Now the John vs. Lou poll removed

[prad]

Natural talent is overrated

Tap Tap, this is the real deal! When I was a young man, I practiced and played as much as any living human and I reached my full potential as a pool player. I played pretty good but always a speed or two below the top players. They just had more ability then me and I could see it. That's why I finally gave up and became a tournament director. My friend Danny Diliberto said it best to me one day, "Jay, you're a shortstop for life!"

Jay, with all due respect I do not agree with what you say here.
The term "natural talent" is thrown around very often when people mention someone very skilled in any sport be it tennis, golf or pool. The use of this term overshadows a lot of other things that were of more importance like dedication, drive to win, practice hours, mindset, heart and various others.
There are always going to be people who have more physical or mental advantage over others but if they don't practice and do the hard work that "natural talent" is going to get them nothing. Let's say if I want to be a basketball player but cuz of my height (5'6) it is going to take a lot to make it to NBA. So, it's apparent here that I don't have any natural talent (height) for this game and so if I want to break in to pro scene I will have to try harder than other guys or do some ground breaking changes.
All the professionals be it in any sport work 'harder' in one way or other than the armatures. Ask any top professional in any sport the question "hey was it easy for you to be here at the top of sport since you got a lot of natural talent ?". What you think they will say?
You wrote

They just had more ability then me and I could see it.

.
The difference in "ability" could be something else that we can't put our finger on. So a lot of times it's just easier to say it "natural talent". Now, that's not saying I can get any random person from street and they can be a top pro. No, that's probably not going to happen but at least they can be taught to play at high level. There are always people who have certain advantage over others and that is just a fact of life be it physical or mental.
What bothers me that people give "natural talent" more credit than what it deserves.

Here is a good article about natural talent :- http://www.blueprinttennis.com/featured/natural-talent-fact-or-fiction/

 

[one stroke]

Are they retarded?

If not, then yes.

LMFAO ,, not a prayer in hell


1

 

[JB Cases]

What , those are perfect example ,, JB is of the opinion that the only thing that separates the best is hard work and practice ,,
he has even gone as far to say science backs that up ,, the only scientist who would back that up is some dork who could never play anything and was looking for a excuse why and distorted fact from fiction ,, and the only ones believing one word of it are people just like him



1

I didn't say that. I said you can't find a champion who didn't put in MORE work and practice than his peers who are not champions. I said that this is what the studies found when looking for examples of people who were world class or at the top of their field.

Natural ability and limitations would indicate that there are people who put in half the work and yet still rose to the top of their field as well as people who put in twice the work and didn't rise above average. Neither was found to be the case. In every situation those world class performers who were intensively studied were found to have put in MORE hours honing their skills than other performers who were not as good.

One of the conclusions as to what separates classes is desire. Those who rise to the top seem to have an incredible amount of desire and drive. A huge willingness to sacrifice everything else in life to work towards attaining the most skill they can.

That desire translates into working harder, training deeper, studying their craft more. And all that extra work and study makes for a world class performer.

Regarding the running gene you mentioned, there are people who are physically suited to running - that's not talent that's simply a physical trait that is inherent in some people. That makes their body more suited to a certain physical movement but does not mean that every person from that area will have the desire to take advantage of whatever physical extra they were born with. Every 6.5' person doesn't become a star basketball player and every person who can sing doesn't become a platinum selling artist.

It's entirely possible though that there are "talent" genes in the sense that one could tweak the genetics to make a person more apt to be interested in and good at sports with great hand-eye coordination.

But guess what, it's been PROVEN then a person who is terrible at hand-eye coordination can LEARN to have excellent hand-eye coordination.

You know what? Let's agree to disagree. You all go on thinking that Lou is a naturally made good player and I will go on thinking that I can improve my game enough to beat him handily by focused training.

I have to ask you all though, why does he want to take lessons from Nick Varner if he is so much more talented than I am? Why does he practice so much?

Even Dick says in his own storytelling that he DEVELOPED into a one pocket player he didn't just appear as one.

 

[JB Cases]

Tell you what, I will take the ten Russian body builders and train them in Pool with Chinese coaches and you give the 10 Chinese golfers Bob Byrne's Standard Book of Pool and let them all play each other in 6 months and the bodybuilders will CRUSH the golfers.

