Mud slow cloth and modern balls.

I have gone through most of the threads regarding cloth for 14.1.

My question is this.

Can good 14.1 be played on MUD slow cloth, with today's balls?

For instance, there is the argument that back in the day, you needed a stroke to play, cause everything was on nappy slow cloth.
But if i remember correctly, weren't the balls different back in the day?
Like, clay balls, or ivory balls?

I am just wondering, because whenever i am at a place that has mud cloth, i feel as if i have, no, let me rephrase that...I KNOW i have the stroke to get the cue ball to work, but it seems as if the cue ball itself, doesn't have any traction and doesn't plow through the stack like i want it to.

This seems to be consistent in most places i go that have really slow cloth.

Reason the modern balls stick out in my mind is because, back in the day, one of the older guys in the pool room came in with an ivory cue ball, and he let me use it while i was practicing, and it opened up a whole new world.
THAT cue ball had some amazing grip/traction, and i would over stroke everything till i got used to it, but it muscled it's way through stacks of balls with EASE. Like a bulldozer.

To this day, i have never played with anything that comes close to performing like that ivory cue ball did.
I am starting to think that despite slower conditions, that back in the day, making the cue ball "work" might have been easier with ivory and clay balls and that the whole argument that comes up..."Well, back in the day, you needed a stroke to play pool", etc etc, is basically moot.
At least it seems that way for 14.1.

Any thoughts from some of the veterans?
Cause i honestly can't see ANYONE posting up major high runs on mud with modern balls.
I can see high runs on fast and medium speed cloth, but not on mud.

mosconiac said:

Was the ivory CB heavier than the OB's? The reason I ask is if your CB gets more than about ~1/4 ounce heavier than the OB's, they seem to jump out of the way of the CB. Ivory being a heavy material, could be a mismatch for modern (plastic) OB's.

Click to expand...

Good question.
Honestly, I could not tell you the weight of the ball.
But it didn't play like a heavy ball at all.

All i could remember was, I could draw the ball a mile, and i could go through balls forever.
Even if it was heavier, i can't do both those things with ease, with a heavy ball today. Sure i might plow through balls, but drawing the ball is a BITTCH.

And when doing side by side comparison, the ivory ball did 10 times the work that the regular cue ball did. On all shots.
Follow, draw, inside, outside, everything.
My buddies and myself were all kind of amazed that it just had such good traction that modern balls didn't.

I'd be willing to bet that it was the ivory that made Mosconi's cueball act like a bulldozer.

I know that the "out of round" cueballs were swapped out for new ones recently in the local pool hall.
I am actually tempted to go buy one of the old balls and then do a test where i score the outside of the ball ever so slightly with a razor blade in a couple of spots to give it "traction" and see exactly how it responds to the pack.

The scoring isn't going to stop the cueball from "bouncing" off the pack because of the weight difference, but i want to see if it aggressively plows it's way through the balls AFTER that.