10-ball may be hurting pool in America

10ball is the future. And yes I am pissed.
America doesn't like 9 on the spot, America doesn't like break from the box, America is offended by 10ball....America, America...bla bla
America just lost Mosconi Cup once more because they play on fking kids tables.
I am so fed up with this rants around here...
Start practice like europeans and asians and complain less.
10ball is a complex game and eliminates the slop factor that 9ball has. Played by the real rules is more complicated and exciting to watch than 9ball.
I like 9/10/8 ball but if were up to me I'll play any tournament in US on 9/10ft tables. 7ft tables are for babies....whining babies
Chris@2015


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sixpack said:
I understand all the discussion about the break. The thing is though, the break was never intended to be a skill shot. It was supposed to be a random event, like a card shuffle, that kept the game interesting and made each rack unique.

It's appropriate and expected that players work hard to master it, but it does detract from the way the game was originally designed to be played.
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I disagree with that. It's hard to say that how something was originally intended to be play when skill level is something that varies.
That may of been the norm cause no one thought to do anything different or equipment didn't allow for it but change would be banned if only the "original" of something was to be expected.
I do agree that a player should not be punished for being better or putting in the time at being better.
 
Rockin' Robin said:
9-ball is the greatest thing to happen to pool in the last 50 years. Texas Express rules made the game much easier to understand for the newbies, and much more fun to play.

Bring the big $ entry fees like Texas Hold-em and watch the interest increase.

Most want to make the game more difficult....that is going backwards. Make the game even easier and more will play. 5 inch pockets would be a good start.

Playing for a thou a game or maybe a ball, and the pockets tend to shrink up a tad.

Don't take the luck out of the game....Maybe if Chris Moneymaker completely shit out on a world champ and took down the cash.....would be a god send to this game......then Joe Average would get off the stool and say.....Where do I sign up?
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I know most will not agree with you for this post, but I have a lot of agreement with you. Making the pros wobble balls on super tight pockets on TV makes the home player think the pros are not all that good. Who wants to watch a bunch of amateurs missing balls or playing safe because they have a little bit of a hard shot. And that is what tight pockets make the pros look like to the common person.
 
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Rockin' Robin said:
Most want to make the game more difficult....that is going backwards. Make the game even easier and more will play.
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Who cares how many people play? No sports fan base that make the sport economically viable is actively out there on the field competing with the pros. They are watching the sport on TV or live and the money in the sport comes from sponsorship, advertising, and merchandise.

Trying to dumb down the sport to draw in dead money entries for the pros to chop up is a ridiculous business model.

We do not need more people "playing" professional pool, we need more people watching it.
 
The Renfro said:
Small bone of contention... The "Frankenrack" We used at the MIH event was my Frankenstein and it is the Accu-Rack... It's made of polyester and mimics the friction of the cloth so the balls will react differently at different speeds... The material choice and geometry make it a little different animal which is why most of the professionals are behind us as the template of choice because it's not a 100% trickshot.. Darren and Jayson are on record that these are the best templates on the market period...


Chris, the rack you designed eliminates gaps between the balls and does make the break more predictable when properly struck, which SVB and Jayson beautifully demonstrated a few days ago. One change that I would have made is this: have the referee RANDOMLY select the racking pattern and then have the incoming player rack and break. Pattern racking produces those predictable layouts. The one ball and the cue ball will still need to be controlled, but the rest of the layout might be more varied.
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10, 9, 8....

I like rotation games for the position play involved... 8 ball is IMO an easier game as you can shoot at more than one of your OB's if you miss position. And I'm seeing a comeback of full rack rotation, which my pool buds and I play... now that's a challenge for position play... I don't don't think it'd make it on TV... same with One Pocket, my favorite game.

The 10 ball scene now is guys using the same break, same spot, pattern racking, etc.
I get where the OP is going... my take would be 9 ball, call the 9, 9 on the break doesn't count. IDK about calling every ball... then it's like 10 ball.
 
To me, 9 and 10 ball are pretty similar, and I don't see either of them as ideal game types.

They are both break and/or early safety play dominated, depending on the generosity of the table or rack or breaking expertise. Who wants to practice breaking or safeties or kicking for 6 hours a day... or watch it?

But they are the main determinants of who wins in these games!

For sub pro levels, the games are ok, because running 7 or 8 in rotation, is quite a challenge.

But as a TV sport, the worst part about rotation games is that the last few balls are 90%+ anticlimactic. Most of the time you could write the winner down quite safely several balls short of the final ball being made... how does that measure up to a knock out in boxing?

8-ball has the advantage of more often presenting a tough do-or-die shot, usually as the first to take on the out gets to a final 2 or 3 balls with opponents' balls presenting considerable hurdles to finishing the clearance.

The idea of team productions is interesting. The Mosconi Cup proves it is possible, but I think the game would be more effectively marketed, as it was in the old days, more like Boxing and UFC. At essence, the game is an individual sport, not one of team work.

Another point I'll mention is the calling for tighter and bigger tables. I'd prefer harder pro-version rules to harder tables. Tight hard tables is a recipe for turning away beginners from enjoying playing as an occasional enthusiast.