I could bring a 13 year old Chinese girl to the USA and turn her loose on locals and she would destroy most players she plays. You all would scream NATURAL TALENT. But what you wouldn't know is she went from zero to monster in less than two years with proper coaching and 10+ hours a day of training.

 

[dudlock]

What , those are perfect example ,, JB is of the opinion that the only thing that separates the best is hard work and practice ,,
he has even gone as far to say science backs that up ,, the only scientist who would back that up is some dork who could never play anything and was looking for a excuse why and distorted fact from fiction ,, and the only ones believing one word of it are people just like him



1

You're right of course. Anybody who ever ran into Johnny Archer when he was 17 would also agree. There's a fellow who did not start out as a toddler dragging a crate around and standing on it either. He went into a video arcade and discovered pool around middle school age. I'll say 13 or 12 at the earliest. He was giving some guys the 6 8 and the breaks for pretty big amounts, I recall when I first ran into him, and he was 17. Didn't use no aiming systems either. Didn't most of you play some sports in high school, even if not organized? Remember most schools had some guy or maybe a couple of them, who could play baseball at any position, and be the best in their class? And then in the fall they could play football and do the same thing? Natural abilities. It's what coaches look for. And then you have to love it and breathe it and start living it. JB is just psyching himself. Thinking he can avert his Titanic disaster before he runs into big bad Iceberg Lou....

 

[JB Cases]

http://www.blueprinttennis.com/featured/10000-hour-rule/

 

[one stroke]

Jay, with all due respect I do not agree with what you say here.
The term "natural talent" is thrown around very often when people mention someone very skilled in any sport be it tennis, golf or pool. The use of this term overshadows a lot of other things that were of more importance like dedication, drive to win, practice hours, mindset, heart and various others.
There are always going to be people who have more physical or mental advantage over others but if they don't practice and do the hard work that "natural talent" is going to get them nothing. Let's say if I want to be a basketball player but cuz of my height (5'6) it is going to take a lot to make it to NBA. So, it's apparent here that I don't have any natural talent (height) for this game and so if I want to break in to pro scene I will have to try harder than other guys or do some ground breaking changes.
All the professionals be it in any sport work 'harder' in one way or other than the armatures. Ask any top professional in any sport the question "hey was it easy for you to be here at the top of sport since you got a lot of natural talent ?". What you think they will say?
You wrote .
The difference in "ability" could be something else that we can't put our finger on. So a lot of times it's just easier to say it "natural talent". Now, that's not saying I can get any random person from street and they can be a top pro. No, that's probably not going to happen but at least they can be taught to play at high level. There are always people who have certain advantage over others and that is just a fact of life be it physical or mental.
What bothers me that people give "natural talent" more credit than what it deserves.

Here is a good article about natural talent :- http://www.blueprinttennis.com/featured/natural-talent-fact-or-fiction/

You have by your own words by saying some will always Physical and Mental advantages over others ,, that proves the base of the argument we all know hard work can achieve great things by the so called over achieves ,, Steve Nash would be a perfect of that ,, but lets not confuse him with MJ

Pete rose would be the best example of a guy with not a lot of natural assets but thru his hard work became one of the best hitters of all time

There are many guys like Jay I'm one of them I practiced pool everyday for along time and just could not get past a certain level ,, I once taught a 14yr the son of a friend who only played the same days I was there so he played no where else in between in a yrs time it was all I could do to beat him ,, the kid just had something I didn't. you can call it what ever you want by guys like me and Jay will call it natural talent


1

 

[crabbcatjohn]

I don't know how you can prove the part the bold.

Now I can disprove, or at the very least put a hole in it by saying that the 99.999999% of people that aren't champions are that way because they simply didn't spend as much time playing pool as the top players.

Obviously.. Well lets put this in another way. Some people are simply better than others at things they can do. Their brains are wired different. You have to agree with that? Right? That's why some people excel at certain things and some do not. That's the debate. That's why i originally used the Savant correlation. I thought people would get the similarities. There are people in the world who could be born the same day as Shane, and could spend their entire lifetime playing pool every day since birth with the best instruction possible every single day since birth and at the same day Shane turns 30 they turn 30 they have put in 400 times the hours he has, but still not be at pro speed and still be very far away from it. But that same guy could tell you in a micro second what day of the week it is 33-1/2 years from now on a certain date or what he did and what time of day it was 19 years ago to the day. Even with years of practice similar to what the first guy had, Shane would never be able to do that in a split second because his brain isn't wired the same. So its very simple, peoples brains work different and as Jay stated, some people can never be at pro speed as hard as they try and as much as they practice.

