A Feel Based "System"

[BeiberLvr]

Let me preface this post by stating I make zero claims that I came up with this. Nobody taught it to me, but that doesn't me it hasn't been done before. I will also state that I believe this is a very feel based system (as the title suggests). So those who have trouble visualizing might not be able to make use of it.

A lot of it is similar to imagining a line from center pocket through the OB to a contact point (top pic). With one slight change as you'll see in the picture below.

I believe that most rail cut shots are easier than open table cut shots. I think this is because we can use the rail as a guide for the OB. We know that if we just make the ball follow along the rail, it will find the hole. So why not make all shots rail shots?

Instead of imagining a line from center pocket. Visualize a line going from the pocket facing directly to the edge of the OB (bottom pic). If you can do that, then you've created an imaginary rail/track for the OB to "ride" to the pocket.

Nothing fancy. Noting guaranteed. Just something I thought was worth sharing.

 

[CJ Wiley]

We like to aim/create angles based on solid reference points, rather than imaginary

Let me preface this post by stating I make zero claims that I came up with this. Nobody taught it to me, but that doesn't me it hasn't been done before. I will also state that I believe this is a very feel based system (as the title suggests). So those who have trouble visualizing might not be able to make use of it.

A lot of it is similar to imagining a line from center pocket through the OB to a contact point (top pic). With one slight change as you'll see in the picture below.

I believe that most rail cut shots are easier than open table cut shots. I think this is because we can use the rail as a guide for the OB. We know that if we just make the ball follow along the rail, it will find the hole. So why not make all shots rail shots?

Instead of imagining a line from center pocket. Visualize a line going from the pocket facing directly to the edge of the OB (bottom pic). If you can do that, then you've created an imaginary rail/track for the OB to "ride" to the pocket.

Nothing fancy. Noting guaranteed. Just something I thought was worth sharing.

I agree in a feel based system, however, this one is very visual. Visualization is fine and dandy, but who can really do it? Steve Mizerak said he NEVER visualized shots, and I have to say I don't either. We like to aim/create angles based on solid reference points, rather than imaginary ones. Imagination is used in pool, but more in the area of creativity in playing the game, not in pocketing balls.

I do advice practicing games where you put EVERY ball on a rail and practice running all of them in order. Shooting "rail shots" do train your mind in a valuable way.

 

[DTL]

.....................

 

[BeiberLvr]

I agree in a feel based system, however, this one is very visual. Visualization is fine and dandy, but who can really do it? Steve Mizerak said he NEVER visualized shots, and I have to say I don't either. We like to aim/create angles based on solid reference points, rather than imaginary ones. Imagination is used in pool, but more in the area of creativity in playing the game, not in pocketing balls.

I do advice practicing games where you put EVERY ball on a rail and practice running all of them in order. Shooting "rail shots" do train your mind in a valuable way.

What's funny is I never liked ghost ball because I just couldn't see it the way some folks could. However, I have zero problems visualizing this line.

 

[BeiberLvr]

Mike James (former owner of Guys & Dolls poolroom) from Shreveport, LA says he aims this way. He uses the top pic but extends the line on out more toward the CB........more like visualizing a true rail shot and trying to hit the contact point and rail at the same time.

Secretly I was hoping I came up with it

 

[nobcitypool]

Hard to tell 100% with the diagram given, but looks like a CTE, ETC with a right pivot to me. LOL

 

[nobcitypool]

Hard to tell 100% with the diagram given, but looks like a CTE, ETC with a Pro One right pivot to me. LOL

 

[CJ Wiley]

I think experimenting with this technique is as healthy as any other.

What's funny is I never liked ghost ball because I just couldn't see it the way some folks could. However, I have zero problems visualizing this line.

Yes, I've never talked to a top caliber player that uses a "ghost ball" for aiming, although they do use their imagination and do visualize edges and lines - It's also helpful to look at the balls as two dimensional or "flat". This helps to "connect the dots is you use sections of the cue ball/object ball or your TIP for creating the given angles.

