The closer to dead-center that the cue ball strikes the object ball, the more of its

two questions?

iusedtoberich said:

Well now that this thread is about center ball, every time this topic comes up, many people say it’s better to stay super close to center. But, this does NOT jive with what pro players do. You can easily see from the CB reaction they use some to a lot of spin on nearly every single shot.

When McCready posted here a lot 15 years ago, he would answer these questions with saying you need to use ALL the CB. Same when Earl was on here many many years ago.

For proof that anyone can see, simply watch the pocketing of the 9 ball by a pro. Usually the 9 stays near the spot if the rack was tight, and a pro will have a similar cut angle on it with the CB about a diamond away from the side pocket. You can bet your house no pro on earth is hitting this shot with no spin. They are all drawing and outside spin this shot 2 rails out of the corner, and sometimes they hit it hard enough it goes all the way to the other end of the table.

If a pro is using spin on the 9 when no position is required, how can you claim they are not on balls 1 through 8 when position is required.

Click to expand...

Why the huge market for low deflection shafts, including from the pro's?

Follow up: How much squirt and deflection do you get when staying on the center axis?

In the interest of verifying your contentions I skimmed through a couple of major nine ball matches, some of Shane vs Niels 2018 world finals and for more flamboyant players, an older match with Efren and Dennis O. I didn't find any examples of players sending the cue ball around the table for no reason or using spin for no reason on the money ball. Spin on the nine ball sometimes but it was to protect the cue ball. The cue ball rarely rolled far enough to even reach a pocket.

Most of the time the nine ball was closer to the foot rail rather than in the rack area. When the shot was much as you describe they mostly used plain draw or stun with little or no side to kill the cue ball. I can't think of any reason to use much running(outside) english and draw in combination when you don't have to squeeze into a particular path or reach a particular spot.

Video seems to show the pro's do what they need to do to pocket the money ball and keep the cue ball safe, no more.

Hu

Patrick Johnson said:

Apparently in response to a misreading of the title.

The title is about ball/ball contact. All the replies (including the OP's) are about tip/ball contact.

pj
chgo

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Ha Ha, you're right and I'm wrong. I misread it and replied about cue tip contact with the cue ball. My bad there. The importance of making a good hit (close to center ball) on the cue ball will remain for another thread to decipher.

I can't believe all the nonsense I keep reading about pool, written by people who may know the physics, but haven't the slightest idea of how pool is to be played practically.

1. Energy in the object ball is actually bad! It's mindblowing that this has to be said out loud, but that's what we've come to! You want the object ball travelling at the slowest speed possible into the pocket (*as long as it is fast enough not to be subject to table roll, and fast enough to hit the facing of the pocket and still go in). A few bankshots and other exceptions do exist, but for normal shots at the pocket this principle does mostly apply. We use spin of various types to allow the cueball to travel WITHOUT imparting too much energy (speed) into the object ball. This means that we play for large angles for long cueball movements and lesser angles for lesser movement (usually).

2. Sidespin in particular, is useful when you want a large angle (to allow for much movement of the cueball), but yet want to hit the ball softly with control. The large angle can sometimes make it tough to manipulate the tangent angle, so we adjust the angle off the rails with side. We don't always have the luxury of using center ball angles. All this nonsense about sidespin making the shot less accurate, fails to take into account that playing a ball softly will make the pocket play twice as large, in some cases even more. Again, it's insane that this has to be said. I can't believe experienced players do not know this, but I keep seeing idiotic pattern play, and I guess misunderstandings such as this is at the root cause.

3. Sidespin allows for diagonal movements with the cueball, even when the object ball is close to the rails. Diagonal routes are the roads to victory. Diagonal routes will allow you to play into the angles, rather than across them.

4. Sidespin allows for easy control of long position shots, by spin reversal. A running spin shot will often reverse after 3 or more rails, allowing for huge margins of error on otherwise tricky shots.

5. No,f this...I don't have the energy for this nonsense. Keep playing center ball, and keep rattling balls for all I care.

I don’t read the new york times much, but we’ve all seen their formula for decades- any artice that begins, “Twenty-five miles southwest of Chicago, the fourteen hundred scientists of the Argonne National Laboratory...” is going to be a multi pager, not a few paragraphs.

