Here's my racking cheat story, which I may have shared before.
I was an area referee at the 2016 US Open Nine Ball in Norfolk. I was in charge of six tables and we were told to approach a table only when asked.
The format was rack your own nine ball with a template with the nine on the spot to avoid automatic wing balls. The players were told that pattern racking was forbidden.
I was waiting for calls sitting near a table with two good US players. "Slick" was in the top five and "Homer" might have been in the top 30.
When Homer was racking for himself, he was very clearly pattern racking -- slowly picking and placing each ball. Slick said nothing. Homer wasn't making a ball very often because of the nine on the spot, and the one ball shot on the break was not known yet.
Slick did not pattern rack, or if he did, it looked like he just threw the balls up there. He did, however, use a technique that had been around for a few years and was known to players who paid attention. At the end of racking, when players usually made sure the balls were all tight with little nudges on the balls, Slick moved the back ball very slightly away from one of the balls in the next to last row.
I had seen the technique used before in a tournament with great success, so I knew what to look for, but Homer was in the dark. That tiny movement made the wing ball dead again, and Slick make it most if not all of his breaks.
I said nothing, since I was told to stay away unless asked.
On another table in my area in the same round, Ralf Souquet was playing "Sly". Sly did the gap trick and made the wing ball. Ralf approached him after the second gap trick and quietly told him not to do that any more and he stopped.
