Help Needed, Very aggravated

H

Highroller54

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Hello, and Merry Christmas to all,

I’m in a bit of a dilemma. From age 10 I grew up with a Brunswick Table in the garage. Me and my buddy’s spent countless hours honing our skills at 15 ball rotation 14.1 8 ball and 9 ball. By 12 or 13 years of age, we became extremely good, so good, that we made our money sneaking into the local pool hall and hustling adults for money. The perfect hustle! I can remember winning a few hundred bucks at a time. Me and two others would hire this local kid to drive us around the state to find people to play. It was great, but we did from time to time get into a lot of trouble, being our age. Well as we got older we became better and better and ended up playing some really big money games.

At one time in the mid 70’s I came away one weekend with $2400.00 in winnings, not bad for a 15 year old. Anyway as time went on pool became less important, girls took priority and my game started to suffer. By age 20 I was in the Navy and before being released I got married. Marriage, Kids and career took priority and up until 2 months ago, I had not even picked up a cue in 20 years. Well I have been practicing and practicing but am getting very aggravated.

When practicing by myself, I can break and run at least 30 balls in rotating without a miss. I can semi control the cue ball, and I seem to have gotten my eye back for cuts shots and English. At this time my problem lies with winning. Any time I play one of the locals at the hall, I seem to go into the game with the first couple racks on top and then it’s all downhill from there. I am getting beat miserably. In fact I beat myself time and time again. I find myself getting aggravated and loose confidence in my game. I miss shots that would make you say, “Why the hell did I do that” or lose control of the cue ball on an easy run and end up snookering myself, time and time again.

The people I am playing are some really great players, but as I watch them play, I can honestly say, they aren’t that good, in other words they wouldn’t stand a chance if I played like I did 20 years ago. So this also is part of my problem, I see that I should be able to beat them, but can’t. So my questions are:

1. Am I rushing things? Need more time and practice.
2. Have I not gotten the right mindset to play?
3. What kind of practice or drills would you recommend.
4. Is 20 years to long to lay completely off and expect to get it back?
5. Should I just face it and concede I’ll never be the player I once was.

Thanks guy for the help, Very aggravated!

Highroller.
 
Questions

Highroller54 said:
Hello, and Merry Christmas to all,

I’m in a bit of a dilemma. From age 10 I grew up with a Brunswick Table in the garage. Me and my buddy’s spent countless hours honing our skills at 15 ball rotation 14.1 8 ball and 9 ball. By 12 or 13 years of age, we became extremely good, so good, that we made our money sneaking into the local pool hall and hustling adults for money. The perfect hustle! I can remember winning a few hundred bucks at a time. Me and two others would hire this local kid to drive us around the state to find people to play. It was great, but we did from time to time get into a lot of trouble, being our age. Well as we got older we became better and better and ended up playing some really big money games.

At one time in the mid 70’s I came away one weekend with $2400.00 in winnings, not bad for a 15 year old. Anyway as time went on pool became less important, girls took priority and my game started to suffer. By age 20 I was in the Navy and before being released I got married. Marriage, Kids and career took priority and up until 2 months ago, I had not even picked up a cue in 20 years. Well I have been practicing and practicing but am getting very aggravated.

When practicing by myself, I can break and run at least 30 balls in rotating without a miss. I can semi control the cue ball, and I seem to have gotten my eye back for cuts shots and English. At this time my problem lies with winning. Any time I play one of the locals at the hall, I seem to go into the game with the first couple racks on top and then it’s all downhill from there. I am getting beat miserably. In fact I beat myself time and time again. I find myself getting aggravated and loose confidence in my game. I miss shots that would make you say, “Why the hell did I do that” or lose control of the cue ball on an easy run and end up snookering myself, time and time again.

The people I am playing are some really great players, but as I watch them play, I can honestly say, they aren’t that good, in other words they wouldn’t stand a chance if I played like I did 20 years ago. So this also is part of my problem, I see that I should be able to beat them, but can’t. So my questions are:

1. Am I rushing things? Need more time and practice.
2. Have I not gotten the right mindset to play?
3. What kind of practice or drills would you recommend.
4. Is 20 years to long to lay completely off and expect to get it back?
5. Should I just face it and concede I’ll never be the player I once was.