 

[Banks]

You can put in tons of work, but so can somebody that is a "natural". When I started playing, I made it to a 6 in my first year. So many people had told me how long it took them to get where they were at, how long they have been playing and so on. The fact remains that people can excel at different things and for many different reasons. You could try to take an apa 2 up to a 7, but during that time, the natural will be far beyond reach of the other player.

Go to the 14.1 forum and ask some of those people why they're not pro speed. Some have tables at home, have taken lessons and have played for decades. People have different limitations, parts of which are desire, drive, dedication, accessibility and other things. We're not all the same and ability is one way that manifests itself. Otherwise, we'd all be lawyers, doctors, actors and sports stars.. and cook like Betty Crocker.

Edit: pretty much what ccjohn said. I suppose "at a high level" would depend on your definition.

 

[JB Cases]

You're right of course. Anybody who ever ran into Johnny Archer when he was 17 would also agree. There's a fellow who did not start out as a toddler dragging a crate around and standing on it either. He went into a video arcade and discovered pool around middle school age. I'll say 13 or 12 at the earliest. He was giving some guys the 6 8 and the breaks for pretty big amounts, I recall when I first ran into him, and he was 17. Didn't use no aiming systems either. Didn't most of you play some sports in high school, even if not organized? Remember most schools had some guy or maybe a couple of them, who could play baseball at any position, and be the best in their class? And then in the fall they could play football and do the same thing? Natural abilities. It's what coaches look for. And then you have to love it and breathe it and start living it. JB is just psyching himself. Thinking he can avert his Titanic disaster before he runs into big bad Iceberg Lou....

What makes you think Lou is such a talent? What makes you think I am not?

I mean we go back again to the FACT that you have no idea how I play. So you think sports is the key ok then I was a professional high diver. What makes you think I don't have more natural ability than Lou ever had? Why is is hard to believe that just because I didn't go on pool vacations and win some matches against a few pros that I am not as good as Lou.

Would you agree that there are people in the United States who have never in their life been to the tournaments Lou has been to, never in their life even played any of the pros Lou has played and yet they are as good or better than Lou is?

How did these people do it?

This is what gets me the most in all these discussions, that you somehow think Lou is the better player by virtue of what????

If he is THAT much better then how could I have possibly ever won a game off him? Or two games? Oh that's right he lost on purpose to get me to bet ten years later.

But assuming that he didn't want to lose how could I have ever won even a single game if Lou is so much better than I am?

The fact is training pays off, Lou himself has said that a hundred times over. And to me it's already proven that I can hang with him on the pool table so my opinion is that if it's a natural talent thing then the fact that I was gambling with grown men at 12 should be enough to prove I have more natural talent and the fact that I am willing to learn more and more about aiming and strategy and put in the time means that I will leverage that extra natural talent to win against him.

That you assume that I possess no talent or not as much as Lou is frankly ludicrous on your part. That you can watch what Stan Shuffett teaches and conclude that it is of no benefit is equally ludicrous.

Lou in his Efren story said he played over his head an started banking like God. Well if you can watch Stan Shuffett banking balls on demand one, two, three, four and five rails at will and don't conclude that this is pretty godlike then you are either being deliberately obtuse or you don't know what world class banking skills look like.

Have you ever seen me banking balls?

No you haven't. So what makes you think I can't make all the banks Lou can and more? Nothing other than dislike because you have ZERO facts. Did I develop this skill at banking through intense repetition? At one time I did when I used to subscribe to the million balls method - same as Lou subscribes to. How about my skill now?

I developed it through the application of Hal Houle, Stan Shuffett and Ron Vitello's methods. I get compliments, applause even, for the bank shots I make and this is due to learning and practicing those methods. That's knowledge not talent.

What makes you think Lou can feather a ball better than me? Can he draw his ball better, follow it better?

