being one unit). The ball is then attached or linked to this unit. Then we align toward a target (fixed and easily defined in basketball, varying and a bit trickier in pool) and then send the ball along the correct path to the target.

In basketball, the rim and backboard are fixed and there is no doubt where the ball needs to go. We just have to align and deliver. In pool, the target changes in accordance with shot perspective, making it not so obvious most of the time. We can align and deliver the stroke and cb perfectly, but if we are wrong about the target we send the cb to the wrong place and we miss.
 
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lfigueroa

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
I feel ya about stance and stroke. They become more and more important as I progress, to the point that they're the bulk of what I focus on now.

But I think systems can be helpful - I think of it as organizing the learning process.

pj
chgo


I think if you're wired that way, systems can be useful. But some of us ain't.

Lou Figueroa
 

lfigueroa

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
To Mr. Patrick Johnson:
I have always felt that pool cannot be compared to golf, throwing a baseball, throwing a basketball, or any other activity of that nature.
The reason is readily apparent. In pool there are TWO balls present to manipulate instead of just one baseball, basketball, golf ball, etc.
The collision of those two balls must be dead on the money or the ball doesn't go into the pocket....for whatever reason. Poor aiming, poor alignment, bad stroking, drunk at the table, scared to death, bad eyes, it can go on and on.
If all one had to do was take the pool stick and shoot the balls into the pocket one at a time without a second ball (the cue ball) being involved....hell, man I could make a thousand in a row.
I realize I am preaching to the choir here, probably. But on the other hand, I do not see how adults who've supposedly been around pool tables all their lives could even begin to compare a two ball process with a (collision of the two involved) to hitting a golf ball. That, in my thinking, is why pool is so darn difficult.
An aiming system (just pick one out) merely increases the chances of that collision of two balls being more accurate than it would be without it.
ALL pool players have a system...every single one of them. Something they've come to rely on over and over and over for years. They may not formally refer to it as a "system" but there is something there that they use.
Before I got into a particular aiming system, I had already "hit a million balls". I often wonder how many of those million balls that didn't go into the pockets would have gone into the pockets had I possessed a better way to aim.
This post will probably be ridiculed by some since I am simply a "nobody" in the world of pool.
You can just about imagine how much sleep I will lose over that.:wink:
You write some pretty good stuff here, by the way.
Stay happy.


I don't mean the analogy to be taken so literally. Of course there are two balls and a third round thing if you count the tip.

What I'm talking about is using feel, from different positions around the court (table), to sink the shot. You know where you are, you know you have the ball in your hand(s) (tip on CB), and you fire, instinctively using all your body parts to make it happen. No system, just feel.

Lou Figueroa
 

lfigueroa

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
i ised to play a lot of pick up basketball until my early 20's. even though pool does have the inclusion of an extra ball, i agree w/lou as there are similarities between the two.
like pool, with basketball there are slight variations with the stroke of shot, depending where on the court you are shooting from as well distance. for example my stroke for shooting foul shorts or anywhere around the key area will be more different than shooting a corner jumper. for me shooting a far away corner j - analogy for pool: executing a table length draw where object is 1 diamond away from the pocket and about a cm from the rail and the cueball is 2 diamonds away from the opposite pocket and also a cm away from the rail. both shots have to be real precise.
a stop shot in pool is like shooting a foul shot. a hanger real close to a pocket is a layup.
shots in basketball go into the hoop mostly through developed muscle memory. this type of memory we use in pool for cue ball speed control as well as getting good hits on that cue ball.
well i gave it a shot as far as the similarities goes. i've never played golf-closest is hacking away at that track ball on the golden-t arcade game years ago at a few bars.


I think you have a pretty good understanding of what I was trying to say.

Lou Figueroa
 

lfigueroa

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Not exactly. The "target" in pool is not fixed. Unless you are referring to the CB as the target. But when it comes to aiming (sending the CB to a predetermined location), I would consider the CB to be part of the stroke arm and cue stick, one unit like the basketball and hand/throwing arm. The target is in the distance, the rim and backboard. Not holding the ball properly would be the equivalent of not striking the CB properly or precisely.

So if the target is the distant ghostball location, or the contact point or the aim point, etc... it's not in a visually-fixed location like a basketball rim. Depending on the shot perspective (ref the OB), the "target" could be anywhere from the center of the OB to more than an inch from the outer surface of the OB. The target is always shifting (visually) from one shot to the next.

As far as the basketball throwing arm and alignment, yes that is the same as the stroke arm and the cue stick (the two elements being one unit). The ball is then attached or linked to this unit. Then we align toward a target (fixed and easily defined in basketball, varying and a bit trickier in pool) and then send the ball along the correct path to the target.

