Pool Myths Explained
- Thread starter JoeyA
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I would emphatically disagree with that. Especially if you're talking about the great players. Almost all bios of great players in pool mention mentoring and road partners and being "enlightened" by better players along the path.
I know that in the USA it often happens that players will stand around and discuss shots and strategies. They learn from each other quite a lot in my experience and observation.
I don't think anyone on this site has ever said that only pros and instructors know how to play and are the only ones qualified to give advice.
But being qualified to give advice is something that certainly should be coupled with a decent skill level or the giver should contain his advice to those at or below his skill level. Unless of course we are talking the mental game where say an APA 2 who happens to be a strong competitor in another sport would be able to dispense advice on how to handle pressure.
But that same APA 2 shouldn't be coaching shot selection, patterns, or technique imo.
A Myth few may agree with
imho, it's a myth that Stroking is more critical than Alignment.
Granted the two aspects often have overlap for most players, in that part of aiming is often about stroking speed, CB impact and direction of cue movement.
That said, it is commonly assumed that when people miss, it is mainly due to a bad stroke being put on the CB. Few notice that it's very common to see players swipe in the opposite direction to the shot they missed, e.g. They swipe right on a right to left cut and still under cut the ball. This is an intuitive swipe to correct poor pre-alignment. Often the correction is not enough and sometimes they over correct. But whatever the real cause, commentators and crowd alike assume blame to a bad stroke.
I suspect a lot will disagree, but it's food for thought.
Most players align with an allowance for swiping to the outside of the cut angle, usually with a touch of OE. These players often struggle with power cueing, which reduces their ability to swipe the CB to the proper line. Force a player to stroke straight and they'll usually find aligning requires much more effort.
imho, it's a myth that Stroking is more critical than Alignment.
Granted the two aspects often have overlap for most players, in that part of aiming is often about stroking speed, CB impact and direction of cue movement.
That said, it is commonly assumed that when people miss, it is mainly due to a bad stroke being put on the CB. Few notice that it's very common to see players swipe in the opposite direction to the shot they missed, e.g. They swipe right on a right to left cut and still under cut the ball. This is an intuitive swipe to correct poor pre-alignment. Often the correction is not enough and sometimes they over correct. But whatever the real cause, commentators and crowd alike assume blame to a bad stroke.
I suspect a lot will disagree, but it's food for thought.
Most players align with an allowance for swiping to the outside of the cut angle, usually with a touch of OE. These players often struggle with power cueing, which reduces their ability to swipe the CB to the proper line. Force a player to stroke straight and they'll usually find aligning requires much more effort.
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Ron Swanson
Banned
The uk has been different, at least my generation. There's playing great and then there's being a great player, then there's being a champion. All champions would be able to play great quite quickly and without leaving their basements (or bedrooms in our case). The progression to becoming great players and champions would be hastened by competiton and coaching, however.
As ever,, this comes down to whether you think great players are born or made.
Ron Swanson
Banned
It is a myth that people want to match up to prove a point. They don't. It happened once and we all know how that went down lol.
All people have to do is video themselves playing, yet they never do.
Yep, I think most people reach a very high level of play on their own. The seasoning and fine tuning that makes a champion comes through coaching, mentoring and competition.
As far as the natural talent debate goes, didn't Hendry make his first 50+ break something like two weeks after first picking up a cue?
Ron Swanson
Banned
Probably, and trump his first maximum at 10.
That 3 year old chinese kid still astonishes me.
You wouldn't be a real good writer on Mythbusters, every myth they would want to tackle, you would say it isn't a myth because we are assuming people believe it.
Myth: if you eat pop rock candy and drink Pepsi your stomach will explode and you will die.
Your response: that's not a myth because we are assuming someone would be gullible enough to believe it. But you won't die if you eat pop rocks and drink Pepsi
Myths are inherently just false statements that can be proven wrong. hence the word "myth".
The point of this thread was to dig up pool related myths. Our lively debate on the million balls myth (not the million balls fact, the million balls myth) makes me think it should definitely be included. With, of course, the added input of why a million balls is just part of the equation. Like you said.
Classic observation. This happens a lot.
Well-stated Colin. I agree. For most, it is probably aim and alignment that are off more often than the stroke. Poor alignment not only includes aligning the cue in the desired direction, but also aligning the tip correctly on the CB.
Also, when using intentional sidespin, many misses will be due to an incomplete understanding of how to compensate for squirt, swerve, and throw.
Regards,
Dave
..............
I heard a myth once that a pool player jumped off the Huey P Long bridge in New Orleans into the water. Before swimming to shore, he wrestled an alligator. In the process, the alligator tore the sleeves off his shirt and made cut-offs out of his blue jeans. Despite the struggle, the pool player swam to the bank and walked out with an alligator tooth necklace and alligator skin cowboy boots on. Rumor has it that he still can be found lurking around pool halls in a cowboy shirt without sleeves, cut-off blue jeans, alligator tooth necklace, and dirty old alligator cowboy boots.
