Break Stats -- World Pool Series, 8-Ball Classic Championship, August 2018

Here are some 8-Ball stats from the seventh event (third of 2018) of Darren Appleton's World Pool Series -- the 2018 8-Ball Classic Championship. It was played August 7-10 at the IDM Club in Bucharest, Romania with free live streaming on the Facebook page of the World Pool Series.

This was a 47-player event, with double elimination down to the final 16 players (races to 11, with a shootout at hill/hill) and then single elimination (races to 13 until the finals, then 17, with a shootout at hill/hill). The winner was Chris Melling, defeating Jayson Shaw in the final match.

The conditions for the streamed matches in this event included:

The stats are for the 16 streamed matches (302 games plus 2 shootouts). These matches represented 19% of the total of 85 matches played in the event. These matches are listed here in the order in which they were played. Fourteen of the games in these matches are not included in the stats -- 13 because a different table was on camera during those games and 1 because the stream was down while they restarted it to improve the video.

Tuesday, Aug. 7, 2018

Wednesday, Aug. 8

Thursday, Aug. 9 -- All Quarterfinal matches

Friday, Aug. 10

Overall results

Here's a breakdown of the 288 games (for match winners and losers combined).


Break-and-run games: The 88 break-and-run games represented 31% of all 288 games, 62% of the 142 games won by the breaker, and 53% of the 167 games in which the break was successful (made a ball and didn't foul).

With alternating breaks, B&R "packages" of the normal type are not possible. But we can still look at the breaks of a given player and see how many he ran on his own successive breaks, and we can call these "alternate-break packages." The 88 break-and-run games consisted of 1 alternate-break 5-pack (by Melling), 5 alternate-break 3-packs (by Kazakis, Shaw, Kaçi, Hohmann, and Melling), 13 alternate-break 2-packs, and 42 singles.

8-balls on the break:
The 8-ball was never made on the break in the streamed matches (it would not have counted as a win).

Miscellany from the data for the 2018 8-Ball Classic Championship -- World Pool Series event #3 of 2018
[This relates only to the 16 streamed matches, not to all the matches in the event.]

• The most balls made on a single break was 4, done three times -- once each by Kazakis (B&R), Charmantzis (scratched on that break and lost the game), and Shaw (B&R).

• The average number of balls made on the break was 0.9 (this includes dry and fouled breaks). On successful breaks (made at least one ball and did not foul), the average was 1.4.

• 73% (209 of 288) of the games ended in one inning – 31% (88) won by the breaker (B&R) and 42% (121) won by the non-breaker. 19% of the games (55 of 288) ended in the second inning of either the breaker or non-breaker, and just 9% (24 of 288) went beyond the second inning.

• 56% (161 of 288) of the games were run out by the player who was at the table following the break. These run-outs were:

• The player who made the first ball after the break:

• The loser won an average of 5.1 games in the races to 11 and 7.3 games in the races to 13. Two of the matches went to hill/hill and a shootout. The largest margin of victory was Shaw d. Kaçi 13-3.

• The average minutes per game for all 16 matches (excluding time for the two shootouts) was 6.5. The elapsed time for each match was measured from the lag until the last ball was made (or conceded), so it includes time for racking and timeouts (but excludes the 13 minute intermission during the final match).

• The race to 11 that was both longest in elapsed time (145 min.) and highest in average minutes per game (7.3 min./game) was Kazakis d. Zielinski 11-9.

• The race to 11 that was both shortest in elapsed time (62 min.) and lowest in average minutes per game (4.7 min./game) was Kaçi d. Charmantzis 11-2.

• The race to 13 that was longest in elapsed time (204 min.) was Ladanyi d. Gorst 13-11. The race to 13 that was highest in average minutes per game (9.1 min./game) was Ladanyi d. Chinahov 13-6.

• The race to 13 that was both shortest in elapsed time (89 min.) and lowest in average minutes per game (5.6 min./game) was Shaw d. Kaçi 13-3.

• Breaking fouls averaged 1 for every 20.6 games, other fouls 1 for every 9.3 games, and missed shots about 1 for every 1.9 games.

• About 11% of the games involved one or more safeties.

MattPoland said:

Given the finals, I wonder how successful breaks 58% compares in this tournament to other 8-ball tournaments in similar conditions. ...