For those who are relatively new to billiards forums, and the Internet of billiards in the first place, article is focusing on Ron Shephard, a long time Internet poster who has stayed away from the forums for quite a while now. We all owe everything we know about the physics of this game to a few people. Bob Jewett and Ron Shepherd are the two in my lifetime that have provided the vast vast vast vast vast majority of scientific knowledge of this game to the pool playing public.

Freddie <~~~ thanks, Ron

For once I would just love someone to post a video of a pro running out a rack of 9/10 ball while staying on the vertical axis. This includes Buddy Hall.

I won't hold my breath.

Straightpool_99 said:

...f this...I don't have the energy for this nonsense.

Click to expand...

Try realizing that before all the whining.

pj <- sorry we let you down again
chgo

Bob Jewett said:

... The speed of the cue ball just after the collision is proportional to the sine of the cut angle; the speed of the object ball is proportional to the cosine of the cut angle.

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And the sum of their speeds is (approximately) equal to the CB's speed just before contact?

pj
chgo

iusedtoberich said:

Well now that this thread is about center ball, every time this topic comes up, many people say it’s better to stay super close to center. But, this does NOT jive with what pro players do. You can easily see from the CB reaction they use some to a lot of spin on nearly every single shot.



When McCready posted here a lot 15 years ago, he would answer these questions with saying you need to use ALL the CB. Same when Earl was on here many many years ago.



For proof that anyone can see, simply watch the pocketing of the 9 ball by a pro. Usually the 9 stays near the spot if the rack was tight, and a pro will have a similar cut angle on it with the CB about a diamond away from the side pocket. You can bet your house no pro on earth is hitting this shot with no spin. They are all drawing and outside spin this shot 2 rails out of the corner, and sometimes they hit it hard enough it goes all the way to the other end of the table.



If a pro is using spin on the 9 when no position is required, how can you claim they are not on balls 1 through 8 when position is required.

Click to expand...

I feel like I’ve watched every nine ball professional match on YouTube a couple times each as I have eight hours a day to kill at work And I one hundred percent agree with all of this.


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Cornerman said:

For those who are relatively new to billiards forums, and the Internet of billiards in the first place, article is focusing on Ron Shephard, a long time Internet poster who has stayed away from the forums for quite a while now. We all owe everything we know about the physics of this game to a few people. Bob Jewett and Ron Shepherd are the two in my lifetime that have provided the vast vast vast vast vast majority of scientific knowledge of this game to the pool playing public.

Freddie <~~~ thanks, Ron

Click to expand...

I wondered where he went. I remember his posts from the rec.sport.billiard days. Didn't know if he had a different handle on here. Not everyone transitioned to web forums for various reasons.

Those were the best threads back then. The Usenet had so much great info. Way ahead of its time. What I see on AZ, FB, Youtube and all that - is much of that info rehashed via a more accessible medium. Figure, most people who had Internet access were on dial-up in those days, and most people in general were not even on dial-up or the Internet for that matter.

Revolutionary in a way. Prior to the Usenet what did we have? Nothing. Largely useless books on pool ( a few exceptions )...there was never a single book dealing with detailed info on the game, or advanced matters. Nothing of real substance for anyone beyond a beginner. Pool always had a culture of secrecy. Knowledge was power. Every little bit of information about the game that could potentially improve one's game was not freely shared. That marked the end of that era.

Pool info, whether scientific or instructional is now all open source. Like it should be.

The only potential downside is a bit of information overload we have these days. There's always some noise mixed in with the signal. But...if one can stick to what matters - what a truly great time to live in if you want to learn pool. So much easier to get better and faster with all the available info and resources.

I didn't get caught up on the whole thread yet, but I wanted to show the example of one shot nearly every current pro on the planet plays with low outside on the 9 ball. I shot it low outside first shot, and center ball second shot. I can find examples of this actual shot on real pro matches, but that is a lot more work then me demonstrating it. Plus, I get to hit the balls this way:grin-square::grin-square:

Video is about 10 seconds long for short attention spans:grin-square::grin-square:

https://youtu.be/WqCuyiGVwcQ

Again, the point of this video is to show that if pro's preferred to play center ball, they would all shoot this shot with center ball.

iusedtoberich said:

...if pro's preferred to play center ball, they would all shoot this shot with center ball.

Click to expand...

