1990 US Open Sigel & Varner - 5 Inch Pockets


Go to 6:45 or so. Grady calls it a "tough-pocketed table" and that Sigel's shot down the long rail was very missable.

And of course, Sigel hits it with tons of body movement and uses ALL of the pocket. Would have missed by a mile on a modern WNT table.
Weird, maybe he had a mental slip or something? Grady was used to playing on triple shimmed GC's because his main game was one pocket.

I think Sigel's shot at 6:45 would have went on Emily's Diamond tables, however, in tournament new cloth/ball conditions.
 
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Can anyone figure out what this rack area is? Looks almost like two spots? I'm lost what I'm seeing.

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Gehen Sie ungefähr zu 6:45. Grady nennt es einen „harten Tisch“ und dass Sigels Schuss an der langen Bande sehr leicht zu übersehen war.

Und natürlich trifft Sigel ihn mit enormer Körperbewegung und nutzt die GANZE Tasche. Auf einem modernen WNT-Tisch hätte er ihn meilenweit verfehlt.
Sigel on his Prime, will be the World Number 1 Today.
 

Speaking of pocket size.............

They played this match on a GCIII with 5 inch pockets. Grady Mathews mentioned how they were 5 inch pockets. And then he called them tight pockets. I couldn't believe how big they were, almost buckets!

Was this the norm for tournaments back around 1990? If they played on this nowadays would anybody ever miss???

r/DCP

i did not watch the clip but grady was known for his deadpan comedy. one time he referred to the GC pockets as "cavernous apertures"..
 
Can anyone figure out what this rack area is? Looks almost like two spots? I'm lost what I'm seeing.

If you watch the match when they scratch on the break the 1B is spotted just above the 9B. That's why they had two spots. They played safe off the 1B about three times during the match. Must have been a rule for the 1990 US Open.
 
Standard for Brunswick factory pockets on all tables mfg. from day one over 150 years ago has always been 4 7/8 corner minimums - they could be found up to 5 1/8 corners and that was what everybody played on as standard until Diamond pro cuts.
Anything less in pocket size before Diamond pro cuts were just purposely made smaller by room owners or TDs - this was true of Gandys , AESchmidt, Murray, Olhausen, etc. Etc.

Great players of any era would have adjusted - smaller standardized pockets just insure that most youngsters who might show up probably won’t enjoy it as much and may not take to the game- any doubt- open your eyes at most rooms that are left in America — when you locate one.
 
💯

I also think Grady would still be regarded as the same player if he grew up playing on the today’s tables. - great players adjust.

Oh absolutely. I was just imagining him being dropped into the current game without seeing the years of progression leading up to it.
 
Can anyone figure out what this rack area is? Looks almost like two spots? I'm lost what I'm seeing.

View attachment 846393
The far spot looks like it's the foot spot. The nearer heavy spot is a mystery. It's too close to the foot spot for a second spotted ball. You can see all of the positions of the nine ball rack. I wonder if they were tapping/training the table.
 

Go to 6:45 or so. Grady calls it a "tough-pocketed table" and that Sigel's shot down the long rail was very missable.

And of course, Sigel hits it with tons of body movement and uses ALL of the pocket. Would have missed by a mile on a modern WNT table.
So what?? Had 4" pockets been the standard back then the same players would have been champions. You adapt to what is the standard of the time. You can't compare 80's and 2020's pool on equal terms. Sigel is one of the straightest shooters to ever play. His own peers said that about him. Had little wickets been standard then he would have been a monster then too.
 
You know plenty yet you posted that specific message? When you piss off half of a forum, is it you, or the rest of the people who are crazy?

I know you're a big toughie who likes to sit at a table holding hands with other big toughies, but your post was out of line and missed the point of the message. It was a personal attack in a thread that didn't justify it.

I'm pretty sure I'm crazy, it makes more sense that it is me and not everybody else.
 
People will often say that great players of yesterday would adjust to the tighter pockets more common today but IMO only some of them would be able to adjust.

The fact of the matter is that some of the older time greats had some pretty wonky mechanics and I’m not so sure they would all be able to dial in the repeatable accuracy today’s equipment requires.

Lou Figueroa
 
When I say that older great players could still be great today under tougher pocket sizes- I think that we all should understand that their mechanics would certainly need to be dialed in to a higher accuracy standard. The assumption that I have is that whatever made those guys champions years ago -- and now add into their routine the same training system that the greats of today have at their disposal-- the old-timers would certainly be greats of today as well.
Just pocketing balls accurately is one component of a world champion player. Guys like Greenleaf, Mosconi, Crane, Balsis, Miz, Varner, Sigel, etc., at their best, all had the make- up to adapt and compete in any era.

People say that there are many more great players at a very high level today, I often feel that way myself about the game today, but consider, this, all the old timers talked about thousands of rooms being open here in years past, and we always hear about 100 ball runners populating many, many rooms in every big city during bygone years, yet guys like Crane and Mosconi and Caras still dominated for years! That tells you these guys had something very special when it came to playing the game and they rose above many, many very capable players in their time.
 
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To my recollection, the most common pocket size back in 1990 was 4 3/4".

SJM,
I would probably agree with that. From the Accu-Stats videos I've watched in the 1990s from the Sands Regency in Reno and the US Open in Norfolk/Chesapeake those pockets look fairly big to me. Not canyons, but still somewhat on the wide side.

r/DCP
 
Can anyone figure out what this rack area is? Looks almost like two spots? I'm lost what I'm seeing.

View attachment 846393

In a couple of those older Accu-stats matches, there's commentary about players requesting a new spot. It's possible once the wired ball started going in all the time, players (such as ahem Earl) started really scrutinizing the spot. Grady once stated it was within a players right to request a new spot. That sounded odd to me.

Maybe that's what we are seeing there.
 
Speaking of pocket size.............

They played this match on a GCIII with 5 inch pockets. Grady Mathews mentioned how they were 5 inch pockets. And then he called them tight pockets. I couldn't believe how big they were, almost buckets!

Was this the norm for tournaments back around 1990? If they played on this nowadays would anybody ever miss???

r/DCP
Watch the WCs circa 2000. Players find ways to screw up - like the pressure lol. Sure it's real. Bending to it is real.

Cut to now. Buckets are boring at the majors level. Players have tuned themselves if only their self esteem, to an elite frame of mind. Buckets would be incongruous and torture. (Just an example, obviously never been there. ) Many would indulge their Efren, shooting stuff above their pay grade. Peter Principle is always a threat.
 
He said that the pocket opening was 4 inch, but it opened to 5 inches. I am not familiar enough with the table difficulty post to have a real opinion about the difficulty of the pockets, but pocket with open shapes like that can rattle quite a bit when shooting down the rail.

The real point I wanted to make was to thank you for the post. I watched the link. What an incredible match!!! It was definitely worth the watch. Crazy match.

Oh, and thank goodness for Texas Express rules. Spotting multiple balls and hitting from the kitchen doesn't even feel like 9 ball anymore.
 
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