In basketball, the rim and backboard are fixed and there is no doubt where the ball needs to go. We just have to align and deliver. In pool, the target changes in accordance with shot perspective, making it not so obvious most of the time. We can align and deliver the stroke and cb perfectly, but if we are wrong about the target we send the cb to the wrong place and we miss.


The target in pool is usually fixed -- one of six pockets.

So once again, I don't mean the analogy to be taken quite so literally because of course it breaks down very quickly. Just think of the basket and the pocket being the same. Think of the court as the table. For various positions on the court you have to put the ball into the basket and you do that without a system. You use spatial relationships, knowledge of where you are on the court, the distance the ball must travel, the angle to the basket, and your muscle memory to execute. I think therein lies the similarity.

Lou Figueroa
 

Patrick Johnson

Fish of the Day
Silver Member
I think if you're wired that way, systems can be useful. But some of us ain't.

Lou Figueroa
Put me in the ain't group too - but I can imagine the benefit for others.

In fact, I think most/all of us are systematic in our aiming, whether we have a name for our system or not. The idea of "aiming metrics" is partially about this, suggesting that we probably all use consistent visual cues of one kind or another. As I say there, I think systems, named or otherwise, mostly differ in their choice of metrics (and in the case of named systems, their dance steps).

I trust your basketball comparison makes sense, like you usually do, but that's not what I'm addressing here.

pj
chgo
 

BC21

https://www.playpoolbetter.com
Gold Member
Silver Member
The target in pool is usually fixed -- one of six pockets.

So once again, I don't mean the analogy to be taken quite so literally because of course it breaks down very quickly. Just think of the basket and the pocket being the same. Think of the court as the table. For various positions on the court you have to put the ball into the basket and you do that without a system. You use spatial relationships, knowledge of where you are on the court, the distance the ball must travel, the angle to the basket, and your muscle memory to execute. I think therein lies the similarity.

Lou Figueroa

Oh yeah, in that aspect it's very similar, as is throwing a baseball to home plate or 3rd base or some other fixed location. The muscle memory and spatial skills must be programmed deep within our brains, then in real time the program runs in colaboration with the visual input we feed it. Poor programming or insufficient programming (due to lack of knowledge or ineffective practice), results in poor/inconsistent execution.

When it comes to aiming at a target, however, the pocket is not the target in pool. Seldom do we align our stroke and the CB directly toward a pocket. If we were to ignore the CB and align our stroke behind each OB, sending each straight into a pocket, then the pockets would be the targets, like throwing a baseball or basketball to a fixed location. In pool, this is a good way for a beginner to develop the basics of the stroke. Once this becomes easy and precise, it's time to incorporate the CB, and that's when the true aiming process begins. The target then becomes the location where the CB needs to be in order to send the OB to the pocket, and that becomes an entirely different skill that requires new knowledge and more muscle memory.

We can use traditional trial and error to develop this refined skill of aiming, or we can use an aiming system that narrows in on the correct aim (or very close to it) and allows us to develop the skill much faster than when using traditional learning methods. I would consider ghostball, contact point aiming, the 5-line fractional system, etc... as traditional trial and error learning methods. They all require a certain amount of visual/spatial judgement that eventually, after enough attempts, gives the player a good feel for recognizing most shots. A good aiming system can drastically reduce the time involved to reach this level of shot recognition.
 
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Ralph Kramden

BOOM!.. ZOOM!.. MOON!
Silver Member
I think pool has some similarities to golf. Rickie Fowler was just talking about the undulating greens at the Bay Hill invitational and
keeping his ball below the hole so he won't get down hill runners. To score in pool you'll need to be on the correct side of your OB.

.
 

paultex

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Lou, i disagree. The way you look at the shot relationship will influence the way you physically align to the shot.

I don't know exactly how you do it but you got to look at something and I know that has to be fact unless im mistaken.

Yes I believe it can be overridden with pure physical alignment but that would still have to be developed over time by understanding how much the eyes influence you physically and I really don't think that is a good thing or viable to be honest.

At some point, there is a correct visual that coincides to the ideal alignment and that means physically aligned truly down the shotline. Therefore, speed does not effect the ball pocketing aspect nearly or remotely as much as misalignment and a twist spin swoop type delivery, producing a severe volatility to the equation, thus fine line of make or miss.

You got to let the eyes do something and that is aiming whether it wants to be admitted or not. However, I do not agree with most conventional contact type point aiming because I believe and know it does often create a misalignment that requires warp twist to get out of the flaw. But that too has benefits for cb effect, especially when a pronounced deflection is needed for cb position after launch point.