I don't think what pros do is an infallible indicator of what's best to do.

pj
chgo

iusedtoberich said:

I didn't get caught up on the whole thread yet, but I wanted to show the example of one shot nearly every current pro on the planet plays with low outside on the 9 ball. I shot it low outside first shot, and center ball second shot. I can find examples of this actual shot on real pro matches, but that is a lot more work then me demonstrating it. Plus, I get to hit the balls this way:grin-square::grin-square:

Video is about 10 seconds long for short attention spans:grin-square::grin-square:

https://youtu.be/WqCuyiGVwcQ

Again, the point of this video is to show that if pro's preferred to play center ball, they would all shoot this shot with center ball.

Click to expand...

Your table has the measles. You should get that checked out, it may be contagious.

My middle son is a senior in hs and is being recruited by the physics departments of University of Tampa and Emory Riddle to name a few. He's thinking of getting into computational physics. But I can still give his butt the wild 7&8 and three on the wire to 7. And for all I know sine and cosine are what you do when you get a loan. I think some people are over thinking it here.

As I've said before, I've played my share of pros. I can say from personal experience that every pro I've played or watched play, used some sort of spin on almost every shot.

I can see where people watching from the cheap seats and especially online would MISTAKE most of their strikes being a lot closer to center than they actually are seeing how they are striking close to center ball but "close to center", is not "center ball", it's "close".

???

iusedtoberich said:

I didn't get caught up on the whole thread yet, but I wanted to show the example of one shot nearly every current pro on the planet plays with low outside on the 9 ball. I shot it low outside first shot, and center ball second shot. I can find examples of this actual shot on real pro matches, but that is a lot more work then me demonstrating it. Plus, I get to hit the balls this way:grin-square::grin-square:

Video is about 10 seconds long for short attention spans:grin-square::grin-square:

https://youtu.be/WqCuyiGVwcQ

Again, the point of this video is to show that if pro's preferred to play center ball, they would all shoot this shot with center ball.

Click to expand...

You just demonstrated what you do as an indication what the pro's do? I went and skimmed through several matches watching them shoot the last shot or two of most games, bandwidth issues and no real interest in watching the whole matches. However, not one of the players sent the cue ball sailing like your first shot. You are specifically talking about using a lot of side spin in this thread and I don't think there is a pro in the world that would use more than a touch of outside, doubt they would use that. More likely if they use any side a touch of inside to help kill the cue ball.

Out of the somewhere between one and two dozen shots I reviewed when a pro shot a shot similar to what you demonstrated the cue ball never reached a rail. Four rails? I think you will be the one digging long and hard to find shots to back up your claim, much less "all" pros playing like this. In fact your second shot which is closer to center ball should be obviously the better choice even to you. Watch your own video.

Hu

ShootingArts said:

You just demonstrated what you do as an indication what the pro's do? I went and skimmed through several matches watching them shoot the last shot or two of most games, bandwidth issues and no real interest in watching the whole matches. However, not one of the players sent the cue ball sailing like your first shot. You are specifically talking about using a lot of side spin in this thread and I don't think there is a pro in the world that would use more than a touch of outside, doubt they would use that. More likely if they use any side a touch of inside to help kill the cue ball.



Out of the somewhere between one and two dozen shots I reviewed when a pro shot a shot similar to what you demonstrated the cue ball never reached a rail. Four rails? I think you will be the one digging long and hard to find shots to back up your claim, much less "all" pros playing like this. In fact your second shot which is closer to center ball should be obviously the better choice even to you. Watch your own video.



Hu

Click to expand...

It’s a shame there is not a good way to bet on this I would bet large on I used to be rich. I have watched thousands of nine ball matches from every pro and I’ve never seen them once shoot the nine ball with center ball the way I used to be rich did, they always always use outside English and go two three and four rails.


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And I’m not trying to be argumentative to be a dick I’m trying to help people I believe I understand the reasons that they shoot it with outside. The pros truly believe the only way that they are going to miss is due to skid or cling or kick so they use the outside English and extra speed to eliminate that Factor.

The only way to hit at the speed they want to is to go two, three or four rails to guarantee no scratch.

Also they are so used to playing with outside low English On every shot because that is the correct way to hold the cue ball That it is easier to shoot it with low outside than center ball for them.

Players that have not hit 1 million balls are going to be more successful using just center ball but if you are really want to take it to the next level you have to shoot 9 ball racks with English on most of your shots.

One last little thing it intimidates your opponents.



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