Thanks guy for the help, Very aggravated!

Highroller.
Click to expand...

The answers to your questions are:
1. Probably, yes.
2. Probably, yes.
3. Can't suggest much without seeing you play.
4. No, if you're still in good health.
5. No; depends on how bad you want it.

There are tons of learning tools available now that were not in 1975. Books, DVDs, instructors online, etc. You might want to hook up with a good instructor. I'd suggest reading "The Pleasure of Small Motions" by Bob Fancher, to help you understand better the mental aspects of the game....why you love it, how to enjoy it, etc....
 
Your problem is clearly mental but likely has to do with desire or an inability to sustain a consistent level of focus throughout the match.

Once you get a lead, you subconsciously slack off and lose the intense focus that you started with.

First thing to do is re-evaluate the nature of your pre-shot routine.

This is where your focus must be consistent. You can't always control the peaks and lulls of focus throughout the game but you can actively create a higher level of focus during the pre-shot routine if you incorporate specific mental queues to stay on track.

I would recommend that you identify 2 or 3 critical aspects of your pre-shot routine that are letting you down when your focus is weak and establish a mental note to provide greater emphasis on those areas while going through your routine to ensure your focus stays at peak momentum.

In this way, you may lose focus in the match but you can sustain a high intermittent level of focus where it is needed most.
 
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Highroller, I think you need to cut yourself some slack. In one of your other posts you wrote that you just started back playing 4 months ago. Take it easy on yourself. Learn to enjoy the game again. Try to have fun playing. Have some patience with yourself.

I think if you take some of the pressure off yourself you'll naturally fall into your game again. But if you keep pushing and judging and putting negative thoughts in your head, you will cause yourself a lot of unnecessary grief.
 
i like you answer rrick33.......i played in a tournament the other night and started out skipping some of my psr and i suffered for it...there are no shortcuts to the psr...once you have it, stick with it exactly the same everytime....
 
Likely mental but could be maybe you thought you were better at 15 than you really were. You are out in the world now and not stuck in some small town WV. I did the same thing when I was younger. I could be just about all the locals on a regular basis. Joined the military and moved to a bigger town and the quality of player was WAY above anything that I ever encountered.

Just a thought ;)
 
One possibility is that you are a natural player with bad fundamentals. As long as you can just play and relax, you will be OK. As soon as your mind tries to take over conscious control, you're toast, because you need your bridge to move and your arm to swerve during the shot to be able to make a ball.

That's just a possibility. There are many possibilities. Without seeing you play, it's really, really hard to say what's going on.

Unless you really want to work on your game -- and very few people do -- I'd suggest that for the time being you just relax and enjoy playing.
 
Another possibility is that you have the wrong goals. You set your mind to play good, and as soon as you see you are, your goal is met, and mentally you are now done. Then, you naturally slack off a little, start playing worse, and then go into full melt down. Try setting a goal of not only beating the guy, but trying to see how badly you can beat him. That way, you stay focused throughout the match.
 
Everything is differant now

Cueball weight. Cloth speed. Pocket size. Just hit them until you get used to the change.
Nick :)
 
A Lot More Better Players

nick serdula said:
Cueball weight. Cloth speed. Pocket size. Just hit them until you get used to the change.
Nick :)
Click to expand...

Twenty years ago there were fewer really good players. Now thanks to the sharing and availability of information pool is a lot more competitive. I have acquired more pool knowledge here on AZ than anywhere else. I also play or practice just about everyday, and play in some kind of tournament at least once a week, sometimes twice. There are lots of people here on AZ that can be very helpful. Be nice.
 
Send me $1000 and I tell you

Not sure of a shot,play safe! Shoot slowly and softly till you get it in stroke. Your confidence is everything it will return.:smile:
PracticePracticePracticePracticePractice
 
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