I have seen my share of lucky shots or leaves but...

In 10 years of playing apa i thought i had seen it all but a shot last night will be etched in my memory forever.

Faced a 6 in last nights 8 ball vegas qualifier. I am a 5. It went back and forth until it was hill -hill.

I am going to describe the scenario the best i can.. I play a safe and leave the cue ball near the top left corner. My opponent has solids and the 3 ball is froze against my 15 on the rail inches below the left side pocket.

His 5 ball is about a diamond off the side rail and a diamond from the bottom rail near the bottom left pocket. It is blocked by 3 of my stripes. I see him line up trying to skim the 3 ball hitting one of my balls and knocking the 5 into the corner. He rares back and it seems like he is going to smack the 3 at warp speed but thinks better of it because the 8 ball is on the rail right below the 3.

So he resets and smackes the cue ball at mach 1 speed instead. Sure enough he skims the 3 hitting my ball into the 5. The 5 misses the pocket and hits the bottom rail dead on and bounces back up table hitting the 3 and sending it into the top left pocket.

The 5 stops dead center of the left side pocket for an easy stop shot and then roll the 8 down the rail into the bottom left pocket..

I dont like losing...heck nobody does but its absolutely frustrating to lose a match on a shot like that. Well back to the tournament this morning.

ShootingArts said:

Slop bothered me because I considered it luck. Then one day I realized some people's style of play leads to a lot more slop shots. Leads to more scratches too, so a bit of a wash.

Once I accepted that some people were going to "get lucky" more often due to their style of play I accepted it and it no longer disturbed me. A person's reaction to a slop shot can do a lot more damage than the shot. It stuck in my head when I considered it pure luck.

Hu

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Its probably odd that a guy who played in bars for years and hates slop as much as i do plays apa but i gotta say that overall i really enjoy it and cant say enough good about our league operators..I

It took a while to accept slop as you mentioned and kind of come to expect it from lower level players. For some reason though it has really gotten to where it has affected me like never before and as a result lower levels are kicking my azz in 9 ball.

Another story about this weekend is a friend ....young guy in his early 20's who has improved from a 4 to a 6 in both 8 and 9 this last year challenged me to a match for 20 bucks. This was after a lil good natured smack talk back and forth between us. I told him 20 bucks was not worth my time taking him to pool school.

He then ups it to 40. I refused both apa rules 8 ball and 9 ball telling him i dont gamble on any game involving luck and suggested race to 7 ten ball. 10 spotted if falls on the break and an early 10 is good if called.

I get up 6-3 when we have to stop due to the pool hall closing. The game really aint that close because i handed him 2 racks on a silver platter due to failing to focus which i promptly corrected during the rest of the match.

Now i gotta listen to him calling me a sandbagger...good natured of course. He dont realize there is a huge difference between slop games and call pocket. He thinks just because he can beat me in slop 8 ball or slop 9 ball that he is a better player than me.

Cocky younguns ...sometimes you just gotta show them they aint as good as they think they are.