Colin
 
Celtic said:
Rotation pool as a whole hurt pool in America and has done so for decades.

Pool needs to figure out that the professional level of pool needs to provide appropriately professional level difficulty equipment akin to the challenge snooker provides. People need to actually appreciate the base difficulty of a game and feel the sense that any shot can be missed at any time if they are to be expected to watch the game and be kept captivated by it.

Once the equipment is appropriately tough we can see the pros play the game that the general public has "never" stepped away from despite professional pool and the Color of Money doing its best to market rotation pool. 8-ball is the "only" game the general public know and understand and is to this day the only game they give even the smallest shit about. Pool promoters and marketers have spent decades trying to force feed rotation pool onto the world with ZERO success and it is idiotic at this point.

We need tables appropriately tough to challenge pros at 8-ball, and then we need to finally start to see that game pushed and publicized.
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Have you seen Chinese 8-Ball? There is a lot of promise there along these lines.
 
10 Ball isn't hurting pool......the cue-makers, case makers, suppliers and affiliated cottage industries are.....neanderthal marketing and atrocious branding of their products.


I love 10 ball because there is no slop.......you should never be rewarded for making a ball in the wrong pocket or from pocketing a different object ball that you were shooting at and intended to pocket but missed and another object drops.......that's called slop and I hate it.....play 9 ball using called pockets and that's a much better game........too many players like to rely upon the element of luck......when you don't have a shot, blast the cluster and if any object ball drops, you keep shooting.......that's bullshit.

The U.S. Open Championship was changed for just that reason......too much luck determined the winner. It used to be played with the winner breaking the rack open and if something dropped, the player kept shooting and all 15 balls were pocketed. A new rack was started and the player last at the table would break again and so on and so forth.....and then a Frenchman, a previous U.S.Open winner, convinced the BCA....or Brunswick back then.....to leave the last ball of the rack out to start a new rack ......Hence, the game of 14.1 was created and remains today with the same rules.

There was too much luck with the old rules for the U.S. Open Championship and that's why the game was changed. Well, in 9 ball, even if you miss a shot badly but by accident another object ball unintentionally gets pocketed and you remain in control of the table......that's terrible and pure luck.....that's why I love 10 ball and hate 9 ball unless it is played with called pockets.......neither you nor your opponent should ever be rewarded from slop.....just my opinion.

Matt B.
 
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sixpack said:
Well stated. I have never really played 10-ball much because it came to prominence after I stopped competing regularly. I have started practicing it though the last year or so and I came to a very similar conclusion.

I can't speak to their motives with complete authority but I think that the people who came up with 10-ball wanted to solve two perceived problems with 9-ball. The slop(luck) during the game and the break.

If you are a top player those two things bother you. I can understand why you hate to lose to a c-player who lucks in a couple of 9 balls, gets an easy combo set up on the two for another game and then gets a 9-ball break to win the match.

But that really doesn't happen all *that* often. I know we can all cite 15 times that it happened to us....but out of how many matches? It happens just often enough to give the c-player hope that he can get a few rolls and compete with a good player. That keeps the c-player coming to the tournaments.

I think that popular games involve luck for a reason. You can argue how much luck is involved in poker, for example. Yet you can't deny it exists. And the reason so many thousands of people play in the world poker championship is because they feel like if they get a few good cards they can go deep and get a good payday.

I felt like there were a whole bunch of players playing in 9-ball bar table tournaments that had no chance to win. But they could make enough balls to have fun and win some games as well as maybe get a few rolls and beat a good player. They are willing to wager/spend their $50-$75 for that.

With 10-ball. Especially on 9' tables with the tight pockets we see everywhere now. I think the weaker players have very little hope. Their odds are probably about the same. But their perception of their odds is significantly diminished. And so they don't enter. The strong regional tours are the same 35-50 players each stop + a handful of locals. I remember seeing 100+ players for Texas express 9-ball bar table stops back in the day. If you didn't get your entry in well in advance you might not get in.

Lower level players pay the bills and higher level players set the rules. And they set them to their competitive benefit at the peril of their financial benefit IMO.
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IMO: This ^^ is one whole bunch of SENSE! For the first time in what seems an age, someone has hit the nail on the head, albeit as a response to an excellent thread start :thumb:

I highlight the end because the reality of truth cuts a deep wound... A bud for you Mr. Sixpack!
 
10 ball is a great game. Too many runouts? To predictable on the breaks? How about bank or kick the 10? How about call shot/call safety? By that I mean if you call a shot, shoot, miss and roll safe, then the incoming player has the option to pass it back? That pretty much slows down the big packages right there, and makes even to the top players bear down a little when they know there's no such thing as a two way shot. Eliminate ball in hand, go back to Straight Rotation spot shots. Sure, the top players will drill those, but getting shape off a spot shot is a lot less certain than ball in hand from anywhere. Lots of options for promoters/TDs to make the game more challenging than changing the equipment.

When I first started playing, tournaments were just moving to Texas Express rules to move tournaments along...maybe we go back to the old roll out rules and no ball in hand on break fouls?
 
