Which do you prefer. Do you like to use the rails or do you prefer playing patterns to avoid going to the rail
Holding or using the rail
- Thread starter peteypooldude
- Start date
Well...
My ideal pattern would be stop shots till I'm out so I'm going with no rails if the option presents itself.
In all seriousness though , the less you have to move the CB or the less it travels , most likely the better your chances of hitting 'shape' consistantly.
My ideal pattern would be stop shots till I'm out so I'm going with no rails if the option presents itself.
In all seriousness though , the less you have to move the CB or the less it travels , most likely the better your chances of hitting 'shape' consistantly.
I believe this is a good question but the answer is more dependant on the situation. The target window should dictate the higher percentage shot. Additionally as the table becomes more vacant, playing larger windows with rails is more realistic (on average).
Personally I love to shoot into the rail and back out if it means I can let natural roll "float" me into a target window as opposed to "babying" a ball with english.
Personally I love to shoot into the rail and back out if it means I can let natural roll "float" me into a target window as opposed to "babying" a ball with english.
Well...
My ideal pattern would be stop shots till I'm out so I'm going with no rails if the option presents itself.
In all seriousness though , the less you have to move the CB or the less it travels , most likely the better your chances of hitting 'shape' consistantly.
That is true , a lot of times with BIH you have that option of setting up to use the rail to get down the table or just slide it down the table using draw.
With me it varies night to night and table to table. I think this is really what one is comfortable with. I see players using both methods as a primary and at high levels.
Thanks for the input
Absolutely use the rails. I'm confused at the question.
To be a good 8/9/10-ball player, you have to know and play the standard 5 or 6 shot patterns at will without a second thought. They all include rails.
Freddie <~~~ wonders what game others are playing
Really......
Petey<~~~ wonders the same thing
All jokes aside people play different patterns at a high level.
I don't see it as that cut and dry.
Good post and thanks for the reply
I play near the middle of the table when possible. Even if its a slightly harder shot than playing shape near the rail. Play the middle and keep an angle is my motto. When I was younger I played a lot of shape near the rail, somewhere along the way I realized I was working harder and taking more chances of getting out of shape than by simply playing the middle as much as possible.
My $.02 cents is usually worth at least $.03 cents.
My $.02 cents is usually worth at least $.03 cents.
I was taught to play center table whenever possible. 1 reason is because you will never be more than half a table away from the OB and 2 if you can cross center table at will then you can beat a lot of scratches
Well, I prefer not going to a cushion, but that is rarely the best way to get through a rack. As a challenge, I like to run out a rack of nine ball with as few cushions as possible. It forces me to play precision speed control.
A standard rule of thumb for position play is "when in doubt, leave yourself a half-ball cut." The position play from a half-ball shot is nearly always off a cushion.
Straight pool is a different. You should be able to avoid cushions on a lot of shots depending on the layout. Greenleaf was noted for absolutely minimizing the travel of the cue ball. The less it moves the smaller will be your position errors. At nine ball the patterns force you to move the ball more.
I almost always play an angle, so I use rails. Since I play a lot of rotational pool, often two rails or more.
I believe playing an angle in most cases allows more room for shape error than trying to get straight in on a shot. In fact, in most cases if I'm straight in it's because I made a mistake!