Look people, pool or what is actually there on that table and what is reasonably possible and what it's asking for, requires alot of different methods and techniques that one system itself cannot possibly cover. Its as simple as that if one is talking in terms of pro level and higher.

I say darts is the closest thing I can think of to the jack n the box phenomenon known as pool. You can align and aim and deliver supposedly correct, BUT THERES SOMETHING ELSE and that is the mind twisting aspect of the jackn the box.

Very goo' Daniel'san buh yoo fo'geh one ting, yes yoo did the udduh 5 tings but fogot about yaw this time. The udduh time yoo fogot about pitch, the udduh time you did not contro your speed etc etc etc.....Daniel'san yoo joke too much, yoo no concentrate enuff, toh'noment just around deh'corner.
 

lfigueroa

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Put me in the ain't group too - but I can imagine the benefit for others.

In fact, I think most/all of us are systematic in our aiming, whether we have a name for our system or not. The idea of "aiming metrics" is partially about this, suggesting that we probably all use consistent visual cues of one kind or another. As I say there, I think systems, named or otherwise, mostly differ in their choice of metrics (and in the case of named systems, their dance steps).

I trust your basketball comparison makes sense, like you usually do, but that's not what I'm addressing here.

pj
chgo


Pat, my system, such as it is, is about looking at the shot and then getting into shooting position in a consistent, systematic way so that I execute the shot successfully.

Dare I say it: there’s no aiming, just execution.

Lou Figueroa
 

lfigueroa

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Lou, i disagree. The way you look at the shot relationship will influence the way you physically align to the shot.

I don't know exactly how you do it but you got to look at something and I know that has to be fact unless im mistaken.

Yes I believe it can be overridden with pure physical alignment but that would still have to be developed over time by understanding how much the eyes influence you physically and I really don't think that is a good thing or viable to be honest.

At some point, there is a correct visual that coincides to the ideal alignment and that means physically aligned truly down the shotline. Therefore, speed does not effect the ball pocketing aspect nearly or remotely as much as misalignment and a twist spin swoop type delivery, producing a severe volatility to the equation, thus fine line of make or miss.

You got to let the eyes do something and that is aiming whether it wants to be admitted or not. However, I do not agree with most conventional contact type point aiming because I believe and know it does often create a misalignment that requires warp twist to get out of the flaw. But that too has benefits for cb effect, especially when a pronounced deflection is needed for cb position after launch point.

Look people, pool or what is actually there on that table and what is reasonably possible and what it's asking for, requires alot of different methods and techniques that one system itself cannot possibly cover. Its as simple as that if one is talking in terms of pro level and higher.

I say darts is the closest thing I can think of to the jack n the box phenomenon known as pool. You can align and aim and deliver supposedly correct, BUT THERES SOMETHING ELSE and that is the mind twisting aspect of the jackn the box.

Very goo' Daniel'san buh yoo fo'geh one ting, yes yoo did the udduh 5 tings but fogot about yaw this time. The udduh time yoo fogot about pitch, the udduh time you did not contro your speed etc etc etc.....Daniel'san yoo joke too much, yoo no concentrate enuff, toh'noment just around deh'corner.


I’m looking at the shot before I get into shooting position and once down ready to pull the trigger.

I see the whole shot — cue tip, cue ball, object ball, rails, pocket (sometimes).

It’s more like looking at a screen than particular spots on a ball.

Lou Figueroa
 

Patrick Johnson

Fish of the Day
Silver Member
Pat, my system, such as it is, is about looking at the shot and then getting into shooting position in a consistent, systematic way so that I execute the shot successfully.

Dare I say it: there’s no aiming, just execution.

Lou Figueroa
Me too... some days. :)

pj
chgo
 

BilliardsAbout

BondFanEvents.com
Silver Member
In rifle shooting my front sights are crisp in my vision, and the distant target blurry. The opposite is true for pool players who look at the ob and not the cb during the stroke.

Respectfully, Lou, there are numerous systems that help the player--including standing appropriately to the shot as you yourself suggested. Correct stance for the shot at hand is a "system", too.
 

lfigueroa

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
In rifle shooting my front sights are crisp in my vision, and the distant target blurry. The opposite is true for pool players who look at the ob and not the cb during the stroke.

Respectfully, Lou, there are numerous systems that help the player--including standing appropriately to the shot as you yourself suggested. Correct stance for the shot at hand is a "system", too.


Absolutely. I'm certainly not saying that what I do and how I do it is for everybody. (But I suspect that a lot of guys are doing the same.)

And the bit about the opening stance being a system -- that is particularly true.

Lou Figueroa
 
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