I think experimenting with this technique is as healthy as any other. From my experience it's always positive to keep feeding your mind new, challenging ways to create angles. If it was me I'd target the left side of the pocket in your example, and find a way to throw the ball slightly to the center, either using deflection or spin.

This is the advantage of using the TOI or something similar - it increases our ability to hit different sides of the pocket at will because we're doing it consistently.

 

[ENGLISH!]

Jon,

I'd move the line in your top photo to the left point & shoot it with left outside english (or right TOI) & I'd shoot the bottom one with right inside english (or left TOO). That is unless there was a reason not to shoot them that way.

The point is, as CJ eluded, is to utilize the whole pocket & to 'control' a 'mis' to still go into the pocket.

That shot is rather simple but on a longer one, center to center to center is not that easy & being off on that first center can throw the next one off which throws the next one off & usually results in a mis.

If it's working for you that is all that matters.

I sort of perceive shots like you are saying because I am usually aligning to the points which IS to where the rails edges go. So it is like rotating the rail from the point until it meets the edge of the ball. Then it is just don't cut it INTO the rails but roll it along the rail or ever so slight away from the rail.

I wish you could super impose the NEW rail position from the ball edge to the point. I bet that visual would help some people.

Regards & Best Wishes,
Rick

 

[Pidge]

Very similar to a method I got taught probably a good 10 years ago when I was just a little kid.
You would imagine a line from the inside edge of OB to the part of the pocket you want that inside edge to enter the pocket. Now extend that line past the OB and stop it where you "think" the inside edge of the CB would be when contacting the OB. Then stand with your (right for righties, left for lefties) foot along the inside edge of CB to the imaginary point on the table you found earlier. Then just drop to centre ball, or what ever area of the CB you want to strike.

Quite like a variant of the ghost ball method but without imagining where the centre of the CB should be to pocket the ball.

I never really classed it as a way to aim, more of a method to align your body to the CB the same every time.

Methods that align your body the same all the time are better than any "magical" aiming system IMO. It takes the guess work out of it and makes you think less about the aiming aspect of the game.

 

[CJ Wiley]

."cheating the pocket" by intentionally hitting one side or the other

Jon,

I'd move the line in your top photo to the left point & shoot it with left outside english (or right TOI) & I'd shoot the bottom one with right inside english (or left TOO). That is unless there was a reason not to shoot them that way.

The point is, as CJ eluded, is to utilize the whole pocket & to 'control' a 'mis' to still go into the pocket.

That shot is rather simple but on a longer one, center to center to center is not that easy & being off on that first center can throw the next one off which throws the next one off & usually results in a mis.

If it's working for you that is all that matters.

I sort of perceive shots like you are saying because I am usually aligning to the points which IS to where the rails edges go. So it is like rotating the rail from the point until it meets the edge of the ball. Then it is just don't cut it INTO the rails but roll it along the rail or ever so slight away from the rail.

I wish you could super impose the NEW rail position from the ball edge to the point. I bet that visual would help some people.

Regards & Best Wishes,
Rick

Yes, it's very important to "get a feel for the pocket," however, it's not prudent to get a feel for the center unless you get a feel for both sides....."cheating the pocket" by intentionally hitting one side or the other is crucial to playing your very best. We all get out of position and have to do this, sometimes many times in a set. Doing it with accuracy rather than spin is ideal.....and this comes from creating a 3 Part Pocket Zone.

 

[336Robin]

Reverse Ghost Ball System

I read the posts above. You know pool and a lot of things in the world can seem complicated but really aren't as much if they are simply explained. I wrote the book Aim is the Game in Pool and put a method very similar in the back of it. At the time I was using several systems that are similar to nail shots so I listed all of them that I had used.

The system I use in total and nothing else I call the Reverse Ghost Ball system and it allows you to use all parts of the pocket like CJ promotes in his material. Imo you have to be able to do that. Now I'm not a full time player like CJ and his crowd, but I play decent enough to run out, break run out and then break and run out from time to time. I just work a lot and don't get to play, paying for college for my kid sort of keeps me on the run.

