Alignment Issue Question for Instructors

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ChrisinNC

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
One of our better young players is a left handed player who is mostly right eye dominant - as he aligns his head/eyes over the cue stick/shaft just slightly inside of his right eye, but closer to his right eye than directly between his eyes. He is a really good player, and has copied Ronnie O'Sullivan's snooker mechanics including firing his elbow through the stroke. After incredible improvement in his game his first 4-5 years of playing, he has hit a wall in his improvement, as he just can't figure out his alignment to feel confident and consistent in his shotmaking. He has never really been confident in figuring out exactly where his vision center is in that 1-1/4" range between the center of his right eye and directly between his eyes, and has experimented with various eye positions over the stroke, without much success in finding a consistent spot that feels most comfortable for him.

When observing and filming him from in front as well as behind him, when he thinks he's addressing his tip dead center cue ball he is actually addressing the cue ball clearly right of center with his cue shaft / tip. However, when he strokes, he must be making some kind of adjustment as when he actually strikes the cue ball he does appear to hit it virtually center ball.

When I align his tip up dead center on the cue ball, he feels like it's 1/4 to 1/2 tip of left english, and it feels very strange to him. Any ideas from the instructor regulars here or anyone else knowledgeable on this subject as to how I might be able to help him correct this issue? Is this a problem that any good players have, and can they get away with doing what he seems to be doing in somehow subconsciously correcting it during his stroke, or does he need to fix this now, to give him the best chance at continuing to improve? Thanks
 
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hang-the-9

hang-the-9

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
ChrisinNC said:
One of our better young players is a left handed player who is mostly right eye dominant - as he aligns his head/eyes over the cue stick/shaft just slightly inside of his right eye, but closer to his right eye than directly between his eyes. He is a really good player, and has copied Ronnie O'Sullivan's snooker mechanics including firing his elbow through the stroke. After incredible improvement in his game his first 4-5 years of playing, he has hit a wall in his improvement, as he just can't figure out his alignment to feel confident and consistent in his shotmaking. He has never really been confident in figuring out exactly where his vision center is in that 1-1/4" range between the center of his right eye and directly between his right eye, and has experimented with various eye positions over the stroke, without much success in finding a consistent spot that feels most comfortable for him.

When observing and filming him from in front as well as behind him, when he thinks he's addressing his tip dead center cue ball he is actually addressing the cue ball clearly right of center with his cue shaft / tip. However, when he strokes, he must be making some kind of adjustment as when he actually strikes the cue ball he does appear to hit it virtually center ball.

When I align his tip up dead center on the cue ball, he feels like it's 1/4 to 1/2 tip of left english, and it feels very strange to him. Any ideas from the instructor regulars here or anyone else knowledgeable on this subject as to how I might be able to help him correct this issue? Is this a problem that any good players have, and can they get away with doing what he seems to be doing in somehow subconsciously correcting it during his stroke, or does he need to fix this now, to give him the best chance at continuing to improve? Thanks
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My son is the same way, right handed but left eye dominant. His head is tilted and cue is way under his chest, along with his elbow jutting out to the side. He misses some cut shots all the time due to not being able to see the real lay of the balls.

So here is what my son did.. he started to play left handed. And actually got good very fast playing that way. A side effect of that, is when he plays right handed (he is still better that way), his alignment is much better.

Your player may need to work on his stance, feet and head alignment to maybe move more to the side (arm out from body more). It's really not an easy thing to do, especially once someone has spent years playing a certain way. My son has a very hard time with things and we have been working on his stance for years.
 
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ChrisinNC

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Just to clarify here, I respect some of the professional instructors that we are lucky enough to have here on the forum depend on and certainly deserve receiving an income for their expertise. For those who have experience working with players that have had this issue successfully, that are extremely confident they can help this young man, he is very motivated and passionate about the game and I'm sure would expect to have to pay a fee to receive professional instruction to help him correct this. In the case where logistically it may be hard for the two to get together, I assume an arrangement could be worked out for him to send videos of himself shooting to an instructor, for an agreed upon fee, to work together to see if they can resolve this problem.

I can only assume, for a player with this young man's potential and natural talent, this stagnation in his performance must at least somewhat be related to this issue.
 