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Your "in similar conditions" is the kicker. This was the 5th 8-Ball event in Appleton's WPS, and the rules/conditions have differed to at least some degree in each of them. Here's a stats comparison I posted last year after WPS #4: https://forums.azbilliards.com/showpost.php?p=6012799&postcount=3

I may well add to that comparison shortly.

Catalin said:

I believe players are allowed to use jump cues, but only when the opponent snookers them, not when they snooker themselves.

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No, Appleton changed that for this event -- no jump cues allowed, and no use of break cues for jumping.

BRussell said:

Shaw was complaining about the racks after the finals.

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Hmmm. Same racker for Melling as for Shaw. Melling was successful on 12 of his 15 breaks, Shaw on 6 of his 14.

pt109 said:

The speedifying of Klenti
Again he was involved in some of the fastest matches.

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Well, the quick matches I mentioned for him are a little misleading. In the real speedy match at 4.7 min./game, his opponent was hopelessly outplayed and Kaçi could kind of freewheel it. In the other one (5.6 min./game), Kaçi didn't spend much time at the table, and Shaw made about three-quarters of the balls that were pocketed.

One of Kaçi's other matches was a slow one, and the players were put on a shot clock.

Here's a further extension of the stats comparisons I have posted after each of the World Pool Series 8-Ball events.

A significant change from most 8-Ball events in the first WPS event was breaking outside a 2-diamonds-wide central box. The second WPS event narrowed the allowable breaking area even more, to about a half-diamond width off of either side rail, and used a table with even tighter pockets for most of the streamed matches. For the third and fourth events, the allowable breaking area was widened to what it was for the first event, and the table was at least as tight as in the second event. For the fifth WPS 8-Ball event, they switched to a template rack and reverted to allowing breaking from anywhere behind the line.

The 10 events compared here are:


All 10 events were on 9-foot tables. The first 5 events used Diamond tables, the first 3 with standard pro-cut 4½" pockets and the 2 US Opens with 4¼" corners. WPS event #1 used a Brunswick Gold Crown with 4¼" corners. But I doubt that the difficulty factor for this Brunswick was any higher than for the pro-cut Diamonds (shallower shelf depth on the Brunswick, e.g.). Most of the streamed matches for WPS event #2 used a Rasson table with corner pockets just a bit over 4". WPS event #3 used a Rasson table with 4" corner pockets and 4½" side pockets. WPS event #4 used a Rasson table with 4” corner pockets, 4½” side pockets, and hard pocket facings. The fifth WPS 8-Ball event used a Rasson table with 4¼" corner pockets and 4¾" side pockets. The first 4 WPS events used a regular triangle instead of a breaking template, and that may have had an effect on the stats. The WPS events also had several other differences in the rules/conditions, but I doubt that they caused any significant difference in the stats. The field strength for the streamed matches was high for all 10 events.

Successful breaks (made at least one ball and did not foul):

Breaker won the game:

Break-and-run games, on all breaks:

Break-and-run games, on successful breaks:

Runouts by the player at the table following the break:

Games won by the player at the table following the break:

Games ending in one inning (by B&R or on non-breaker's first visit):

Approx. number of games involving safeties:

Average number of balls made on all breaks and on successful breaks:

Average number of minutes per game:

Clearly, the equipment and rules have significant effects on the statistical results. Moving from the first two events to the third, we saw the effect of not having an open table after the break -- a reduction in the rate of run-outs from the break and in the breaker's win percentage. The fourth and fifth events were with tighter pockets, but were back to an open table after the break.

In the first four WPS events, we saw that breaking outside a central box and using a regular triangle instead of a breaking template had a further effect in making the game more difficult -- lower success rates on the break, reductions in B&R's and breaker wins, and more player interaction. The extra-difficult pockets on the streaming table in WPS #4 made it the most difficult table for breaking and pocketing balls in all of these events. Then for the most recent WPS event, they kept the take-what-you-make-more-of rule but widened the pockets a bit, switched to a breaking template, and eliminated the breaking box.

So Darren Appleton's tweaks to the WPA rules certainly made the game more difficult for top pros. But apparently his feedback was that he had gone too far with WPS#4, so he made things easier in this most recent event. But he has indicated that any future WPS events may be 9- or 10-Ball, so we'll have to wait and see whether his experiments with 8-Ball are over.