In all of my pool doings and everyone's experience is unique and I will reference how CJ thinks about his picture of the shot as a flat disc...that sounds crazy to me but works for him. When I was playing I will be the first to tell you I didn't understand how I was doing what I did but I could run out. It was all just a bunch of feelings I had that told me what to do.

So I made it a point when I came back to playing to try and write down things and to provide a pathway to better playing by understanding how to control Instinct and from what I see here.......BeiberLvr....has finally happened on part of it. Sure its not anything Earth Shaking but when you consider...that many a professional player has figured out what to do...but cant seem to say more than......I just use the edge of the ball to tell me what to do...Efren Reyes...in a you tube interview. Then you have the comments we have all probably read by Corey Deuel and John Schmidt we have a great divide in system proponents and Natural Feel Players.

The System Proponents on one side have a method...CTE...that is hard to argue with it but my experience tells me its just a bit complicated and more so that I want to be thinking of while at the table. So I searched for something much easier that got balls to the pocket and its not Rocket Science, it just hasn't been explained in a easier way up until possibly now.

I've been conflicted on the best way to put my material to use. I wanted to do a piece designed to create more players and use it as an advertising piece for room owners and wrote one....but from what I've found room owners don't want to do anything more than open the door....so back to the drawing board. Not to mention the costs of putting something like that together.

So I'm about to the point that I just want to do an Ebook and be done with it and share it with as many people as possible. I know for a fact that a reference method and feel can produce a great game of pool as long as running out is ok.

It doesn't matter what it is, someone's opinion is going to be different and some people can accept new things and others can't. There will always be new methods and I have mine. It works for me and if you are curious about it send me an email and I will put you on the list of folks to send out information to if I decide to do the ebook. My main thing is I love pool man. I really do. I probably should have been a player but I managed to rescue myself from that life to do hard time working for the prison system...going to retire in 16 months but who is counting then Im going to play some pool. I would just like to see new players being created and I am playing around with the best way to do that. Its what I do.

 

[CJ Wiley]

it's just an easier way to "connect the dots" to create the angles

I read the posts above. You know pool and a lot of things in the world can seem complicated but really aren't as much if they are simply explained. I wrote the book Aim is the Game in Pool and put a method very similar in the back of it. At the time I was using several systems that are similar to nail shots so I listed all of them that I had used.

The system I use in total and nothing else I call the Reverse Ghost Ball system and it allows you to use all parts of the pocket like CJ promotes in his material. Imo you have to be able to do that. Now I'm not a full time player like CJ and his crowd, but I play decent enough to run out, break run out and then break and run out from time to time. I just work a lot and don't get to play, paying for college for my kid sort of keeps me on the run.

In all of my pool doings and everyone's experience is unique and I will reference how CJ thinks about his picture of the shot as a flat disc...that sounds crazy to me but works for him. When I was playing I will be the first to tell you I didn't understand how I was doing what I did but I could run out. It was all just a bunch of feelings I had that told me what to do.

So I made it a point when I came back to playing to try and write down things and to provide a pathway to better playing by understanding how to control Instinct and from what I see here.......BeiberLvr....has finally happened on part of it. Sure its not anything Earth Shaking but when you consider...that many a professional player has figured out what to do...but cant seem to say more than......I just use the edge of the ball to tell me what to do...Efren Reyes...in a you tube interview. Then you have the comments we have all probably read by Corey Deuel and John Schmidt we have a great divide in system proponents and Natural Feel Players.

The System Proponents on one side have a method...CTE...that is hard to argue with it but my experience tells me its just a bit complicated and more so that I want to be thinking of while at the table. So I searched for something much easier that got balls to the pocket and its not Rocket Science, it just hasn't been explained in a easier way up until possibly now.

I've been conflicted on the best way to put my material to use. I wanted to do a piece designed to create more players and use it as an advertising piece for room owners and wrote one....but from what I've found room owners don't want to do anything more than open the door....so back to the drawing board. Not to mention the costs of putting something like that together.

