Break Stats -- 2022 Sandcastle 9-Ball Open, October 2022

AtLarge

AzB Gold Member
Gold Member
Silver Member
Here are some aggregate break statistics from the Sandcastle 9-Ball Open played October 6-8, 2022 at Sandcastle Billiards in Edison, New Jersey. Pay-per-view live streaming was provided by Sandcastle through the On Site Pool Network. The main commentators were Neight Mindham and Mike DeMarco.

This was a 3-day, 64-player true double-elimination event. Aloysius Yapp won the tournament, defeating Chang Jung-Lin in the hill/hill first (and only) set of the final match.

Conditions -- The conditions for the matches streamed on the feature table in this event included:
- Diamond 9-foot table with 4½" corner pockets;​
- New gold Simonis 760 (said one commentator) cloth;​
- Aramith Tournament balls;​
- Accu-Rack racking template;​
- referee racks with the 9-ball on the foot spot (2-ball not necessarily in back location);​
- alternate breaks from behind the head string in a central box (less than 2 diamonds wide);​
- no 3-point (illegal-break) rule;​
- foul on all balls (only on Day 3 for the last 8 players);​
- jump cues allowed;​
- 30-second shot clock (only on Day 3);​
- all slop counts; and​
- lag for opening break.​

The stats are for all 16 matches (178 games) shown on the feature streaming table. These 16 tracked matches represented 12.8% of the event's total of 125 matches played (1 match was forfeited), and are listed here in the order in which they were played. [Note: The statistics are for 172 games instead of 178, because the stream was down for all of the first 5 games and part of the 6th in Match 6 below.]

Thursday, October 6, 2022
1. Carlo Biado defeated Jesus Atencio 7-6​
2. Chang Jung-Lin d. Ko Pin-Yi 7-5​
3. Josh Roberts d. Mickey Krause 7-3​
4. Skyler Woodward d. Ko Ping-Chung 7-2​
5. Francisco Sanchez-Ruiz d. Denis Grabe 7-4​

Friday, Oct. 7
6. Phuc Long Nguyen d. Roberts 7-3​
7. Shane Wolford d. Robbie Capito 7-6​
8. Biado d. Woodward 7-2​
9. John Morra d. Billy Thorpe 7-4​
10. Moritz Neuhausen d. Francisco Sanchez-Ruiz 7-5​
11. Biado d. Alex Kazakis 7-2​

Saturday, Oct. 8
12. Lee Vann Corteza d. Neuhausen 7-6​
13. Chang d. Wu Kun Lin 7-4​
14. Aloysius Yapp d. Corteza 7-5 (Hotseat match)​
15. Chang d. Corteza 7-3 (Semifinal)​
16. Yapp d. Chang 7-6 (Final)​

Overall results
Successful breaks (made at least one ball and did not foul):
Match winners -- 81% (72 of 89)​
Match losers -- 69% (57 of 83)​
Total -- 75% (129 of 172)
Breaker won the game:
Match winners -- 65% (58 of 89)​
Match losers -- 40% (33 of 83)​
Total -- 53% (91 of 172)
Break-and-run games on all breaks:
Match winners -- 43% (38 of 89)​
Match losers -- 24% (20 of 83)​
Total -- 34% (58 of 172)
Break-and-run games on successful breaks (made at least one ball and did not foul):
Match winners -- 53% (38 of 72)​
Match losers -- 35% (20 of 57)​
Total -- 45% (58 of 129)

Here's a breakdown of the 172 games (for match winners and losers combined).

Breaker made at least one ball and did not foul:​
Breaker won the game: 78 (45% of the 172 games)​
Breaker lost the game: 51 (30%)​
Breaker fouled on the break:​
Breaker won the game: 3 (2%)​
Breaker lost the game: 12 (7%)​
Breaker broke dry (without fouling):​
Breaker won the game: 10 (6%)​
Breaker lost the game: 18 (10%)​
Therefore, whereas the breaker won 53% (91 of 172) of all games,​
He won 60% (78 of 129) of the games in which the break was successful (made at least one ball and did not foul).​
He won 30% (13 of 43) of the games in which the break was unsuccessful (fouled or dry).​

Break-and-run games -- The 58 break-and-run games represented 34% of all 172 games, 64% of the 91 games won by the breaker, and 45% of the 129 games in which the break was successful (made a ball and didn't foul).

With alternating breaks, B&R "packages" of the normal type are not possible. But we can still look at the breaks of a given player and see how many he ran on his own successive breaks, and we can call these "alternate-break packages." The 58 break-and-run games consisted of 2 alternate-break 3-packs (1 each by Neuhausen and Corteza), 9 alternate-break 2-packs, and 34 singles. No one in these 16 matches broke and ran more than 3 games in a row on his own breaks.

9-balls on the break -- The 58 break-and-run games included 2 9-balls on the break (1.2% of all 172 breaks).
 
Last edited:
Miscellany from the data for the 2022 Sandcastle 9-Ball Open
[This relates only to the 16 tracked matches, not to all matches in the event.]

• The most balls made on a single break was 4, done just twice -- by Ko Pin-Yi (a game win by B&R) and John Morra (a game loss).

• The average number of balls made on the break was 1.2 (this includes dry and fouled breaks). On successful breaks (made at least one ball and did not foul), the average was 1.4, and the distribution was 62% 1 ball, 34% 2 balls, 2% 3 balls, and 2% 4 balls.

• Number of innings;
57% (98 of 172) of the games ended in one inning – 58 games on the breaker's first inning (B&Rs) and 40 games on the non-breaker's first inning.​
36% (62 of 172) of the games ended on the second or third inning.​
7% (12 of 172) of the games went beyond the non-breaker's third visit to the table, with the longest game ending on the non-breaker's 5th visit.​

• 45% (78 of 172) of the games were run out by the player who was at the table following the break. These run-outs were:
- By the breaker after successful breaks (B&R games) – 45% (58 of 129)​
- By the non-breaker after fouls on the break – 80% (12 of 15)​
- By the non-breaker after dry breaks – 29% (8 of 28)​

• The player who made the first ball after the break:
- Won the game in that same inning 66% of the time (112 of 170)​
- Won the game in a later inning 16% of the time (27 of 170)​
- Lost the game 18% of the time (31 of 170)​
[Note -- total games used here are 170 rather than 172 to eliminate the 2 games in which no ball was made after the break.]​

• The loser won an average of 4.1 games in the 16 races to 7. Four matches went to hill/hill; the most lopsided were three that ended at 7-2.

• The average elapsed time for 15 of the 16 races to 7 was 68 minutes, or 6.1 minutes per game (I was unable to time Match 6, because the stream was down at the beginning.). The elapsed time for each match was measured from the lag until the winning ball was made, so it includes time for racking and timeouts.

• The match that was both longest in elapsed time, at 100 minutes, and highest in average minutes per game, at 7.7, was Biado d. Atencio 7-6.

• The match that was shortest in elapsed time, at 47 minutes, was Woodward d. Ko P-C 7-2. The match lowest in average minutes per game, at 4.8, was Corteza d. Neuhausen 7-6.

• Breaking fouls averaged 1 for every 11.5 games, other fouls 1 for every 6.4 games, and missed shots about 1 for every 6.7 games.

• One or more safeties were played in about 31% of all games and in 47% of games that were not B&Rs.
 
Last edited:
Back
Top