Lesson with Dennie Orcullo Today

TATE

TATE

AzB Gold Mensch
Silver Member
I went to Jay Helfert's house today for a lesson with Dennis - correct spelling is Orcullo and it is pronounced Or-cool-yo (approximately).

3 hours, $150 - best money I ever spent.

Dennis is a great guy and a great teacher. We went through table after table of 10 ball patterns on Jay's Diamond - which is a lively table with the tight pro cut pockets.

What did I learn?

- Look at the entire table before you shoot, make a plan. You can always adjust.

- play simple patterns. He pointed out some position play to simplfy things, shooting sometimes at less obvious pockets to simplify cue ball travel. Play simple shape and make the ball. He played patterns to some shots I don't like - I learned I'm going to have to practice those shots more.

- Don't rush. If it was one theme over and over he got me really concentrating over the shot and to stay down through the shot. The effort a pro puts into each shot is a lot more than most of us and part of what separates them.

- practice. He recommended 5 hours a day of practice, every day. I laughed because I thought he was kidding. THAT was an eye opener. I can't do that but I can sure put in 3 hours 3 or 4 times a week before a tournament.

- Kicking. We also played "safety and counter" as he called it. I would safe him and he would safe back. I learned that his first choice is always to kick a ball away and down the table (or behind a cluster). Sometimes that means foregoing the easy 1 rail kick and kicking 2 rails behind the object ball, even if the hit is more difficult. He kicks as good two rails as he does one rail. He can also pretty much direct a kick where he wants it - so his kicks are much more precise than I would expect.

- English - he uses it often. He prefers to spin the ball instead of shooting with great force. Basically, with the patterns we were doing, most of the shots had side spin of some kind.

So don't rush your shot, stay down through it, play simple patterns to open areas of the table, use spin as necessary to control position, learn to kick accurately 1 and 2 rails, and practice 5 hours a day.

And he will still beat you because he practices 10 hours a day.
 
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I had a hunch he would be a good teacher. Smart of you for giving him a try. Johnnyt
 
Good info Chris! Dennis is a great guy! When I attended Corey's seminar with Dennis he ran through patterns with each of us individually, having us shoot the runout under his tutelage. It's much easier to run out when you have his roadmap! Anyway, he recommended 3 hours of practice everyday which I would have no problem doing, but the wife thinks otherwise!
 
Thanks for the report.

If I ever had time to spend with someone like Dennis I would pick his brain about his cueing technique much more so than table management but that's just me.

I love watching him stroke the ball. People tend to lump all the Filipinos together when they talk about their technique but Dennis is much more controlled than many of the others.

I would love to do this. You guys are getting spoiled on the west coast.
 
TATE said:
I went to Jay Helfert's house today for a lesson with Dennis - correct spelling is Orcullo and it is pronounced Or-cool-yo (approximately).
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Everything on this post was great, but this sentence above all is the greatest contribution. Thanks.

Freddie <~~~ now I can rest at night!
 
Cornerman said:
Everything on this post was great, but this sentence above all is the greatest contribution. Thanks.

Freddie <~~~ now I can rest at night!
Click to expand...

One thing that was cool, Freddie, was we would discuss position from shot to shot and I would confirm how I was going to hit the ball (follow, low left, etc). Much of the time he agreed which really boosted my decision making confidence. Here you have the greatest player in the world confirming your decisions. it felt great. Then sometimes he would suggest playing a shot another way - and why - and it served to open up my mind.

He kind of had me shooting shots I wouldn't normally shoot - and some I was a little clumsy with - but that was the greatest eye opening experience right there. A better, simpler, less error prone way to get out.

It was an excellent experience.
 
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Wow, sounds like a great experience.
I hear a lot of people say the best way to improve is to step up and gamble with great players, but taking that money and getting some advice and lessons from them is even better.
 
TATE said:
I went to Jay Helfert's house today for a lesson with Dennis - correct spelling is Orcullo and it is pronounced Or-cool-yo (approximately).

3 hours, $150 - best money I ever spent.

Dennis is a great guy and a great teacher. We went through table after table of 10 ball patterns on Jay's Diamond - which is a lively table with the tight pro cut pockets.

What did I learn?

- Look at the entire table before you shoot, make a plan. You can always adjust.

- play simple patterns. He pointed out some position play to simplfy things, shooting sometimes at less obvious pockets to simplify cue ball travel. Play simple shape and make the ball. He played patterns to some shots I don't like - I learned I'm going to have to practice those shots more.

- Don't rush. If it was one theme over and over he got me really concentrating over the shot and to stay down through the shot. The effort a pro puts into each shot is a lot more than most of us and part of what separates them.

- practice. He recommended 5 hours a day of practice, every day. I laughed because I thought he was kidding. THAT was an eye opener. I can't do that but I can sure put in 3 hours 3 or 4 times a week before a tournament.

- Kicking. We also played "safety and counter" as he called it. I would safe him and he would safe back. I learned that his first choice is always to kick a ball away and down the table (or behind a cluster). Sometimes that means foregoing the easy 1 rail kick and kicking 2 rails behind the object ball, even if the hit is more difficult. He kicks as good two rails as he does one rail. He can also pretty much direct a kick where he wants it - so his kicks are much more precise than I would expect.

- English - he uses a lot of it. He prefers to spin the ball instead of shooting with great force. Basically, with the patterns we were doing, most of the shots had side spin of some kind.

So don't rush your shot, stay down through it, play simple patterns to open areas of the table, use spin as necessary to control position, learn to kick accurately 1 and 2 rails, and practice 5 hours a day.

And he will still beat you because he practices 10 hours a day.
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Holy crap Tate- for all the years you've spent around the game, surely you learned all of those basics within the first year.

With that said, there isn't a substitute to hearing those things, again and again, particularly from a Bon a Fide monster. Money well spent.
 