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Low500

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Patrick Johnson

Patrick Johnson

Fish of the Day
Silver Member
ChrisinNC said:
When I align his tip up dead center on the cue ball, he feels like it's 1/4 to 1/2 tip of left english
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That clearly means his vision center is too far to the right of his stick.

Try getting the stick more under the eyes by moving the elbow and/or back shoulder closer to the body.

pj
chgo
 
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ChrisinNC

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Patrick Johnson said:
That clearly means his vision center is too far to the right of his stick.

Try getting the stick more under the eyes by moving the elbow and/or back shoulder closer to the body.

pj
chgo
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That concept of his vision center being different than where he has his eyes positioned over the cue makes the most logical sense to his problem. If his true vision center comes from the right of where he he's currently positioning his head/eyes over the shaft, it would make sense why he is addressing the ball to the right of centerball. We'll experiment with that next time he's in - thanks!
 
Patrick Johnson

Patrick Johnson

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ChrisinNC said:
That concept of his vision center being different than where he has his eyes positioned over the cue makes the most logical sense to his problem. If his true vision center comes from the right of where he he's currently positioning his head/eyes over the shaft, it would make sense why he is addressing the ball to the right of centerball. We'll experiment with that next time he's in - thanks!
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Yeah, because of the way our brains combine/interpret the views we get from our two eyeballs (one of which is usually more "dominant" than the other), we don't see things equally from both eyes - so centering the stick under one eye or exactly between them is often not best.

If you haven't already, take a look at Dr. Dave's Vision Center info.

pj
chgo
 
Cornerman

Cornerman

Cue Author...Sometimes
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ChrisinNC said:
When I align his tip up dead center on the cue ball, he feels like it's 1/4 to 1/2 tip of left english, and it feels very strange to him. Any ideas from the instructor regulars here or anyone else knowledgeable on this subject as to how I might be able to help him correct this issue?
... Thanks
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He needs to find his true center, and I suggest you give up on the "dominant eye" term.

I like the method that the Pool School instructors (RandyG and Scott Lee) teach. It's their method, so you'd need to ask them.

Additionally, you might want to try Joe Tucker's Third Eye Stroke Trainer:

https://www.seyberts.com/practice-aids/third-eye-stroke-trainer-with-dvd/


Freddie
 
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ChrisinNC

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Cornerman said:
He needs to find his true center, and I suggest you give up on the "dominant eye" term.

I like the method that the Pool School instructors (RandyG and Scott Lee) teach. It's their method, so you'd need to ask them.

Additionally, you might want to try Joe Tucker's Third Eye Stroke Trainer:

https://www.seyberts.com/practice-aids/third-eye-stroke-trainer-with-dvd/


Freddie
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Fred, so can I assume his true center is positioning his eyes over the shaft at that position where when he feels he is addressing the cue ball dead center he actually is addressing the cue ball dead center?
 
Cornerman

Cornerman

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Patrick Johnson

Patrick Johnson

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ChrisinNC said:
Fred, so can I assume his true center is positioning his eyes over the shaft at that position where when he feels he is addressing the cue ball dead center he actually is addressing the cue ball dead center?
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Yes.

pj <- full disclosure: not Fred
chgo
 
Cornerman

Cornerman

Cue Author...Sometimes
Gold Member
Silver Member
Patrick Johnson said:
What does "give up on" mean, Freddie?

pj
chgo
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I mean that too much has been written about "dominant eye," and it tends to confuse rather than help. Vision Center is a much more meaningful term in pool, especially if finding the center of the cueball is the goal.

"Aligning mostly over his right eye," as ChrisNC said of his left-handed student, is not an indication of "right eye dominant." It's simply an indication that the stick is under the right eye. There a ton of accomplished players that are right-eye dominant in the real world by standard layman dominant eye tests, but put the cue mostly under the left eye. That's another study in of itself that has nothing to do with eye dominance.

Freddie <~~~ one of the ton
 
Patrick Johnson

Patrick Johnson

Fish of the Day
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Cornerman said:
I mean that too much has been written about "dominant eye," and it tends to confuse rather than help. Vision Center is a much more meaningful term in pool, especially if finding the center of the cueball is the goal.

