tap tap tap, well said.
Which game is harder: pool or golf?
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tap tap tap, well said.
I've spent time golfing with you.
I've spent time at the pool table with you.
You are MUCH better than me at both games, and ... you wear pink shirts.
:banghead:
Wait a second ... I can TYPE!
:lol:
Well, you're ESSENTIALLY right, but pool players tote their break and jump cues. But if you feel that a few extra cues would help you do a few extra things, then by all means go ahead and use 'em. No one is stopping you.
Golf is harder to play because you don't have 16 year old golfers beating seasoned pros like you do in pool. The entry level in pool is very low.
That can be attributed to the games that are played in pool. For the sake of "fan excitement" , tv, and trying to get pool into the sport mainstream(which has never worked as we all know), the pool industry decided to embrace a terribly easy game called 9BALL, and by doing so allowed youngsters on a good day, to beat legit pros or at least give them a scare. The only other game like this is poker.
That can be attributed to the games that are played in pool. For the sake of "fan excitement" , tv, and trying to get pool into the sport mainstream(which has never worked as we all know), the pool industry decided to embrace a terribly easy game called 9BALL, and by doing so allowed youngsters on a good day, to beat legit pros or at least give them a scare. The only other game like this is poker.
No,,,that pool is harder to make money at is a no-brainer. Which game is harder to play is a better question.
I am a student of both games - having played pool for over 23 years and golf for about 2 years.
But the answer is: Golf, most definately the more difficult sport.
Pool, you move fewer body parts to complete your shot
Pool, a fixed playing surface, regardless of the minor variations in temperature, humidity or even equipment, you're pretty much playing with the same type of equipment in pretty similar conditions.
Pool, you use at most 4 different "clubs" 1. Break Cue 2. Playing Cue. 3. Jump Cue 4. Bridge
Pool & Golf - equal in the mental discipline it takes to be a top competitor -any competitive sport requires a high level of concentration, talent, work ethic and mastery of one's own emotions.
Golf, hundreds of muscles involved in one swing - and to learn to control each and every muscle is the most frustrating yet compelling process I've ever encountered.
Golf, use up to 14 different clubs and with each club the variation in the swing component is unparalleled - Take the Pitching Wedge - for a little flop shot you're going to use a different swing then if you are hitting a 90 yard slice. Or take a 9 iron into a long bunker shot and hit it versus a 9 iron from 120 out. (O.K so it takes me a 7 iron to hit 120 but hey, I never said I was good!) let's not forgot the putt. Many equate putting with pool, and to a certain degree that's a fair comparison, but golf is much harder - Remember Tiger Woods's shot at the Tour Championships several years back where he aimed 15 feet to his right, nearly perpendicular to the hole that was a long ways away, and after his hit, everyone watched as the ball made it's way on the green and took a nice 90 degree turn to the left, down the slope, nuttin' but net. That doesn't happen in pool
Golf, the course variations are endless and of course you're outdoors so the conditions can range from foggy, cold & rainy (ever been out at first tee time?) to hot, dry, windy (try Las Vegas in July with 30mph winds howling at you trying to hit an 8 iron into that headwind!).
I love pool, I adore pool, I've lived, breathed, eaten, slept pool for nearly 24 years (god I'm getting old!) - if I didn't I would be working where I work
But golf, now golf is endlessly fascinating because it's never the same game twice, heck it's sometimes never the same front & back 9 twice! It calls you back time & time again - "Anne, remember that beautiful 60 foot put you made, downhill, aiming 2 foot left of the hole and you made it? Come try that again!" or.. "Anne, remember that awesome 8 iron you hit and landed 1.5 foot from the hole for a rare but oh-so-satisfying birdie? Come do that again!"
My name is Anne Craig - and I'm a golf addict!
I have always contended that The Table is my opposition but I can
never seem to get that point across to most other players.
Can't answer it better than this. You need to be rich or at least semi-rich to become great at golf. I don't know if you can say that golf is harder than pool, but you can say that professionally, golf is more competitive. If you look at all the pros, they play more hours than the average pool pro and they also have coaches that continually adjust their swings. Also, to become a golf pro, you pretty much have to pick up a club by the age of 10. For pool, there are many pros who started in their late teens and competed professionally.
Given 6 months of training from zero experience most people would be better pool players than golfers. So pool is definitely easier to become proficient at.
