On paper, pushing when you have a clean look at the 1 is bad, and you never have an advantage. But based on AtLarge's break stats, the pusher has an edge.
I think that edge is real... but it's a psychological one, not something we can diagram.
Basically, it's using a young champion's ego against him. Shane wants to show Johnny that pushing into a clean look at the 1 is a mistake and Shane will punish it. If Johnny is hoping Shane takes it but screws up (maybe due to distance), Shane wants to prove he can execute. If Johnny is hoping to get it back because he sees a shot Shane overlooked... Shane wants to prove he's clever enough to spot the trap, and turn it around.
Occasionally a clean look just isn't enough to guarantee a good outcome, and Johnny was hoping that Shane wouldn't recognize that this is one of those times.
Plenty of room to debate whether that's true. The way I see it, you have 4 options -
- send the cue ball and 1 to opposite long rails. This is no good because a short bank (as opposed to a full table one) is a sellout for either of these guys. They both bank well. And there's no blocker really except the 8 ball, which is too difficult to count on.
- the diagrammed solution, banking it straight down the table. This is risky. Imagine the cue ball a little to the left or right of the diagrammed position, where the 8 doesn't block it. It's a long thin cut but it's very makeable, the one's only a diamond-ish from the pocket. There's also the risk of a slight undercut (bump the 7) or a slight overcut (park the 1 right in front of the hole).
- bank the 1 towards the right side intentionally. If you send it towards the corner that's a plain sellout. Towards the 4-7 cluster might work out? But unpredictable. I can see it turning into a 1 hanging in front of the side, a 1-4 combo, a 1-4 carom, etc.
- bank the 1 towards the left side. We already know what can go wrong here.
So, tentatively I can see why Johnny felt that even with 9 balls on the table, all of his options were bad and it would be better if someone else where shooting.