I Used to Use a System But Now....

I've seen both your DVDs.

Lou Figueroa
talk about
a good laugh

Yes, and a lot of people see you out and about but they do not know or recognize you for the yellow-bellied sap sucker that you really are.

Your knowledge of CTE on a scale of 1 to 10 is most likely less than 1.......You can debate me at a table any time after my book release and you will end up looking like a fool.

Stan Shuffett
 
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Yes, and a lot of people see you out and about but they do not know or recognize you for the yellow-bellied sap sucker that you really are.

They certainly do out in California. All we have to do is talk to a guy named Wayne about it who lives there and plays in one of the best gambling pool rooms.

Your knowledge of CTE on a scale of 1 to 10 is most likely less than 1.......You can debate me at a table any time after my book release and you will end up looking like a fool.

Stan Shuffett

No Stan, he reached the status of looking like that a long time ago. He's far beyond to greater heights...I mean greater depths. Tough to find anyone lower than Lou.
 
I know you are being sarcastic, but sure I don't care to talk about CTE any more. I stated my opinion, which was based on the original topic (even though you don't think it was). I didn't even post anything until something over 30 posts before me. If somebody like Tony wants to talk about it then I will as long as it is constructive, but again, it isn't my mission to go on about all this.

Good, I hope not.

As far as implementing feel, it isn't that difficult. You seem to be hung up on a different definition of feel from mine, so I don't know what to say about that.

I don't know what gives you the idea I'm totally oblivious to playing by feel. Before I ever learned about CTE from Hal I played mostly by feel.

I saw the CB, OB, pocket and got down on the shot and pop it went with a decent percentage into the pocket.

I learned how to aim when I first started, not with GB, but with a contact point. An excellent player in the pool room told me to stand behind the OB with my cue tip at a spot on the ball that lined up dead into the pocket and then keep the spot in focus as I walked back to the CB and then hit that spot.

It worked some of the time but I missed a lot. He saw me a week later and asked how I was doing and I said sometimes good and other times it doesn't work. He watched me and asked what I was aiming on the CB to hit the spot and I said the middle of the CB. And he said "no wonder you're missing. However far the spot on the OB is from the center of the ball is where you need to have the CB hit it at the same distance from center on the opposite side. A light bulb went on and that's what I refined and used for many years until linking up with Hal and then Stan.

After all those years I saw the contact points immediately and played 100% by feel.

Now that I'm adept at CTE I can see things very quickly. But I'd never give up doing what I now do with CTE visuals and go back to what I did before with contact point.


Like I said before, IMO, you can learn everything you need to know about aim by setting up any cut shot with hole reinforcers and shooting the same shot maybe 25 times a day for a week or two. Do this with several different kinds of shots and you will be on your way to establishing a memory bank of how to pocket balls ("feel" if you will).

There still needs to be some kind of visual starting point on one or both balls. I damn well don't need to be taught or lectured on how to do it. If you want to learn more about aiming at least get Todd Leveck's book. I have the book and there are more aiming systems taught in there than you never knew existed. Each one has a VISUAL STARTING POINT AND ENDING POINT. If it gets so learned and ingrained without thinking about it then it might be referred to as "feel" but it always goes back to the aiming system starting points except done very quickly without much forethought.

FYI:
His Holiness, Pope Francis
Apostolic Palace
00120 Vatican City

Are you Catholic? Can't be a Saint if you aren't.
 
Tony, I think you've taken a good stab at it and made some good observations. If I get what you are saying, it is that although you can find ETA and CTE, which are parallel lines, in reality to see them both at the same time your head has to be in between the two lines so if you draw new lines from the original OB A and E lines they will intersect at your eyes, right?

This COULD explain why you get different shot angles at different distances between the CB and OB for the same ETA and CTE. However, this could be tested easily by drawing the lines on a scale drawing to see if the angles change the appropriate amount. I have a pretty strong suspicion that it doesn't work out, though.

And of course the big enchilada is your quote above. If Stan could explain how you get two different shot angles out of the same visual with the CB and OB at the same distance away in each case, then I might become a believer. Until someone can explain it, I have to assume "feel" (oh, sorry, I meant visual intelligence) fudges the shot to make the system work. It is also easier to add this fudge without realizing it when doing a sweep, rather than the more methodical and precise manual pivot.

I don't understand why it is so hard for Stan to explain this one point in a few sentences, rather than telling people to go visit him (which he knows will never happen) or buy his book.

