Odds for a player in Snooker to...

u12armresl

u12armresl

One Pocket back cutter
Silver Member
With the O'Sullivan opponent breaking them wide open it made me think.
What are the odds of someone breaking the reds wide open and making a 147.

Have to be close to 0 wouldn't it?
If anyone could do it, would Ronnie be the only one, maybe Judd?
 
straightline said:
Off the top of my head, your odds of making a ball might be real good. The odds of making difficult layouts would be pretty good as well. And what if you made two reds?
Click to expand...
I'm thinking balls frozen to side rails, and having to get back on the 7 ball 14 more times.
 
u12armresl said:
I'm thinking balls frozen to side rails, and having to get back on the 7 ball 14 more times.
Click to expand...
Most of the rail shots they avoid are bankable but to me this is a problem with the jaws. Get rid of those no access pockets and you could do some real shooting.
 
u12armresl said:
With the O'Sullivan opponent breaking them wide open it made me think.
What are the odds of someone breaking the reds wide open and making a 147.

Have to be close to 0 wouldn't it?
If anyone could do it, would Ronnie be the only one, maybe Judd?
Click to expand...
Long odds for sure. Ronnie at one time contemplating a 147 left handed, so I wouldn't put it past him.
I thought I read or heard that Vafaei did it because Ronnie did it to him once. However there's a time and place for everything. Playing Ronnie in the World Championship ain't the time for that break off.
 
gregcantrall said:
Long odds for sure. Ronnie at one time contemplating a 147 left handed, so I wouldn't put it past him.
I thought I read or heard that Vafaei did it because Ronnie did it to him once. However there's a time and place for everything. Playing Ronnie in the World Championship ain't the time for that break off.
Click to expand...
To me, the only thing Vafaei said with that break-off is: "I already give up, you won, congrats."
 
straightline said:
Off the top of my head, your odds of making a ball might be real good. The odds of making difficult layouts would be pretty good as well. And what if you made two reds?
Click to expand...
Odds of making a red is slim to none, because of the difficult pockets with rounded jaws that don't allow a ball going in off the jaw. And even if a red drops, making a 147 is not going to happen because you have to get back to black on every red with the reds all over the place. If you make 2 reds, you get 2 points and a 147 is now impossible.
 
gregcantrall said:
Ronnie made a red with his, Vafaei didn't. Does that make it 50% chance?
Click to expand...
50% over the 2 occurrences we mentioned here, sure.
I'll show you some more occurrences, so we'll have some data to talk about:

This Quentin Hann you see here, was notorious for the 'smash break-off' in the nineties. (also notorious for match fixing, but that's another matter)
In this video he makes a red one time out of four break-offs, and to me he seems particularly happy it happens that one time.
Btw, also Jimmy White does a smash breakoff (and makes a red) but that was in a demonstration game.

Pay extra attention to the spread of the reds after the break-off, they are all over the place which makes the table a minefield if you want to put a nice break together (let alone a 147).

I'll admit, I said 'slim to none' to emphasize my point a little bit. The is a chance a red will drop, but the chance you give your opponent an open table is far larger so it's just generally never a good idea.
Come to think of it: I remember watching a 1P game where Corey Deuel broke the rack as an 8ball break where he hit the 2nd ball. I seem to remember he was about 50-50 successful.
 
Last edited:
hotelyorba said:
Odds of making a red is slim to none, because of the difficult pockets with rounded jaws that don't allow a ball going in off the jaw. And even if a red drops, making a 147 is not going to happen because you have to get back to black on every red with the reds all over the place. If you make 2 reds, you get 2 points and a 147 is now impossible.
Click to expand...
Exactly.
What happens if one or more of the colors goes in?
 
The reds can be scattered and still left safe... high risk pots with no safe path back to baulk.

I have also heard it said that it is actually more difficult to make a big break because there are more obstructions in the way to get onto high scoring balls like pink and black.
 
quinten hann tried this back in the early 2000s.at the world's, He was not very successful.
He knew he couldn't win. So he just smashed the pack up,
 
My math isn’t good enough to give actual odds, but the chances of potting a ball are probably higher than most people think but lower than what would make it worthwhile. Probably 1 in 4 or 1 in 5.

But then getting the max is a tall order because those smash breaks tend to send the reds all over the table and it’s likely that you will put the black awkward. But if we were talking about setting about a camera in practice and doing endless attempts to get a break and run with a max, I’d argue that any player in the top 30 could theoretically do it.
 
Cameron Smith said:
My math isn’t good enough to give actual odds, but the chances of potting a ball are probably higher than most people think but lower than what would make it worthwhile. Probably 1 in 4 or 1 in 5.

But then getting the max is a tall order because those smash breaks tend to send the reds all over the table and it’s likely that you will put the black awkward. But if we were talking about setting about a camera in practice and doing endless attempts to get a break and run with a max, I’d argue that any player in the top 30 could theoretically do it.
Click to expand...
I'd like to see an insurance company do that for one year.
Snooker world would hate it.
$3M for a run of 147 off the break.
 
With the apparent attention to detail in snooker , I am sure the better players could develop a break that would consistently pocket a red.

Now Bob Jewett can attest to the randomness of results for the rest of the balls on the break. This would lead me to believe odds would be close to 1 in a 10,000 for a 147 from the break. A 155 would probably occur about as often. 😉
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top