As for reaching the pro level, in either sport it takes countless hours of practice and grooving swings/strokes. At this level, I'm not sure it is fair to say whether golfers or pool players are more talented since they have each mastered their trade.
But my vote is for golf.
Another interesting thing, in my own experience, is that it takes me a lot longer to get my golf swing back if I haven't played for a while than it does my pool stroke. However, that may be because I'm a better golfer than a pool player so I have a much higher standard for my golf swing...and I've been playing golf for about 12 years and pool for about 1 year...
As for reaching the pro level, in either sport it takes countless hours of practice and grooving swings/strokes. At this level, I'm not sure it is fair to say whether golfers or pool players are more talented since they have each mastered their trade.
But my vote is for golf.
Another interesting thing, in my own experience, is that it takes me a lot longer to get my golf swing back if I haven't played for a while than it does my pool stroke. However, that may be because I'm a better golfer than a pool player so I have a much higher standard for my golf swing...and I've been playing golf for about 12 years and pool for about 1 year...
theyre both hard in their own ways. Golf has more conditions to fight with, but pool is the only sport that you can lose without ever getting to shoot. Golf might have a slight edge but to me its a toss up.
It's impossible to compare the two as they both have their own challenges. You can't consider factors such as cost of play and ability to make a living at it because these have nothing to do with the actual challenge of the game.
I would say the average shot in pool is certainly easier to execute than the average shot in Golf. So for a beginner I think they would find golf to be more challenging in this respect, then add to it the frusteration of losing balls in the forest/water, not being able to get the ball air born or even hit it at all. But it should also be considered that even if the ball keeps bouncing along the ground every shot, you are still advancing the ball.
In short the initial frusteration factor in golf is definitely higher than pool. Furthermore when you use 8 ball and 9 ball as your basis of comparison, pool once more seems much easier. I have known many B level amateurs that have managed a pro level performance 9 ball and 8 ball. But how many golfers of an equivalent skill level have managed a score of 3 or 4 under par?
But how would we compare the difficulty of reaching a 100 ball standard in 14.1 or a century break standard in snooker to achieving a plus handicap in golf? Snooker requires tremendous amount of precision, control and break building knowledge. 14.1 requires the aforementioned skills and a lot of concentration as a run of over 100 balls usually takes about 30 minutes to complete.
Finally what about the challenge of competing against top level players in their respective games? Any given mistake in pool can be disasterous, whereas a bad shot in golf is usually recoverable. A player doesn't finish last in a PGA tournament because he bogeyed a hole it's build up of mistakes over two days. But a pool player can lose his first match because he missed the one ball. There is the saying in golf, three bad shots and one good one still make par.
My conclusion, they are incomparable or at the very least equally challenging in they're own respect.
I would say the average shot in pool is certainly easier to execute than the average shot in Golf. So for a beginner I think they would find golf to be more challenging in this respect, then add to it the frusteration of losing balls in the forest/water, not being able to get the ball air born or even hit it at all. But it should also be considered that even if the ball keeps bouncing along the ground every shot, you are still advancing the ball.
In short the initial frusteration factor in golf is definitely higher than pool. Furthermore when you use 8 ball and 9 ball as your basis of comparison, pool once more seems much easier. I have known many B level amateurs that have managed a pro level performance 9 ball and 8 ball. But how many golfers of an equivalent skill level have managed a score of 3 or 4 under par?
But how would we compare the difficulty of reaching a 100 ball standard in 14.1 or a century break standard in snooker to achieving a plus handicap in golf? Snooker requires tremendous amount of precision, control and break building knowledge. 14.1 requires the aforementioned skills and a lot of concentration as a run of over 100 balls usually takes about 30 minutes to complete.
Finally what about the challenge of competing against top level players in their respective games? Any given mistake in pool can be disasterous, whereas a bad shot in golf is usually recoverable. A player doesn't finish last in a PGA tournament because he bogeyed a hole it's build up of mistakes over two days. But a pool player can lose his first match because he missed the one ball. There is the saying in golf, three bad shots and one good one still make par.
My conclusion, they are incomparable or at the very least equally challenging in they're own respect.
Yes but does he lose because the shot was beyond his ability or because the simplicity of the game allows an incoming player the possibility of the win almost anytime he's get's to the table.
Even the Pros agree that in pool (8ball/9ball) , anything less than a race in the double digits is little more than a coin toss because of how often it's so relatively simple to get out.
