Save the Break Ball or Not?

Dan White said:
In this situation the 12 ball is a classic break ball for the next rack (I'm left handed). The question is whether you save the 12 as your break ball and try to get though the rack, or shoot the 1 and then use the 12 to break up the rest of the cluster right away?

The 13 is too straight, even with cheating, to open up the cluster. The 8 is almost a dead carom into the lower right pocket and can be made easily. The 11 doesn't go anywhere and there are no good combos.

I don't like breaking into clusters without a safety ball, but sometimes you have to do it. Is this one of those situations?

Here was my thinking: Shoot the 1 and follow to the rail for the 3. Follow down to the cube of chalk on the left rail for the 8 ball carom. Shoot the 8 carom medium soft with a little draw so that the 11 moves the 10 and 4 out, and you may get a little luck and get position on the 13 in the side or the corner (that's my safety ball). Worst case scenario I most likely have the 12 in the side or corner as a safety ball if I have to take it.

In reality the cue ball skipped/skidded when I hit the 3 and I didn't get any follow.

Larger picture question: How strongly do you want to keep that break ball in tact? I know there was one player (was it Mizerak?) who routinely shot in the break balls if it helped him get to the rest of the rack.
Click to expand...

I'm a little confused. what is wrong with shooting the 13 to the 8 ? does the 8 not go ?

if you shoot the 8 at a medium speed to open the cluster another BB will probably develop. plus there another breakball already there, the 14. the 1 ball in the side can be used as an insurance ball for when shooting the 8.

-Steve
 
stevekur1 said:
I'm a little confused. what is wrong with shooting the 13 to the 8 ? does the 8 not go ?

if you shoot the 8 at a medium speed to open the cluster another BB will probably develop. plus there another breakball already there, the 14. the 1 ball in the side can be used as an insurance ball for when shooting the 8.

-Steve
Click to expand...

that was sort of my question, follow the 13 a little bit and shot 8 straight into the lower Right corner ??
 
stevekur1 said:
I'm a little confused. what is wrong with shooting the 13 to the 8 ? does the 8 not go ?

if you shoot the 8 at a medium speed to open the cluster another BB will probably develop. plus there another breakball already there, the 14. the 1 ball in the side can be used as an insurance ball for when shooting the 8.

-Steve
Click to expand...

It's my understanding that this was the original proposition: that to go from the 13 to the 8 was not an option because the shot was fractionally off-straight on the wrong side (= i.e. the cue ball would have gone towards the 8, although not enough to comfortably bump it).

Greetings from Switzerland, David.
_________________

„J'ai gâché vingt ans de mes plus belles années au billard. Si c'était à refaire, je recommencerais.“ – Roger Conti
 
Yeah with follow the cue ball will be so close to the 8 that you would need perfect speed. It didn't look like the best option to me.
 
This kind of questions and thoughts are good practice but in the end it always comes to execution.

Sometimes you need to choose shot where is more margin of error for execution, sometimes you shoot shot that offer more margin of error for position.

That why table time is so important. It teaches what way to go because you learn from mistakes ( repeated ).
Lately I've been personally inspected my game and found out mistakes i never thought were mistakes..

I would love to tell examples but my English is not good enough for that.
 
Dan White said:
the 12 ball is a classic break ball for the next rack The question is whether you save the 12 or use the 12 to break up the rest of the cluster right away?

The 13 is too straight,

Larger picture question: How strongly do you want to keep that break ball in tact? .
Click to expand...

I just watched a group lesson put on by Ray Martin, that was on you tube. (thank you Ray!)

Larger picture question.....I'm pretty sure he said he doesn't think about a break ball until all the clusters are open. He is looking for secondary break balls and how to get to them asap.

If he didn't get the right angle on the secondary break ball, he would shoot another ball until he got the right angle on it. Using that logic, he might choose the 13 as the next secondary break ball, but work his way to back to it, on a better angle. ?
 
Thanks, Michael. I don't suppose that youtube video is public domain? I wouldn't want to violate his group lesson policy so if it is private, then fine. But if it isn't then do you have the link? :grin:
 
Re: Ray Martin video

There are a couple of things I would add between 3:00 and 4:00 about the opening break shot.

If the balls are all frozen, there is no way for only two balls to come out (and go back). That's because the corner ball that you hit goes into a ball (its neighbor on the back row) that is frozen to three other balls. It will push on two of those balls. That means that you will transfer some energy back into the upper rack. If the balls are all tight this cannot be avoided. Similarly for the middle ball on the back row -- it is going to be pushed into its next neighbor on the back row but also one of its neighbors in the next to last row. If the rack is tight, some other balls must come out.

