9 pack on you, would it suck or not?

PROG8R

PROG8R

Gator Nation
Silver Member
If you read this on the front page, then it is old news, but I have to ask you guys; would you be in awe, or would you be pissed that you just got killed and never got to defend yourself?

"But where was Tommy Kennedy? The jovial Kennedy it seemed had not slept very much the previous few days and could not be rousted for his first match against Scotty Townsend. Fortunately for TK, he was on the winner's side of the bracket and good fortune for Townsend who cruised into the hot seat without having to chalk his cue.

Kennedy did arrive in time for his second match. He goodnaturedly shrugged off the forfeit and looked to be hitting very well during his warm-up prep for the match against Richie Orem. They tossed the coin, Orem wins the first break. He breaks and runs out. Game 2 - Orem has the break again, being the event is winner breaks. Then Orem proceeded to run out again. Game 3, deja-vu. Game 4, a pattern is being established, game 5, see where this is going? Yes, Orem broke and ran 9 racks in a row. TK never got out of his seat to shoot a ball and settled for 3rd place."
 
Lol..

Wonder if Tommy heard the old saying, 'If you snooze, you lose' very much after that. Boy, did that come home to roost... lol

BTW, in my Pool circles, anything above an 8 pack (5-8 pack normally talked about) seems to put a player into a higher class than thought of before.
 
I never figured Richie had it in him, that's awesome. Thanks for pointing it out!! Oh, and I would probably be a little pissed on one hand, but happy to see such high caliber play even if it is at my expense. I guess it depends if I have to get up and rack for the person or if it's "rack your own".
 
Poor Tommy. He is a really great guy, we used to play cheap sets everytime he was in town. I have not seen him in years.:)
 
It would suck for sure, but complaining about it would imply that the 9-pack could have been matched, given the opportunity.

Maybe to be "fair", a special rule could be added:

In the event that Player 1 breaks and runs out the entire set in one inning, where Player 2 never had an inning, Player 2 gets "last ups" as follows:

Player 2 gets an opportunity to break and run out the same number of racks in one inning. If successful, a third set will be played (or sudden death, or ???). If Player 2's inning ends before running out the 2nd set, the match is over and Player 1 is the winner.

Adding a rule like that would make it more fair, even though the odds of matching that 9-pack are slim.

Anyway, technically, if they lagged for break, there was an opportunity to defend himself, even though it wasn't a very good opportunity. He's just very unfortunate, or unlucky, that he happened to be the guy that got the 9-pack run on him.
 
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It would suck for me if I was gambling and on the receiving end.

I once saw a very talented player break and run four racks in a race to five. His opponent who came late and hadn't hit a single ball until that point got up and ran a five pack for the set.

I once ran five racks against Ronnie Wiseman and lost 11:5.

What happened to TK could just as easily have gone the other way. Had to suck though! Maybe TK will rethink the winner breaks format.

Buddy Hall once told me that he hates winner breaks. He figures that if he beat in alternate breaks format then he got to break at least as much as the other guy and had chances to be in the match.

John
 
WOW, talk about knowledge, skill, experience, and talent with all of the large runs.

This is why I hate when people try to relate pool to golf; Golf, each player has an equal opportunity to win, even if your opponent is shooting well. Like said before here, as someone quoted Reyes "It doesn't matter how good you are if your not at the table shooting."
 
Cuebacca said:
even though the odds of matching that 9-pack are slim.

Not for Tommy. I have seen him rip thru mini tournaments like a Buzz saw,
never losing a game. Ask Little David Howard or John Dovinski, they sat in the electric chair, while TK ran back to back sets many a time.:)

Not a bad idea about the rule.:D
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Definition of a pack...

Do you have to break on the first rack to include the game in a "pack"? For instance, I was playing a race to 5 and at 1-4 my opponent came up dry and I ran that rack and two more to tie it up. Does this count as a 3-pack?

For those interested in how the set ended up, I came up dry on my 4th break and left him with an EASY 1-9 combonation...lol. Talk about taking the wind out of your sails!
 
Gregg said:
This is why I hate when people try to relate pool to golf; Golf, each player has an equal opportunity to win, even if your opponent is shooting well. Like said before here, as someone quoted Reyes "It doesn't matter how good you are if your not at the table shooting."
Click to expand...

That is true in theory, not it doesn't always hold up. If I play in the morning and I get perfect conditions and you follow later in the day..
Your perfect drive lands into my unrepaired deep ass divot (too bad)
You hit the green and have a decent shot at birdie, but I drug my feet and forgot to repair the marks (too bad, you are not allowed to fix them before you putt)
I had no wind, and now you are in 20MPH gust and it is raining, (too bad).

It sounds nice on paper, but it doesn't always hold up in reality.
 
CaptainHook, even if someone is capable of running a 9-pack, and done it plenty of times in their life, I still think the odds of coming up with one on demand are slim. (I guess it depends on how much cash is on the line though, or how bad they want it.)

Anyway, I hope it didn't sound like I was trying to take anything away from TK by saying that. If you're saying the chances aren't slim, I will trust you on that, and agree with you that it makes my proposed ruled rule worth considering. ;)

Maybe my idea would work better with alternating break. If the score goes to hill-hill, and no one has failed to break and run out on any of their breaks, they could extend the set one game at a time until someone fails to run out. At that time, the next player to be ahead in the set wins. (If Player2 fails to run out, Player1 wins the match. If Player1 fails to run out, the winner of that game wins the match.)

Without a rule like that, I don't think alternating break would solve the problem, other than the fact that it takes away the momentum. Aside from that, alternating break would not help Player2 when Player1 breaks and runs out every time. Even if Player2 matches every break/run, he still loses by one game. Of course, however, to ignore the momentum factor probably wasn't a safe assumption. :o :cool:
 
PROG8R said:
If you read this on the front page, then it is old news, but I have to ask you guys; would you be in awe, or would you be pissed that you just got killed and never got to defend yourself?