What exactly can Lou Figueroa do better than me on the pool table? You don't know do you?

Yet, you allow yourself to make comments as if Lou is just way above me in skill. Maybe you should curb your assumptions.

 

[JB Cases]

You can put in tons of work, but so can somebody that is a "natural". When I started playing, I made it to a 6 in my first year. So many people had told me how long it took them to get where they were at, how long they have been playing and so on. The fact remains that people can excel at different things and for many different reasons. You could try to take an apa 2 up to a 7, but during that time, the natural will be far beyond reach of the other player.

Go to the 14.1 forum and ask some of those people why they're not pro speed. Some have tables at home, have taken lessons and have played for decades. People have different limitations, parts of which are desire, drive, dedication, accessibility and other things. We're not all the same and ability is one way that manifests itself. Otherwise, we'd all be lawyers, doctors, actors and sports stars.. and cook like Betty Crocker.

Edit: pretty much what ccjohn said. I suppose "at a high level" would depend on your definition.

Yes some people "get it" quicker than others. But if you have two people at the same level and one did it in one year and the other one in three then so what? They are both at the same level.

All the anecdotal evidence that we all put out there only counts a little because it's not controlled in a study to account for all the factors. In other words you don't KNOW how much time any other person really put in or how intensely they practiced or how they were coached if at all.

A person can compliment you and say well I have been playing for four years and I am still a 5 but that doesn't allow you to review the movie of their life to see exactly what that 5 years of experience was. The total dedicated hours might be far less than you put in in a single year. It's also exponential, the more dedicated focused hours you put in in a row the more you get out of it.

So for example I could practice intensely for 2 hours a week for five weeks on a skill and you could practice ten hours in a row on the same skill and you would probably be way ahead of me at that skill even if you stopped for five weeks to allow me to finish my ten hours. Not only would you have learned the skill but you would also be able to see all the tangential applications of that skill whereas I might not be able to do that having broken my ten hours into five two hour sessions over five weeks. Now perhaps if I had done two hours a day for five days there wouldn't be much difference OR I might even be better than you with your single ten hour session because studies also show that in sleep those who practice deeply are often able to work out problems and wake up with solutions.

 

[one stroke]

How do you explain the Chinese prodigy piano player playing better piano at 5 yrs old than Concert pianist 10 times his age ,, I know one thing he certainly hasn't slept much with that 10,000 of practice


1

 

[JB Cases]

Obviously.. Well lets put this in another way. Some people are simply better than others at things they can do. Their brains are wired different. You have to agree with that? Right? That's why some people excel at certain things and some do not. That's the debate. That's why i originally used the Savant correlation. I thought people would get the similarities. There are people in the world who could be born the same day as Shane, and could spend their entire lifetime playing pool every day since birth with the best instruction possible every single day since birth and at the same day Shane turns 30 they turn 30 they have put in 400 times the hours he has, but still not be at pro speed and still be very far away from it. But that same guy could tell you in a micro second what day of the week it is 33-1/2 years from now on a certain date or what he did and what time of day it was 19 years ago to the day. Even with years of practice similar to what the first guy had, Shane would never be able to do that in a split second because his brain isn't wired the same. So its very simple, peoples brains work different and as Jay stated, some people can never be at pro speed as hard as they try and as much as they practice.

Unfortunately you cannot find a single person who HAS put in the same time as Shane and is not also a world class player. So the myth is that it's possible for someone to put in the same time and effort and not be world class but you can't prove it because every single person who did became world class as far as we know.

 

[crabbcatjohn]

Are they retarded?

If not, then yes.

And by the way,i saw your post ... my son along with a lot of other folks in the world are mildly mentally impaired. We don't call it "retarded" anymore... Only people who are vastly uninformed on the subject use those crude schoolyard terms. He has an IQ less than 60, and can out work a lot of men i know. He's not a savant or anything like that and from speaking to him you would't know there is anything wrong with him. But i'm sure we could think up a couple mental or physical games he could challenge you at that would make you look "retarded"

 

[crabbcatjohn]

How do you explain the Chinese prodigy piano player playing better piano at 5 yrs old than Concert pianist 10 times his age ,, I know one thing he certainly hasn't slept much with that 10,000 of practice


1

What he said, and my posts weren't about you JB, i don't know if your brain is wired right to learn to be a pro caliber player. I just disagree with the statement that ANYONE can get there with practice.

