WPBL (Bonus Ball) - Pocket Cut

Bob Dixon said:
I think people are hitting fast shots, down the rail and otherwise, and not realizing that the OB is touching the rail/point just before the pocket. Or they realize it and think it should go in anyway.

On a Diamond, per RKCs example of lining up several frozen balls on the rail and shooting it hard, there is nothing wrong with the pocket if the ball goes in. It doesn't "jaw" when it's accurate.

If weaker players are having trouble with accuracy then they should just reduce their ball speed, not change everyone else's playing conditions to adjust to them.
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Actually, the argument is that speed shouldn't be as big a factor in determining how much accuracy a shot needs. Hitting the ball hard with draw or spin is generally MORE difficult than rolling a ball at the pocket. There is no good reason why a ball hit at speed should require more accuracy than a ball rolled at the pocket when it is in fact harder to do so in the first place. Both hard and soft shots should have similar margins for error just like they do when you are shooting at the pocket from out in the middle of the table.


JumpinJoe said:
This type of pocket could NEVER be used for one pocket. Some people to have been around pool along time, or seen most things amaze me at how silly they are. These are buckets, valleys.
If you think these are super tight, then a "B" player like myself should get action to play like the 7 ball ghost.
Anyone want that action? I'll play it on this table if allowed come July during the BCA. And if I get lucky and win, I'll give you a shot for the same bet playin the 9 ball ghost right after.
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How tight were the tables you played on? 4 1/4" pockets at this cut angle are indeed buckets. Probably comparable to your standard Diamond pro cut in terms of difficulty. 3 7/8" on the other hand is a completely different animal.
 
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perfectpocketz said:
Maybe I can help you better understand as to what I mean when I say shooting balls down the rail should be harder.....for one the point of aim going down the rail is the smallest target....you agree with that?

Now if that's the smallest target on the table...why should if accept the balls easier?
I'm not here to prove anyone wrong.....I know exactly what I'm saying and I'm 100% right.
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Hmmm - One of the largest targets on the table, i.e., one of the largest margins of error, exists on a slow-medium speed shot from close to the rail into the corner pocket. It has about as large a margin of error - due to the rails - as a straight-in shot into the same pocket from the same distance.
 
I think it's better to concentrate on how a pocket should behave rather than on how that behavior is achieved (such as with soft facings or undercut). The following is mostly about corner pockets.

One way for a pocket to behave: Whether the ball goes in is nearly independent of the speed of the shot. Also, the effective size of the pocket should not depend much on the angle of approach. The pocket should never have "holes" in the middle of it.

The last point needs some explanation. Some pockets have hard facings that come out even with the nose of the cushion or even stick out a little farther. A ball shot almost along the cushion that touches the cushion just before the pocket also hits this stuck-out facing and is deflected enough to miss. If the ball is shot worse and hits the cushion farther from the pocket, it misses the point and goes into the pocket. This means that from the ball's point of view prior to the shot there is a range of angles over which it will go into the pocket but within that range there is a smaller range of angles where the ball will miss. Of course if a table is put together well, this problem should not occur.

Another way for pockets to behave is as they do now: The effective width of the pocket changes by up to a factor of two for changes in the speed of the shot depending on the angle of approach.

My personal preference is for the first kind of behavior. Most people are used to the second and think it's "normal" or even "good", but I think that's just because they have never seen anything different.

Many years ago Meucci teamed up with a pool table company from Italy. This was roughly around 1997. I think the intent was to provide branded equipment for the pro tour. Anyway, the table maker had no idea of how the US made pockets and produced a table with parallel facings and either very soft facings or just plain rail rubber. In any case, although the pockets looked small, they played easy relative to the usual US design. I suspect that they were actually close to Type I behavior above but I didn't get a chance to test them. They were told to go back to the drawing board and make US pockets.

In the last couple of issues of Billiards Digest I reported on measurements of pocket size with varying approach angles and speed. One result that was surprising to me was that "get-in english" does have an effect on the size of the pocket.
 
Bob Dixon said:
The only way you can do that is by making the table easier. In fact, it's pretty much a definition of making the table easier.
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No. Being able to hit the rail going in at soft speeds makes the table easier. You can't do that on these pockets. Hard shots rattle more on Diamonds because there is a chance you grazed the point, or you hit the facing slightly too far out, or you put the wrong spin in the ball. That doesn't mean the table is more difficult in terms of accuracy, it just means that the table is more difficult in arbitrary conditions that aren't favorable to the ball going in. That is not a desirable characteristic for a table.


Bob Dixon said:
This just means you want to be able to shoot hard with less accuracy and still make the ball. Why not try to shoot hard WITH accuracy? Is that a crime?
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No, I want to be able to shoot balls both hard and soft and have similar margins for error for both shots. Another way to look at it is that Diamonds make soft shots TOO EASY. Ernesto-style pockets make both hard and soft shots difficult.
 
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Glen, doesn't a diamond work on the same principle, (small target, big hallway)? Which is what sets it apart from gold crowns? If you think that dumbs it down, why not design diamonds with less parallel facings so the pockets stop accepting balls that made it to the hallway?

