I ticked the "other" box because for the last 20 years, I've been playing with a birdseye pro taper shaft Jerry Franklin made for my Southwest, original ring work of course - he was a bit taken aback when I showed up at his shop the day after I bought the cue and told him I don't like the taper of his original straight grain shafts. Now, after all these years, I've had one of the latter re-tapered (got it back two days ago), copying the taper of a Tascarella shaft I sent in along with it. Again, Laurie Franklin was a bit surprised, and now in all fairness I must say it doesn't play quite like the Tasc shaft, but the improvement, to me, is very significant indeed (whippier, but the deflection behaviour is more gradually consistent/less erratic from slow to maximum speed when I use a lot of side spin - which on the more slippery modern cloths is more important even than it used to be on the woolier cloths 20 years ago). Plus I still get that wonderful hit and feel of a Southwest.
As to LD shafts, I have a very simple theory on the subject: pros use them a) because of sponsorship, b) because they play on slippery new cloth more often than the average amateur, and c) because LD shafts are more forgiving when it comes to minor mishits attempting to shoot center ball (no side spin intended), i.e. the make percentage goes up, and one learns to live with minor positional errors (which, playing on new cloth, one will have to get used anyhow). Moral: pros aren't ever "off aim", but even their muscles twitch once in a while when the pressure is on. The deflection one gets shooting with side spin is irrelevant to anyone practicing and competing with such regularity - it'll take some adjustment no matter how much or little a cue deflects (and all cues deflect - best to pick one that does so in a consistent manner, i.e. gradually),
Greetings from Switzerland, David.
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„J'ai gâché vingt ans de mes plus belles années au billard. Si c'était à refaire, je recommencerais.“ – Roger Conti