 

[JB Cases]

How do you explain the Chinese prodigy piano player playing better piano at 5 yrs old than Concert pianist 10 times his age ,, I know one thing he certainly hasn't slept much with that 10,000 of practice


1

Training and desire. He is interested in playing and was trained since he was three. If you are an otherwise empty vessel with no other care in the world then you are receptive to deep training in whatever interests you.

But also I agree that people are WIRED differently and that SOME do have ability to get things much quicker than others. We call them prodigies. Often however they end up not being better than others as they get older. They lose interest or burn out and simply do not have the desire to continue.

If there are brain damaged people that we call retarded or mentally challenged then it follows that there must be brain enhanced people who have more mental ability than the average. However those people often do not end up being the very best despite the early ability shown.

"Success is 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration" is the quote that best fits here. Yes it's romantic to think that Shane is a naturally gifted pool player. Less romantic to look deeper and see that he grew up in a pool playing family and was given the freedom to pursue his interest from a very young age. Less romantic to hear him talk about his pool work ethic. Less Romantic to hear Jay Helfert tell us that when staying at Jay's house Shane and Dennis Orcullo would rather be practicing and hitting balls than doing anything else.

 

[JB Cases]

what he said

Well I happen to live in China and that child gets intensive training.

 

[richiebalto]

Yes some people "get it" quicker than others. But if you have two people at the same level and one did it in one year and the other one in three then so what? They are both at the same level.

All the anecdotal evidence that we all put out there only counts a little because it's not controlled in a study to account for all the factors. In other words you don't KNOW how much time any other person really put in or how intensely they practiced or how they were coached if at all.

A person can compliment you and say well I have been playing for four years and I am still a 5 but that doesn't allow you to review the movie of their life to see exactly what that 5 years of experience was. The total dedicated hours might be far less than you put in in a single year. It's also exponential, the more dedicated focused hours you put in in a row the more you get out of it.

So for example I could practice intensely for 2 hours a week for five weeks on a skill and you could practice ten hours in a row on the same skill and you would probably be way ahead of me at that skill even if you stopped for five weeks to allow me to finish my ten hours. Not only would you have learned the skill but you would also be able to see all the tangential applications of that skill whereas I might not be able to do that having broken my ten hours into five two hour sessions over five weeks. Now perhaps if I had done two hours a day for five days there wouldn't be much difference OR I might even be better than you with your single ten hour session because studies also show that in sleep those who practice deeply are often able to work out problems and wake up with solutions.

I look forward to reading all of your posts John, if i happen to agree with them or not doesnt really matter, what does matter is i enjoy reading your stuff, never knowing what it may be about or who, but like always, John says whats on his mind and speaks what he believes.

Iam now convinced that you will take down all the money in your upcoming 1 pocket battle with Lou!

I like a man with know how and confidence, you John have plently of Both!

 

[one stroke]

Unfortunately you cannot find a single person who HAS put in the same time as Shane and is not also a world class player. So the myth is that it's possible for someone to put in the same time and effort and not be world class but you can't prove it because every single person who did became world class as far as we know.

I would say there are not one but several that put in Shane's hours that obviously not Shane's ability ,, I have already given you examples of other sports where that was just not the case I'm sure pool is no exception

Also as pertaining to your game name me a player your age in any sport that jumped up several levels ,, there is a reason they say you can't teach a old dog new tricks


1

 

[Banks]

Yes some people "get it" quicker than others. But if you have two people at the same level and one did it in one year and the other one in three then so what?

Then give them another year and the "natural" will probably be another two years ahead. Rinse and repeat for a decade.

I admire your tenacity in this case, but the difference between learning on the fly during the match is a bit out there. Identical moves may not come up and it tends to be more difficult to incorporate new ideas rather than those that are already practiced and known.

As for this match between yourself and Lou, I hope it's a good one..

I have no idea how you play, but I certainly wouldn't expect a weak player to cash repeatedly in strong tournaments. I'm humbled on a regular basis by players that have cashed. Then again, I'm also in pool bfe here in Portland.