Colin Colenso said:
Another point I'll mention is the calling for tighter and bigger tables. I'd prefer harder pro-version rules to harder tables. Tight hard tables is a recipe for turning away beginners from enjoying playing as an occasional enthusiast.

Colin
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Not sure about that, snooker does well enough over here...
 
What happens in 10-Ball if the 10-ball is racked on the foot spot and the player breaks from near center table? Or how about from near a side rail, what happens then?
 
Shane is the only American that makes 10ball looks easy with his dominating break. His BNR rate in the MIH event was 43% !

Most 10b tournaments, the BNR rate is borderline 20% at best
 
Runner said:
I like rotation games for the position play involved... 8 ball is IMO an easier game as you can shoot at more than one of your OB's if you miss position. And I'm seeing a comeback of full rack rotation, which my pool buds and I play... now that's a challenge for position play... I don't don't think it'd make it on TV... same with One Pocket, my favorite game.

The 10 ball scene now is guys using the same break, same spot, pattern racking, etc.
I get where the OP is going... my take would be 9 ball, call the 9, 9 on the break doesn't count. IDK about calling every ball... then it's like 10 ball.
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Is pattern racking allowed over in the US, on the GB9 Tour here in the UK I'm pretty sure there is a specific rule stopping it?
 
In 10-Ball, what if we required random racking of all balls except the 10-ball -- still requiring that the head ball be struck first on the break, but the 1-ball could be anywhere in the rack except in the 10-ball's location.


[just tossing out a few what-if's here]
 
If we want to see another American win a WPA World title we need to be playing with the same rules that they use... Just because some people think the break was and should be a random event should not mean it has to be that way today...

Alternate break on a template and first one blinks loses... We have not had that format on TV ever so what is to say the American TV Viewer wouldn't watch it just like the Asian and Euro TV Audiences do?

I have yet to see anyone who called that style of pool boring be able to perform at that level......
 
If the question is "is 10-ball bad for pool"? Unequivocally yes.

MOST people have no idea what 10 ball is, or what's going on. Only "pool players" play 10-ball. MOST players who play pool in the US are not "pool players" like all of us are.

Listen...you play little league baseball, and the pros play almost the exact same game. You play soccer as a kid, and the pros play pretty much the exact same game. Pro soccer (football) players don't play with 3 soccer balls and tiny nets, pro baseball players don't play with tiny gloves to make it harder or a pitchers mound 100 feet away. They simply play the game at its best, but it's the SAME GAME that you play.

When you say "pool" to anyone in America (except us wacky pool players, which make up a very small percentage of people who have played some pool at one time or another), it's 8 ball. In fact, they don't even know what "8 ball" is because 8 ball IS pool to them. They play 8 ball, no slop, winner break, on a 7 foot table. That's pool.

We keep changing it to a different game on different equipment with different rules because we want something harder or more interesting TO US. That's why pool in America is failing fast.
 
AtLarge said:
In 10-Ball, what if we required random racking of all balls except the 10-ball -- still requiring that the head ball be struck first on the break, but the 1-ball could be anywhere in the rack except in the 10-ball's location.


[just tossing out a few what-if's here]
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How about the lowest numbered ball remaining after the break be required to be banked in before the rest of the rack is run off in the usual numerical sequence? Maybe not that crazy of a thought and maybe really fun to play. I might try that next time. It would have the added benefit of encouraging even more strategic play in the early stage of each rack and a secondary added benefit for viewers of a quality and/or spectacular shot required to get going.
 
nfuids said:
I don't have the stats near by, but there is a LOT more runout in 8 ball than in 9/10 ball.
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devorator said:
10ball is the future. And yes I am pissed.
America doesn't like 9 on the spot, America doesn't like break from the box, America is offended by 10ball....America, America...bla bla
America just lost Mosconi Cup once more because they play on fking kids tables.
I am so fed up with this rants around here...
Start practice like europeans and asians and complain less.
10ball is a complex game and eliminates the slop factor that 9ball has. Played by the real rules is more complicated and exciting to watch than 9ball.
I like 9/10/8 ball but if were up to me I'll play any tournament in US on 9/10ft tables. 7ft tables are for babies....whining babies
Chris@2015


Sent using Tapatalk
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http://billiards.colostate.edu/threads/break.html#statistics
10b should be played on 10ft like Bigfoot.
Should be alternate break, ref rack with wooden rack like WCOP

Celtic said:
Who cares how many people play? No sports fan base that make the sport economically viable is actively out there on the field competing with the pros. They are watching the sport on TV or live and the money in the sport comes from sponsorship, advertising, and merchandise.

Trying to dumb down the sport to draw in dead money entries for the pros to chop up is a ridiculous business model.

We do not need more people "playing" professional pool, we need more people watching it.
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EXACTLY.
It is ridiculous that folks think fans/spectators/viewers should play.
How many MMA or boxing fans/viewers actually know how to fight?
How many soccer fans/viewers actually know how to play?
How many American Idol fans/ viewers actually know how to sing?
:D
 
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