So I'm about to the point that I just want to do an Ebook and be done with it and share it with as many people as possible. I know for a fact that a reference method and feel can produce a great game of pool as long as running out is ok.

It doesn't matter what it is, someone's opinion is going to be different and some people can accept new things and others can't. There will always be new methods and I have mine. It works for me and if you are curious about it send me an email and I will put you on the list of folks to send out information to if I decide to do the ebook. My main thing is I love pool man. I really do. I probably should have been a player but I managed to rescue myself from that life to do hard time working for the prison system...going to retire in 16 months but who is counting then Im going to play some pool. I would just like to see new players being created and I am playing around with the best way to do that. Its what I do.

Actually, when someone looks at the picture in the first post of this thread, the balls appear as "flat" or "two dimensional".....my point has always been that it serves no benefit to look at them as round balls.....it's just an easier way to "connect the dots" to create the angles using the center/edge of each ball as a reference point.

 

[336Robin]

Two Dimensional View

Actually, when someone looks at the picture in the first post of this thread, the balls appear as "flat" or "two dimensional".....my point has always been that it serves no benefit to look at them as round balls.....it's just an easier way to "connect the dots" to create the angles using the center/edge of each ball as a reference point.

CJ,
Exactly. What I think is most important about what you view as your method is the fact that you are applying a "visual" method to connect the shot to the pocket. In my method I use an application of what I call visual geometry to provide the ability to know the cut on the ball based on a depth perception technique. There are a lot of ways to reason out a shot solution. I will never forget something I read by a great pool author that will go unnamed where he didn't like the use of the contact point. I understood what the man was saying but at the same time you sort of have to reason out a place to hit the ball or a perception to use to do it. Whatever you do with visual geometry, imagery, etc the cut on the ball that you apply to the shot has the contact point in the center of it. Its just a fact. When Im hitting the ball well I've noticed its the simplest explanation of the shot that gets you out and over complicating the issue never seems to work.

The very minute you over complicate the issue or have doubts you're in serious trouble. If you see it as easy then it is and the next thing you know you've gotten out because with the aiming piece simplified it sure it easier to plan what you're going to do with the cue ball which is the biggest piece. If you can't get shape you can't get out....pretty simple really.

I agree and I'll take a stab at disc pool. Sounds interesting to me! I ain't afraid of no ghost!

 

[CJ Wiley]

Modeling other players and experimenting is advantageous, but...............

CJ,
Exactly. What I think is most important about what you view as your method is the fact that you are applying a "visual" method to connect the shot to the pocket. In my method I use an application of what I call visual geometry to provide the ability to know the cut on the ball based on a depth perception technique. There are a lot of ways to reason out a shot solution. I will never forget something I read by a great pool author that will go unnamed where he didn't like the use of the contact point. I understood what the man was saying but at the same time you sort of have to reason out a place to hit the ball or a perception to use to do it. Whatever you do with visual geometry, imagery, etc the cut on the ball that you apply to the shot has the contact point in the center of it. Its just a fact. When Im hitting the ball well I've noticed its the simplest explanation of the shot that gets you out and over complicating the issue never seems to work.

The very minute you over complicate the issue or have doubts you're in serious trouble. If you see it as easy then it is and the next thing you know you've gotten out because with the aiming piece simplified it sure it easier to plan what you're going to do with the cue ball which is the biggest piece. If you can't get shape you can't get out....pretty simple really.

I agree and I'll take a stab at disc pool. Sounds interesting to me! I ain't afraid of no ghost!

Yes, I just show player several ways to connect the cue ball to the object ball. You can use your TIP, your shaft, the edges or center of one or both balls, etc.

One of these will be better for one player than another, the key is "aiming ABOVE the shot" and when you get down, fine tune it with a "Touch" of Inside....or outside if you choose to spin the ball slightly more. The important thing is to "be at choice," and do what "clicks" to you and your own personality and perception, not what someone else does.

Modeling other players and experimenting is advantageous, but pure copying rarely works from my experience. You must know ALL the options to make the best decision, and this is universally true in life, not just pool. 'The Game of Life is the Teacher'