Depends on the player as well as the game being played. But I was refering to matches, not single games.
I was to all intents and purposes a cue sports pro via english 8 ball nearly 30 years ago (before there was any formal pro body). Then after a 20+ years complete break from playing any pool at all and from snooker which I played a little, I restarted playing US style pool a few years ago and was able to take frames off Ronnie Alcano (4-9) and Jianbo Fu (5-9) in 8 ball events in Asia after less than 200 frames experience/practice after restarting to play....not suggesting in any way whatsoever that I could actually beat them. Rarely play and don't consider myself to have any particular ability at pool now but won't make a complete fool of myself in most company on either style of table.
I took up golf at 46 and am now 56. My handicap is 1 from a Championship course. I have played as an amateur qualifier in two European Seniors PGA tour events, but retained amateur status by signing waivers (just as well, as would have won about the price of a Starbucks coffee I finished so low!). I doubt that I could beat any regular Tour Player (ie not Seniors Tour) ranked in the world top 5,000 over 36 holes or more unless he had a heart attack half way round lol....but can certainly occasionally beat Club teaching pros in regional Opens.
I have never had any tuition at either sport. I mention all of this not to boast or be clever but merely to give a background to the circumstances in which I'm passing an opinion now.
The two games do present very different challenges so I would never want to get too deep into any arguments about it, but speaking very generally I personally believe that there is no contest as regards which sport is more difficult to become proficient at from a consistently correct execution of shots point of view..........golf by a country mile, not even close.
I also agree with the things John Schmidt said earlier in the thread and his opinion on this subject is good enough for me.
I took up golf at 46 and am now 56. My handicap is 1 from a Championship course. I have played as an amateur qualifier in two European Seniors PGA tour events, but retained amateur status by signing waivers (just as well, as would have won about the price of a Starbucks coffee I finished so low!). I doubt that I could beat any regular Tour Player (ie not Seniors Tour) ranked in the world top 5,000 over 36 holes or more unless he had a heart attack half way round lol....but can certainly occasionally beat Club teaching pros in regional Opens.
I have never had any tuition at either sport. I mention all of this not to boast or be clever but merely to give a background to the circumstances in which I'm passing an opinion now.
The two games do present very different challenges so I would never want to get too deep into any arguments about it, but speaking very generally I personally believe that there is no contest as regards which sport is more difficult to become proficient at from a consistently correct execution of shots point of view..........golf by a country mile, not even close.
I also agree with the things John Schmidt said earlier in the thread and his opinion on this subject is good enough for me.
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Big Perm you must be one hell of a golfer.I would pay to see you shoot in the 80's with 3 clubs(no putter or driver) :grinning-moose:
Ooh... Challenge!!!
Can we get this on TAR?
Big Perm you must be one hell of a golfer.
How difficult this might be for Big Perm won't just depend on his ability, it will depend a lot upon the difficulty/length of the course.
As it happens for a bit of a change 14 of our club amateurs ranging from handicap +2 to -3 plus 2 of our club teaching pros (one Canadian one a Brit) held a money in the pot stroke play tournament a month ago in whch we were allowed to carry any 3 clubs we wanted but no putter allowed.
To give some perspective we played off the Championship tips at our club which is an annual European PGA Tour event venue. With recent extensions it is par 72 measuring about 7,520 yards off those tees and has a standard scratch score of 76 off those tees. The rough wasn't very long at the time but the greens were quick at about 11.5 on the stimp so without a putter they were very tricky. There are lots of water hazards. There was a stiffish breeze.
The best score on the day was 88 which is a great score. The two pros finished 4th and 6th. I took a 19 degree rescue, a 6 iron and a 52 degree wedge and shot 94, playing well but having difficulty putting with the rescue. I play off 1 handicap. I reckon that on a short pay and play type public course of about 6,000 yards or less the scores might have been on average in the range of about 10%-15% lower.
However to remind us all what true golfing genius is and how pathetic all us low handicap amateurs really are.......Sevvy Ballesteros once went round The West Course at Wentworth in Surrey England (current venue of The European PGA Tour Championship and former venue of The World Match Play Championship) in an exhibition match in 1982 using only a 5 iron and a putter and shot 76 !!!!
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That brings up another interesting point. People don't realize this but the difference between a scratch golfer and a PGA touring professional is light years. I wonder if the same thing is true for pool. I don't think the difference is quite so huge in pool between a professional and say, a shortstop.