Thanks.

Well ETA and CTE are not parallel, if you look straight at ETA, going from center t edge is angled, so it creates a sort of "V" shape. If it were ETA and ETC, it would be parallel, but I'm not sure how your eyes would process that.

And I don't know if measuring the angles on a diagram would work, unless you made the OB varying degrees of smaller than the CB. The CB will always look bigger because it's closer.


Still doesn't explain why if you line up CB OB on the long rail 3 diamonds apart, and keep shifting them in parallel towards the center of the table, for a good while, you can make the different shots with the same perception.

The balls remain the same distance from each other, and are lined up straight. The only variable is the angle to the pocket. I can't figure out why applying the visuals gives me different results. I think that's the big rub here.


But we've made progress I think.

The main question is: Why does applying the same visuals perception, result in different outcomes, when the only thing that's changed is pocket angle?

Thank you for responding to my posts.
 
Yes, and a lot of people see you out and about but they do not know or recognize you for the yellow-bellied sap sucker that you really are.

Your knowledge of CTE on a scale of 1 to 10 is most likely less than 1.......You can debate me at a table any time after my book release and you will end up looking like a fool.

Stan Shuffett


yellow-bellied sap sucker?

lol, someone has been watching too many old John Wayne movies.

Lou Figueroa
 

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There still needs to be some kind of visual starting point on one or both balls. I damn well don't need to be taught or lectured on how to do it.

You asked me to describe how I would teach someone how to aim so they can pocket a ball. I do that and then you get angry? Odd.

Anyway, I agree that you need a starting point, but that's all it is. You can say "Imagine a ghost ball as the spot in line with the pocket opposite the object ball," or "connect the back of the cue ball to the target spot" etc etc. Those are crutches that get a new player started. In the end, you cannot pocket balls based on a 1,2,3 system (not mentioning any acronyms). Everybody, in the end, plays by feel because that's how the brain has come to learn how to pocket balls. That takes us full circle to my first comment and I'd prefer just to agree to disagree on whatever it is you disagree with.
 
Well ETA and CTE are not parallel, if you look straight at ETA, going from center t edge is angled, so it creates a sort of "V" shape. If it were ETA and ETC, it would be parallel, but I'm not sure how your eyes would process that.

You are correct. It's been awhile since I've thought about this stuff, so my bad.

The main question is: Why does applying the same visuals perception, result in different outcomes, when the only thing that's changed is pocket angle?

Well this is the question that has been asked for 20 years and gone unanswered. If you keep pushing that button you will become an outcast. Just watch all the flack I'm about to take below for saying this. If there were an answer I'd probably be a big proponent of CTE. My best guess is you're fooling yourself with the sweep, and you are actually pocketing the shot by feel. Absent any other explanation, that's all I can come up with.
 
You are correct. It's been awhile since I've thought about this stuff, so my bad.



Well this is the question that has been asked for 20 years and gone unanswered. If you keep pushing that button you will become an outcast. Just watch all the flack I'm about to take below for saying this. If there were an answer I'd probably be a big proponent of CTE. My best guess is you're fooling yourself with the sweep, and you are actually pocketing the shot by feel. Absent any other explanation, that's all I can come up with.

It gets old hearing you and others make the same false claims over and over. It has been answered. You just don't comprehend the answer, so you dismiss it. You can't comprehend it because you don't have an open enough mind to do so. In your mind, there is no way it can work, so it never will for you.

And, for you to state for a fact things which you simply just don't know about, such as everyone only shoots by feel, only makes you look foolish.
 
You asked me to describe how I would teach someone how to aim so they can pocket a ball. I do that and then you get angry? Odd.

My impression was that you were trying to teach me how to learn to shoot with feel. If that was how you teach someone how to aim, it's basically hit a million balls, although you confined it to 25. 25 and that's supposed to last someone a lifetime? OOOOOKKKKKK.

Anyway, I agree that you need a starting point, but that's all it is. You can say "Imagine a ghost ball as the spot in line with the pocket opposite the object ball," or "connect the back of the cue ball to the target spot" etc etc. Those are crutches that get a new player started. In the end, you cannot pocket balls based on a 1,2,3 system (not mentioning any acronyms).

Yes you can. We won't use the acronym example but we can use Joe Tucker's contact point aiming system. Unlike you who is too cheap and lazy to learn from a real pro, I also drove up to spend a good amount of time with Joe Tucker. His knowledge and skill level in ALL facets of the game are quite impressive.

