I was playing straight pool with my friend last night. The cue ball was stuck in the middle of a cluster with a real tight shot going over a couple balls. My friend tried to bridge over the balls but couldn't quite reach, so he gripped his cue like a backward spear, and cue-butt first hits down on the cue ball and made the shot. He looked at me and said he bets I'd never seen that shot before. Was that legal? BTW, he went on to run a dozen balls, so it was particularly annoying.