Preferences?

Given that Dennis has all the shots mastered:

Without traffic as a limiting factor, did Dennis express a preference getting to the other end of the table shape window, by drawing out 2 rails vs. spinning around 3 rails with inside?

Hope that makes sense.

He hits both shots so well, maybe only slight differences in cb-ob angle to pocket the ob dictate the choice.

Pocketing the ob in the corner sitting near the second diamond on the long rail, and coming around 3 rails with massive inside is something to see. He makes it look effortless. Especially when the cb is half a table or more away from the ob...heck I can't even see that far.:eek::

Thanks for the lesson report.

Sounds like very well spent time and money. ...pretty jealous here.
 
3RAILKICK said:
Given that Dennis has all the shots mastered:

Without traffic as a limiting factor, did Dennis express a preference getting to the other end of the table shape window, by drawing out 2 rails vs. spinning around 3 rails with inside?

Hope that makes sense.

He hits both shots so well, maybe only slight differences in cb-ob angle to pocket the ob dictate the choice.

Pocketing the ob in the corner sitting near the second diamond on the long rail, and coming around 3 rails with massive inside is something to see. He makes it look effortless. Especially when the cb is half a table or more away from the ob...heck I can't even see that far.:eek::

Thanks for the lesson report.

Sounds like very well spent time and money. ...pretty jealous here.
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Mostly he recommended outside English, drawing two rails, when given the option. The other thing he really prefers to get shot angles and that more or less create natural paths to the next position and to keep each position play as simple as possible, even if it means longer shots. He did not really ever suggest the typical power follow inside English shots, but used more direct routes.

Besides the simple position routes, the main point he made about position play was not to stroke any harder than necessary because, as he said "pressure" causes you to miss. Pressure meaning excessive force. Say I was shooting a straight in on a fairly long shot and wanted to draw back a foot to make my next shot shorter on the other end of the table. He said no, just use a stop shot and leave the next shot a foot longer. His logic was you were less likely to miss each ball this way.
 
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We were messing around on Big Bertha at hard times this weekend.

Dennis was trying to bank balls into the corners on big bertha and was hitting them perfect, but those kind of shots don't go in on big bertha.

Then Ricky was doing a full table shot into the corner while looking away.

He did it twice in a row, and then a third a couple of minutes later, so I said, I gotta try this.

So I screwed my cue together and setup the shot, I lined it up and looked away and slammed it into the corner first try. I hit it so hard it went straight back into the back of the pocket and bounced out. Those ****ers let me believe that I had missed it and it bounced off the table. Then I went out side and my friend Scott Slayton told me what had actually happened.

Back on point... Dennis was insane, he was hitting every shot exactly where he wanted to. He was nailing every bank he shot into the side pockets and was hitting center pocket on his banks into the corners, but they just won't go no matter how well you hit them unless they're pocket speed.

Jaden
 
Tate
Glad it went well

I took part in the group lesson a couple weeks back. Even in the group setting I was able to gain a lot of information I found good.

An interesting thing you mentioned was that he used a lot of english. I think you mean he uses English often.
We talked and discussed there how little english(distance from center) he uses and still gets incredible action.
His cue ball seemed to go across the tangents much faster than even other Pros I have seen.

No apparent system but he did give a little thought on how he starts off a bank shot. Ends up being feel but he had a couple other thoughts in there as well.

I watched his backhand, his eyes and observed his bridges and gained some useful information. On several shots he never looked at the cueball. He even said that on easy ones he doesn't have to. He looked at OB as he was going down and then fired.

I liked that he starts almost 100% of all his shots off in the same manner. Hand in same spot. Body is same or similar position then goes into the shot.

He was very personable as well. Very open and answered everything we asked.

I enjoyed learning about his start in pool and how he first went north to play in the better rooms.

Overall I paid $50 and thought I was stealing. Very good experience

Have to say that we got a tour of the Tiger setup as well and Tony was extremely nice. Learned a lot doing that part of the day too.
 
Just one question Chris. What did our bro Jay charge for table time? :grin-square:

Good to see you at the Swanee Saturday night. :thumbup:
 
So Tate is now so buddy-buddy with one of the best pool players in the world that he calls him Dennie.

Interesting ;)
 
TATE said:
Mostly he recommended outside English, drawing two rails, when given the option. The other thing he really prefers to get shot angles and that more or less create natural paths to the next position and to keep each position play as simple as possible, even if it means longer shots. He did not really ever suggest the typical power follow inside English shots, but used more direct routes.

Besides the simple position routes, the main point he made about position play was not to stroke any harder than necessary because, as he said "pressure" causes you to miss. Pressure meaning excessive force. Say I was shooting a straight in on a fairly long shot and wanted to draw back a foot to make my next shot shorter on the other end of the table. He said no, just use a stop shot and leave the next shot a foot longer. His logic was you were less likely to miss each ball this way.
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All so far sounded good to me, but this advise IMO is not good. You have to learn your stroke at all speed, and with different butt hand/bridge hand position. Dennis's stroke is not the usual long american stroke, it is not the best for force shots, but strokes like SVB, or Earl they can power a shot with ease. If you are to use Dennis' short stroke, you have to coordinate your backward swing with forward swing, and worst case you have to change your aim if you consistently miss to one side forcing a shot.
 
Man really apriciate you taking the time to write this! I hope I get to meet him at the SBE in march.
 
Tate, where would you rate your game? (B - A++ Etc) Also, $50 an hour with one of the best players in world is a steal. Could you imagine trying to get that kind of one on one instruction with the best in any other sport? They'd laugh in your face if you offered $50 an hour. That's the only benefit of not having any money or sponsors in our sport, the top pros are easily accessible and fairly cheap for one on one lessons.
 
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