MYTH or LEGEND? You be the judge. I vote legend.
I heard a myth once that a pool player jumped off the Huey P Long bridge in New Orleans into the water. Before swimming to shore, he wrestled an alligator. In the process, the alligator tore the sleeves off his shirt and made cut-offs out of his blue jeans. Despite the struggle, the pool player swam to the bank and walked out with an alligator tooth necklace and alligator skin cowboy boots on. Rumor has it that he still can be found lurking around pool halls in a cowboy shirt without sleeves, cut-off blue jeans, alligator tooth necklace, and dirty old alligator cowboy boots.
MYTH or LEGEND? You be the judge. I vote legend.
On the subject of HAMB without an instructor, Bob Byrne says somewhere, "Practise doesn't make perfect. It makes permanent."
Very much to the point of this thread is the Website of a twenty-seven-year-old French star named Pierre Soumagne. Soumagne is sweeping the European billiard world before him, both at three cushion and at the "smaller games," such as balkline.
In a brief biography on his Website, in the form of an interview, he says that he was introduced to a serious billiard room by his father when he was in his mid-teens. The room had two highly recognized instructors. Soumagne became the pupil of one of them. In the off-season, he worked under the man's instructions. In one month, he logged two hundred and ninety hours on the table. When the next season began, he entered a junior field with an announced handicap based on his play from the previous year. His performance in the new season was so strong that it was a "scandal." It was if a team showed up in the APA with an declared C player who turned out to be a Master. (I wonder what the French for "sandbagging" is.)
In the last paragraph, Soumagne addresses the question whether he is a "supertalent" in billiards. He says the only way to determine whether one person is more gifted by nature than another would be to hold all the variables constant: equipment, hours practised, quality of instruction received, and application of the learner to his task. He says that he had the advantage of having all of the best of all of these. As he says at the beginning of the biography to the interviewer, "If it hadn't been for my instructor, you wouldn't be interviewing me."
Very much to the point of this thread is the Website of a twenty-seven-year-old French star named Pierre Soumagne. Soumagne is sweeping the European billiard world before him, both at three cushion and at the "smaller games," such as balkline.
In a brief biography on his Website, in the form of an interview, he says that he was introduced to a serious billiard room by his father when he was in his mid-teens. The room had two highly recognized instructors. Soumagne became the pupil of one of them. In the off-season, he worked under the man's instructions. In one month, he logged two hundred and ninety hours on the table. When the next season began, he entered a junior field with an announced handicap based on his play from the previous year. His performance in the new season was so strong that it was a "scandal." It was if a team showed up in the APA with an declared C player who turned out to be a Master. (I wonder what the French for "sandbagging" is.)
In the last paragraph, Soumagne addresses the question whether he is a "supertalent" in billiards. He says the only way to determine whether one person is more gifted by nature than another would be to hold all the variables constant: equipment, hours practised, quality of instruction received, and application of the learner to his task. He says that he had the advantage of having all of the best of all of these. As he says at the beginning of the biography to the interviewer, "If it hadn't been for my instructor, you wouldn't be interviewing me."
I believe the best players in America are lurking in rooms everywhere and you have never and will never hear of them. They are working and raising families and don't have any ambitions of being well known.
The myth that there is only one right way to stand, stroke or aim your cue. There are an infinite variety of ways to play this game well and I'm still seeing new ones all the time! 
myth-somebody showed a guy how to hold a golf club,and they shot even par for their first 18 holes
This is a good one, and I agree completely. A lot of shots are missed by intermediate players, who think they missed the shot when they stroked, but who actually missed the shot when they placed their bridge hand on the table. If you're not accurately aligned by the time you're done stepping into the shot and placing the bridge hand on the table, it's too late to shoot the CB where you want.
Another one I'd add is the myth that there are arcane qualities of the stroke that allow the pros to move the CB more with less english and softer speed. Because of the loose grips and the acceleration through contact and the long follow-through and all that. The truth that is so often obscured by this thinking is that "stroke" is only about where the tip contacts the CB and how quickly it's moving when it does. The "great strokes" of the game are just much better at achieving higher cue speeds and still hitting far from the center of the CB with great precision.
-Andrew
The myth that there is only one right way to stand, stroke or aim your cue. There are an infinite variety of ways to play this game well and I'm still seeing new ones all the time!
But there might be only best way one per player. Keith McCready makes great things happen with his technique, and Thorsten Hohmann makes great things happen with his technique, but would either of them ever have made a ball if they each had to use the other one's stance and stroke? We'll never know, but I'm thinking they're both better off if they don't switch.
-Andrew
I agree. It's simply not possible.