One more for you Erik
OK, maybe I was a bit of a joyk in an earlier post, sorry. To make it up I’ll tell you about another game, although I doubt it’s what you’re after. It is however a nice story imo.
A friend invited me to his 50th birthday party a few years back. In his basement sits an ancient 9’ Brunswick that he grew up with, his father having ‘diverted’ it many decades ago after it was sold by a rural pool hall. The party was well attended by family, brothers and sisters and perhaps 20 teenage-ish nieces and nephews, plus a bunch of friends of all ages. His mother was there, but she didn't play. The birthday boy, a great athlete, fine pool player, and all-round games master (one of the few I’d trust to quickly and fairly prepare a up a 13 team curling draw or 37 man double knockout crokinole tournament) had invented a game to entertain the masses, and entertain them it did ! When I arrived the game was in full swing with maybe 25 playing and a dozen or more watching … they were all having a ball
The game was this. First, no cues are involved (say what ?). Second, nobody sits down and it's a bit hard to do any heavy drinking while playing. The simple objective of the game is to hand-roll the cue ball to contact the single object ball, a sort of “hand billiards”. Players ‘roll’ in rotation as established at the start of the game. Play continues with each player coming to the table in turn (more like fighting through hostile crowds), grabbing the cue ball BEFORE it stops rolling from the previous roll, then rolling (no throwing allowed, thank God!) it to hit the often still rolling (!) object ball. A player is eliminated after three strikes. Last player without 3 strikes wins. One strike is recieved if they miss hitting the object ball with the cue ball, or if they can’t get to the cue ball before it stops rolling (despite often valiant efforts). They also get a strike for pocketing the cue ball on their roll or knocking either ball off the table, and the preceding player gets a strike when a player pockets the object ball with a legal hit. In all of these cases play stops, players gather their breath for the next few sprints around the table, and the next player in rotation starts with ball-in-hand (literally
) and rolls from the kitchen to hit the object ball set on the headspot … GAME ON !
The start of new games is chaotic to say the least. To help things along and avoid confusion (ya right !), an official called out the player order as they played. Occasional errors or slowness by this official (birthday boys wife) only added to the game from what I saw … no appeals could be heard, only laughter and good natured teasing. After the initial jostling rounds with 20 or more people moving rapidly (or not) around the table, things got a bit faster and louder. The survivors seemed to learn a few tricks usually designed to screw up the next roller, very 'dynamic' safety play in my eyes. I saw some back-tracking direction changes like I’ve only seen before from Marcus Allen in his prime ! Occasionally the cue ball would be flying a FL-like circuit around the table and the chaser would bounce this way and that in a futile effort to get in line for a grab. Tall kids seemed to do well for some reason I am not familiar with. The last few had some great finishes, often showing who had more cardio-vascular stamina, eye-hand coordination, and quick sense of anticipation, angle, and a little mean. As I watched the mayhem, not at all disappointed that I sat safely on the stairs, I remember thinking that I’d never seen so many people having so much fun around a pool table, and that’s got to be a good thing.
Dave