"Aligning mostly over his right eye," as ChrisNC said of his left-handed student, is not an indication of "right eye dominant." It's simply an indication that the stick is under the right eye. There a ton of accomplished players that are right-eye dominant in the real world by standard layman dominant eye tests, but put the cue mostly under the left eye. That's another study in of itself that has nothing to do with eye dominance.

Freddie <~~~ one of the ton
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Thanks for the explanation. I think it's often misunderstood too, but I might give it a little more credence as part of (not all of, and not the last word on) the "vision center" equation.

pj
chgo
 
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ChrisinNC

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Jimmorrison said:
Chris, did you see the recent SightRight thread?
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Yes, thanks. I referred him to that thread and website. There certainly seems to be no shortage of information out there regarding head / eye vision center alignment information that is currently available these days, for someone who has a problem and has the motivation to research it and overcome it. As it's hard to do on your own when you're actually shooting, that's where I'm trying to help this young man out by observing him, filming him, etc., even though I am not an instructor. I find this all extremely interesting.

Of all the players in our poolroom, he is the only one that seems to be concerned with his fundamentals, stroke, alignment, etc. in his determined quest to improve. I find it is no coincidence that due to that, he is the only player in our room that has continued to show progress/improvement in his game whereas most all the others are stuck, regardless of how much they play, due to flaws in their fundamentals, stroke, alignment, stance, pre-shot routine or whatever. That's why I'm really trying to help this young man, as he seems to have stagnated in his development, likely due to this "vision center" alignment problem he's struggled with since he started playing.
 
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Low500

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
ChrisinNC said:
Yes, thanks. I referred him to that thread and website. There certainly seems to be no shortage of information out there regarding head / eye vision center alignment information that is currently available these days, for someone who has a problem and has the motivation to research it and overcome it. As it's hard to do on your own when you're actually shooting, that's where I'm trying to help this young man out by observing him, filming him, etc., even though I am not an instructor. I find this all extremely interesting.
Of all the players in our poolroom, he is the only one that seems to be concerned with his fundamentals, stroke, alignment, etc. in his determined quest to improve. I find it is no coincidence that due to that, he is the only player in our room that has continued to show progress/improvement in his game whereas most all the others are stuck, regardless of how much they play, due to flaws in their fundamentals, stroke, alignment, stance, pre-shot routine or whatever. That's why I'm really trying to help this young man, as he seems to have stagnated in his development, likely due to this "vision center" alignment problem he's struggled with since he started playing.
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*Note to self*--- Stay away from this pool room in N.C. Sounds like this young man will clean somebody's clock very quickly.
By the way, any "bargains" in that pool room??.....I like to 'steal' without doing much work.:smile:
:thumbup:
 
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ChrisinNC

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Low500 said:
*Note to self*--- Stay away from this pool room in N.C. Sounds like this young man will clean somebody's clock very quickly.
By the way, any "bargains" in that pool room??.....I like to 'steal' without doing much work.:smile:
:thumbup:
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I hear the owner is a washed up old man who doesn't shy away from mixing it up with the road players that pass through looking for an easy score. Watch out though, he'll try to get you on that 10-foot table! - LOL
 
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tim913

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
I would start with baby steps first, I've seen quite a few really good players go downhill after seeking professional help. One of the regulars at our pool hall needed a little help with his position play and sought help. When he came back he had a whole different stance, new 'vision center', and struggled, struggled, struggled, after a while he quit all together! Not to say that if a player really has some major fundamental problems he shouldn't seek help but some players just need a little help, not a whole new makeover, and some instructors will see that, some won't. I've been to a few professionals myself.

Your player may just need a reference to 'center ball', that's all! Before you go for a whole new makeover, the next time you have him line up on center ball, have him cue low, all the way down on the cloth. Even if he is 1/32 of a tip off, because the ball is so small on the bottom, he'll see it and adjust. After a short time his brain will also adjust and he'll see actual center ball a lot clearer because of this reference point.

There were a lot of great players, side armed Hoppe and McCready, loose wristed Django, and others who, if they had a complete makeover, would not be the great players they were!
 
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