I assure you when it comes to aiming he uses the visual numbered contact point system to perfection. THERE IS NO "JUST SEE THE SHOT AND SHOOT" He takes his time in the visualization aiming process until he's homed in with both balls and it's deadly. Watching and talking to him is living proof that shooting by subconscious memory, guesswork, adjustments, and false bravado is not only moronic and idiotic, it's going to cause losing games in tournaments or for money. The 3 letter acronym is exactly the same way.


Everybody, in the end, plays by feel because that's how the brain has come to learn how to pocket balls.

When learning a new visual aiming system, and there are many, until the eyes, brain, and body are trained or retrained there's a fumbling and stumbling period before it becomes ingrained. But like I said about Joe, it's moronic and idiotic to NOT use it on every shot because it does become like the sights on a gun to be highly focused as a sniper is using the crosshairs. Feel shooting is like shining a regular flashlight from the CB to the OB and illuminating them. A highly refined aiming system is like using a LASER light beam from the CB to the OB. I've used the flashlight method for 15 years but I now know the LASER method is far more accurate and consistent.

That takes us full circle to my first comment and I'd prefer just to agree to disagree on whatever it is you disagree with.

Since neither one of us will ever agree, that's our only option.
 
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Since neither one of us will ever agree, that's our only option.

Hi Dave,

Dan is right. You really have no idea what it means to play "by feel."

It's not just fumbling around and praying the balls find their way into the pocket.

Let's say you set up a 22* left cut to the corner pocket with the CB and OB 2 diamonds apart. We'll use a progression of CTE so you can hopefully have a better understanding of feel.

- The first 100 shots, you use CTE. Very strict and focused with getting the visuals just right, and you are using a manual pivot.

- Then you shoot it 100 more times with the same focus, but this time you are using Pro One with a visual sweep.

By the time you are done with that, you should be able to approach the shot, and just drop down and make the ball. And if you come across a shot that has a little bit more or less of an angle, your subconscious kicks in, and will put you on the shot line.

It's no different when a ball is hanging in the pocket. You don't need CTE for a shot like that. You just get down and fire it in the hole. THAT, is playing by feel.
 
Hi Dave,

Dan is right. You really have no idea what it means to play "by feel."

It's not just fumbling around and praying the balls find their way into the pocket.


Oh Jesus!! 25 years of living on a pool table and I have no idea what it means to play by feel.

Would you like to have a wing shot contest for a couple of grand?
 
Since neither one of us will ever agree, that's our only option.

I'm pretty sure you don't understand most of what I've been saying, so you can have the last word.

Oh, how did you learn to shoot wing shots so well? Did you learn the Evelyn Wood version of CTE? (look it up)
 
I'm pretty sure you don't understand most of what I've been saying, so you can have the last word.

I'm pretty sure you don't understand most of what I've been saying as well as Neil, so I'll gladly take the last word. Don't be an Indian giver or liar.
Lying is a sin and will preclude you from being considered for Sainthood.


Oh, how did you learn to shoot wing shots so well? Did you learn the Evelyn Wood version of CTE? (look it up)

How did YOU learn the way to use CTE so well? The Rainman/ Stevie Wonder version?
 
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It gets old hearing you and others make the same false claims over and over. It has been answered. You just don't comprehend the answer, so you dismiss it. You can't comprehend it because you don't have an open enough mind to do so. In your mind, there is no way it can work, so it never will for you.

Ok, my bad. "The balls present themselves differently on the table." Got it now. How could I have been so dense? (not to mention Bob Jewett, a real life instructor, Dr. Dave, a real life instructor, Mark Wilson, a real life instructor and Landon Shuffett's coach (how's that for irony). We're all blind to the Truth.

I just thought of a good idea. Why don't you humor us and tell us one more time how you get different shot angles for the same visuals? Oh, and please don't tell me in a private message like one unnamed person said that you don't understand it and Stan seems to deny what he is clearly doing with his body position in the video when you have a conversation with him about it. (and then say something to the opposite effect in the forum like some people did last time I was in the aiming forum).

And, for you to state for a fact things which you simply just don't know about, such as everyone only shoots by feel, only makes you look foolish.

If you learned how to nest quotes maybe you wouldn't misinterpret what I have been saying over and over.
 
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