"But where was Tommy Kennedy? The jovial Kennedy it seemed had not slept very much the previous few days and could not be rousted for his first match against Scotty Townsend. Fortunately for TK, he was on the winner's side of the bracket and good fortune for Townsend who cruised into the hot seat without having to chalk his cue.

Kennedy did arrive in time for his second match. He goodnaturedly shrugged off the forfeit and looked to be hitting very well during his warm-up prep for the match against Richie Orem. They tossed the coin, Orem wins the first break. He breaks and runs out. Game 2 - Orem has the break again, being the event is winner breaks. Then Orem proceeded to run out again. Game 3, deja-vu. Game 4, a pattern is being established, game 5, see where this is going? Yes, Orem broke and ran 9 racks in a row. TK never got out of his seat to shoot a ball and settled for 3rd place."
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Running a nine ball match out like that is like having someone put a 150-and-out on you in a straight pool game to 150 points. If you're on the receiving end, there's really nothing you can do about it & it really doesn't make you look bad because you didn't get a chance to shoot. I would think that running a match out like that would be some kind of record on the SE tour as I don't recall hearing about someone accomplishing a feat like that previously.

One thing can be said on Tommy Kennedy's behalf though & that is he didn't miss a ball in either of those matches. I'm sure he was likely smiling & joking about the loss after the match was completed. I sincerely doubt that a format change i.e. going to alternate break will be forthcoming as his tournaments have always been winner breaks & racks if memory serves.

In any case, it was good shooting on his opponent's part. He deserves to be congratulated for his accomplishment.
 
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In any case, it was good shooting on his opponent's part. He deserves to be congratulated for his accomplishment.
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Exactly..... If you have to lose a match, this is the way to lose it. Personally I love watching good pool being played, whether it is on the table across the room, on tv, or against me. If I got to sit ringside so to speak while my opponent ran a 9 rack set from start to finish on me....... I would be thrilled and thank him for the show when it was over. ;)
Chuck
 
RiverCity said:
Exactly..... If you have to lose a match, this is the way to lose it. Personally I love watching good pool being played, whether it is on the table across the room, on tv, or against me. If I got to sit ringside so to speak while my opponent ran a 9 rack set from start to finish on me....... I would be thrilled and thank him for the show when it was over. ;)
Chuck
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I agree, I have been impressed and congratulated my opponent for shooting great, when they did a lot less than running a 9 pack...lol. However, I have also had opponents get mad at me when I run a three pack too...lol.
 
equal innings

Cuebacca said:
It would suck for sure, but complaining about it would imply that the 9-pack could have been matched, given the opportunity.

Maybe to be "fair", a special rule could be added:

In the event that Player 1 breaks and runs out the entire set in one inning, where Player 2 never had an inning, Player 2 gets "last ups" as follows:

Player 2 gets an opportunity to break and run out the same number of racks in one inning. If successful, a third set will be played (or sudden death, or ???). If Player 2's inning ends before running out the 2nd set, the match is over and Player 1 is the winner.

Adding a rule like that would make it more fair, even though the odds of matching that 9-pack are slim.

Anyway, technically, if they lagged for break, there was an opportunity to defend himself, even though it wasn't a very good opportunity. He's just very unfortunate, or unlucky, that he happened to be the guy that got the 9-pack run on him.
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We sometimes used to play 3 cushion with a rule called "equal innings". It's very much like what you propose, but simpler. The idea is that each player should get the same number of trips to the table. In practice, if the player who shot first gets the required points (25 usually, around here) he keeps shooting until he misses, then the other player gets a last chance to tie or surpass him. Sort of like baseball. It could be applied to nine ball, too.
 
my opinion is that alternate breaks suck.

how many times have you seen (either in local match-ups or tourneys) a guy down 8-1 or 8-2 or whatever, and slap the heat on and win 9-8....

no way that ever happens in alternating breaks.....

theres no pressure on the player either on the hill or close when the other player only has a game or two....
 
jcrack_corn said:
my opinion is that alternate breaks suck.

how many times have you seen (either in local match-ups or tourneys) a guy down 8-1 or 8-2 or whatever, and slap the heat on and win 9-8....

no way that ever happens in alternating breaks.....

theres no pressure on the player either on the hill or close when the other player only has a game or two....
Click to expand...


It happens every once in a while, like this year at the playpool.com tournament in Vegas. Hopkins was on the hill and Efren had 1 in a race to 10 or 11, Efren rallied and won the set. It doesn't happen often, but this one is historic in my book.
 
jcrack_corn said:
my opinion is that alternate breaks suck.

how many times have you seen (either in local match-ups or tourneys) a guy down 8-1 or 8-2 or whatever, and slap the heat on and win 9-8....

no way that ever happens in alternating breaks.....

theres no pressure on the player either on the hill or close when the other player only has a game or two....
Click to expand...


I think Alternate breaks suck.

if one player gets up a few games and no matter how good the other play plays he cant catch up if the other guy just finishes his breaks.


Winner breaks allow for excitement. Dramatic finishes. ect.

I think the best format would be somthing like

best out of 3 sets races to 5 or 7 depending on the tournament. whoever gets to break first in the first set gets to break first again at the last set.
 
Personally I would love it if I had a playing partner who could run a 9 pack on me. That would be a dream come true. It would make for great footage to sale on ebay. It would also make me a better player. The most anyonne has ever ran on me was a 3 pack and I enjoyed watching it. If alot of money was on the line I might feel differently.:o
 
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