Here's an experiment you can do for yourself to see this. Spot two balls on the foot spot. (Of course they are frozen and both on the long string.) Freeze a third ball to both of them on either side of the two -- it is frozen to both of them. From the head spot, shoot straight at the ball on the spot. You can even cut it slightly away from the ball to the side and even so, all the balls will move. That's what's happening across the back of the rack.

If you want a perfect break, you can do that by cheating. When you rack for yourself, just move the back row a little back so none of the balls are touching the next to last row. Voh-illa! Only the two corner balls move. You can also accomplish that by moving the back row just a mm to one side so that only half of the contact points are frozen. If you break from the correct side, no back-row ball will push into any ball in the row ahead.

Second, you can tell whether you hit the correct fullness on the corner ball by how far it moves. If it comes out far enough for a shot (along the diagonal from where the cue ball should be), then you hit it too full. Of course this assumes you hit the cue ball at a speed that left it frozen to the head cushion.

If you get those two parts right -- cue ball frozen or near frozen and the ball you hit left near the foot cushion and safe, then you did the best you could on the opening break shot.

Well, one more thing. Before you break you can check for gaps. If one of the corner balls is not frozen against its back-row neighbor I will break on that ball. If you break from the other side, the loose corner ball will probably not move as far as usual and may not return to the rack area. But it's better to have things tight so you know what to expect.
 
Bob Jewett said:
There are a couple of things I would add between 3:00 and 4:00 about the opening break shot.

If the balls are all frozen, there is no way for only two balls to come out (and go back). That's because the corner ball that you hit goes into a ball (its neighbor on the back row) that is frozen to three other balls. It will push on two of those balls. That means that you will transfer some energy back into the upper rack. If the balls are all tight this cannot be avoided. Similarly for the middle ball on the back row -- it is going to be pushed into its next neighbor on the back row but also one of its neighbors in the next to last row. If the rack is tight, some other balls must come out.

Here's an experiment you can do for yourself to see this. Spot two balls on the foot spot. (Of course they are frozen and both on the long string.) Freeze a third ball to both of them on either side of the two -- it is frozen to both of them. From the head spot, shoot straight at the ball on the spot. You can even cut it slightly away from the ball to the side and even so, all the balls will move. That's what's happening across the back of the rack.

If you want a perfect break, you can do that by cheating. When you rack for yourself, just move the back row a little back so none of the balls are touching the next to last row. Voh-illa! Only the two corner balls move. You can also accomplish that by moving the back row just a mm to one side so that only half of the contact points are frozen. If you break from the correct side, no back-row ball will push into any ball in the row ahead.

Second, you can tell whether you hit the correct fullness on the corner ball by how far it moves. If it comes out far enough for a shot (along the diagonal from where the cue ball should be), then you hit it too full. Of course this assumes you hit the cue ball at a speed that left it frozen to the head cushion.

If you get those two parts right -- cue ball frozen or near frozen and the ball you hit left near the foot cushion and safe, then you did the best you could on the opening break shot.

Well, one more thing. Before you break you can check for gaps. If one of the corner balls is not frozen against its back-row neighbor I will break on that ball. If you break from the other side, the loose corner ball will probably not move as far as usual and may not return to the rack area. But it's better to have things tight so you know what to expect.
Click to expand...

Only that it is completely unnecessary to cheat because as you're alluding to yourself, it would be pointless to even try and make the object ball one contacts first come back into the stack, where in a worst case scenario it may set itself up for a dead combination. When I go check the rack, I'm primarily interested in the other side of the rack, that is, the last three balls of the side row (= that includes the corner ball of the end row), because all I try to do is lag the corner ball I contact to the foot rail, while making the opposite corner ball go to the side rail and come back towards the stack by somewhat more than a diamond, again, no need for it to actually get closer to the stack than to where my opponent is confronted with a tough and futile shot from the head rail that I will actually root for him or her to take on. The truth of the matter is that this is as easily if not more easily achieved when the corner ball I'm contacting is not perfectly frozen, because there is more leeway contacting it too fully (a non-frozen corner ball will drag along fewer balls, let alone transfer energy backwards into the stack). The only problem with this break is one may foul because the contacted corner ball isn't reaching the foot rail, but then, I'm effectively given practice tries if my opponent lets me re-break, with the result being virtually the same from his/her perspective, except my execution is bound to be better freezing the cue ball to the head rail with every following attempt.

Greetings from Switzerland, David.
_________________

„J'ai gâché vingt ans de mes plus belles années au billard. Si c'était à refaire, je recommencerais.“ – Roger Conti
 
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