Anyone else get the feeling there was a 100% chance glen would have something bad to say about these tables, since BB had some deal with diamond tables that fell through?
 
BRussell said:
Hmmm - One of the largest targets on the table, i.e., one of the largest margins of error, exists on a slow-medium speed shot from close to the rail into the corner pocket. It has about as large a margin of error - due to the rails - as a straight-in shot into the same pocket from the same distance.
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I agree with that on a slow moving ball close to the rail....that why we would slow roll ball in if the shot would allow for it.
We're talking about getting position...needing to shoot the ball down the rail with speed.

Look....I'm not against what they're doing......I hope they do great.....I just don't see how they would want the balls going down the rails to have a much better chance going in.

Hell....when I was playing and gambling with great players.....I knew they were never going to miss balls out in the middle of the table......shots down the rails were more than likely the shot they would miss trying to do something with the cue ball.

Makes me wonder after all these years why everyone said one of the hardest shots are frozen to the rail???

I think the best thing to do is.....wait and see how everything turns out.....we'll all find out soon enough.

Good luck to BB and all the players playing in it.....wish them success.

Mark Gregory
 
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CreeDo said:
Glen, doesn't a diamond work on the same principle, (small target, big hallway)? Which is what sets it apart from gold crowns? If you think that dumbs it down, why not design diamonds with less parallel facings so the pockets stop accepting balls that made it to the hallway?

Anyone else get the feeling there was a 100% chance glen would have something bad to say about these tables, since BB had some deal with diamond tables that fell through?
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uhhh...no, Diamond's pockets do funnel smaller in the throat of the pocket, making it tighter the further back in the pocket the ball goes. I have no idea what deals if any Diamond may have had or didn't have....as that's none of my concern;)

Glen
 
I wonder if designing and installing the pockets will help them tonight?

LA Wave: Oscar D., Ernesto D., and Louis Ulrich (alternates Josh Ulrich and Jennifer B)

vs.

Atlanta Scorpions: Archer, Daulton, Hatch (alternates are Brumback and Murphy).

LA looks to be a big underdog!
 
No shelf = all balls fall

All balls fall = easier

Easier = less finesse needed

Less finesse needed = I can do it as good as someone with finesse

Result = handicapped table

Oh well.
What's for dinner?
 
Masayoshi said:
Actually, the argument is that speed shouldn't be as big a factor in determining how much accuracy a shot needs. Hitting the ball hard with draw or spin is generally MORE difficult than rolling a ball at the pocket. There is no good reason why a ball hit at speed should require more accuracy than a ball rolled at the pocket when it is in fact harder to do so in the first place. Both hard and soft shots should have similar margins for error just like they do when you are shooting at the pocket from out in the middle of the table.




How tight were the tables you played on? 4 1/4" pockets at this cut angle are indeed buckets. Probably comparable to your standard Diamond pro cut in terms of difficulty. 3 7/8" on the other hand is a completely different animal.
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Arguing design doesn't change the fact that the pockets were made so balls that are close drop, and don't wedge. Making them shooter friendly. As for the different pocket sizes, 3.875 and 4.500 is a difference of .312 per side. That's a minor adjustment not a different animal.
 
CreeDo said:
A lot of players think the same way when they first encounter a diamond.
"omg a diamond plays tough as hell it's an inch smaller than a gold crown" but the pocket cut is a little easier,
so you'll find a 4.5" diamond spits out fewer balls than most gold crowns shimmed to 4.5".
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I agree with that. I have 5" pockets with very deep shelves on my home table, and the Diamond Pro-cut pockets at the local pool room are way more forgiving on any shot along the rail than my table is. Those tables were purchased after being used at Turning Stone a few years ago, so they are the same pockets the pros were using. The combination of deep shelves and flared pocket openings on my home table makes for a lot of frustration, and forces you to use pocket speed on rail shots or miss a lot of shots.

A while back I did a little experiment where I placed a ball three diamonds away from the corner pocket and 1/16" from the rail. I used a 1/16" piece of shim stock for consistency. I then placed four balls along the rail behind it to eliminate any throw effect. This created a shot that was dead for the center of the pocket facing.

Using a firm stroke, every time it hit the center of the pocket facing, and every time, it got spit out. Only by shooting the shot at pocket speed would the ball fall over the edge of the shelf and drop in. With all balls frozen against the long rail I can hit it very hard and the ball will go in every time. So basically, in normal play, you either hit it soft or you hit it perfect or it just won't go in.
 
I kind of think we are all arguing over minutia. The cut of the pocket isn't going to change how popular pool is in the US. None of us have the answer to that (we'd be rich if we did), but it certainly is not the pocket cut.

The cut of the BB table is just for the BB table. No one is going to be going out and spending hundreds of dollars for new cushions and a mechanic to make them this way on their home table. None of the pool halls will do the same either. And of the remaining US designed/built tables, I highly doubt any of them will take their decades of experience and change the designs.

Lets just sit back and watch the game.
 
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