This is what I thought. But actually what I observed is that using a straight stroke at the miscue limit it's very difficult to get the same amount of spin as when I start with center ball and swipe across the cue ball. Swiping produced more spin than stroking straight.
But what happens as you approach the miscue limit? Will the straight stroke then begin falling short of producing the same spin as the swooping stroke? If the maximum coefficient of friction is essentially constant regardless of the type of stroke, then the answer is no. In other words, with the swooping stroke, you'll start miscuing before reaching the miscue limit of the straight stroke.
I didn't find that I miscued using the swooping stroke unless I started to the right of center when trying to apply right spin.
So, as I see it, you want to try to maximize the spin/speed ratio with a straight stroke by getting out there right at the miscue limit, then see if you can beat that with an added swoop. (Or, alternately, first maximize the spin/speed ratio with a swooping stroke, then try to beat that with a straight one.)
I don't think it's possible to swoop and hit the ball without miscuing when the cue tip is already addressing the cue ball at or near the miscue limit.
The cueball loses sidepin rather slowly and retains it well after natural roll sets in (unless it has only a sliver of sidespin to begin with). Rolling doesn't mean the sidespin is gone by any means.
I am either misunderstanding you or disagreeing with you. From what I have seen the cue ball hit with side spin will slide down the table until a certain point at which the side spin lessens considerably and the cue ball is rolling forward. This is essentially one of the major skills in pool that few people master, which is the ability to accurately judge how hard to hit the ball so that the side spin is still effective when the cue ball reaches the target.
I would like to see a video of a natural rolling cue ball with significant side spin. I confess that I am somewhat out of my depth trying to converse about this aspect. Which again is why I chose a task with a starting point and and end point where I could try to hit the ball every way I can and see which methods achieve the goal.
The reason for making sure the ball is rolling in both cases (swoop versus straight stroke), is that its forward speed is pretty much "settled in" at that point. That is, the cueball loses forward speed at much slower pace when rolling. Thus, the spin/speed ratio doesn't change much over a short distance. (If the cueball is at one end of the table, it should be rolling by the time it reaches the other end, except for very fast shots approaching break speed.)
Again the task-based approach pretty much determines what the cue ball will be doing when it hits the end rail. In other words I believe that it is ONLY possible to hit it a few ways and still complete the task. You can play around with spin/speed all you want but at the end I think you will find that there are only a few ways to get there and of those few only one that is really accurate.
Ultimately, we're trying to compare spin/speed ratios produced with both types of stroke. That's what determines the angle it'll take off the cushion. As a bonus, if we compare shots of similar speed then, we're also comparing the amount of absolute spin (i.e., revs per second).
I don't really know how to judge speed accurately without a radar gun. As noted above though higher speeds don't complete the task so there is a definite threshhold where the speed is simply to high for the cue ball to hit the side rail in the designated zone no matter how you hit it. (masse' shots excepted of course) In this test you can't really use distance of travel as a way to judge speed because of the variables in hitting two rails with maximum spin. Well, I guess it's possible to map out the distance traveled with any shot and get an idea of the speed but I think it's sort of irrelevant. I am going to go out on a limb and say that I believe that with most shots requiring a combination of speed/spin to get the cue to X position there are two and maybe three ways to do it using a fairly level cue. I would say three is pushing it.
Hope that clarifies some of the motives behind my 'criteria.'
Jim
Honestly I don't quite understand because I am certainly not a mathematician nor a physicist.
But for the sake of "science" I will do the test and let you analyze it
