I have heard that some shots are high percentage while others are low %. How do they come to this conclusion? Are banks and kicks lower percentage than straight in shots and how are they figured, distance, if your cue is on the rail, angle of cut??? just curious about the whole percentage thing. It only takes a few games to figure out every shot is hard.
percentage shots
- Thread starter firstcue
- Start date
Percentage or success rate is very important to figure out, especially with your own abilites. Usually bank shots are lower percentage shots than normal straight in shots. But, what many people don't realize, is that you need to learn your own abilities to figure out the success rate on each shot and especially if you have many choices, you need to choose the shot which gives the best success rate. Usually you have many choices.
Choosing a safety over a difficult attempt on a ball is usually overlooked by many novice/intermediate players. They want to shoot many do-or-die shots and don't realize that they would win more racks if willing to take "the hard way" and play a safety. Even if you duck a difficult ball and make safety and your opponent lucks his way out, you'll know that you played the right shot, but that time your opponent beat the odds and won the rack. I pisses me off if I have chosen a wrong shot and lost because of that.
A couple of examples (wei table):
http://endeavor.med.nyu.edu/~wei/pool/pooltable2.html
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Safety or bank shot ? I would choose the safety almost every time. The bank shot to left corner wouldn't necessarily sell out as the bank shot to middle would definitely sell out if missed, but still I think the safety is quite easy and leaves the opponent safe even if not getting the cueball behind the 9. And hardly any easy safety chance for my opponent.
Another example:
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Quite easy to make the 8, but very difficult the get position for the 9. Maybe with some elevation and extreme low right would bring the cueball closer to 9 but would still leave a difficult 9. Or extreme left-hand sidespin would bring to cueball near the 9 around the table. But in both cases you might miss the 8. The bank to lower left corner is hardly possible because of the risk of a double kiss. So, I would play a quite easy safety to put the CB and the 8 in the opposite ends of the table. This shot is much easier than is looks, because it can be shot very hard and the 8 always stays near the short rail.
I think in this case the safety gives the best percentage to win the rack.
Choosing a safety over a difficult attempt on a ball is usually overlooked by many novice/intermediate players. They want to shoot many do-or-die shots and don't realize that they would win more racks if willing to take "the hard way" and play a safety. Even if you duck a difficult ball and make safety and your opponent lucks his way out, you'll know that you played the right shot, but that time your opponent beat the odds and won the rack. I pisses me off if I have chosen a wrong shot and lost because of that.
A couple of examples (wei table):
http://endeavor.med.nyu.edu/~wei/pool/pooltable2.html
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)END
Safety or bank shot ? I would choose the safety almost every time. The bank shot to left corner wouldn't necessarily sell out as the bank shot to middle would definitely sell out if missed, but still I think the safety is quite easy and leaves the opponent safe even if not getting the cueball behind the 9. And hardly any easy safety chance for my opponent.
Another example:
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%\i9C6%]C9N0%^N3C8%eB1`2%_E9G2%`N2E0%aP2D0
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Quite easy to make the 8, but very difficult the get position for the 9. Maybe with some elevation and extreme low right would bring the cueball closer to 9 but would still leave a difficult 9. Or extreme left-hand sidespin would bring to cueball near the 9 around the table. But in both cases you might miss the 8. The bank to lower left corner is hardly possible because of the risk of a double kiss. So, I would play a quite easy safety to put the CB and the 8 in the opposite ends of the table. This shot is much easier than is looks, because it can be shot very hard and the 8 always stays near the short rail.
I think in this case the safety gives the best percentage to win the rack.
firstcue said:
Firstcue, even if you ignore banks and kicks, the matter of which shots are easiest is much more complicated than you might think.
Jack Kohler, in his superb book "The Science of Pocket Billiards", deals with a concept called "permissible error", which indicates, for many different shots, how far you can miss the aim required to pocket in the dead center of the pocket and still pocket the ball. I'm in my forties and have played pool since I was a kid, and figured I knew an easy/tough shot when I saw one, but I found Kohler's analysis to be eye-opening.
I highly recommend the book.
A wise player once told me to always play a cut shot rather than a bank shot if you have a choice.
What he was saying was that cut shots are made more often than bank shots. So you would be more likely to make the cut shot in the pocket.
-Cut shot = Hitting object ball at correct angle.
-Bank shot = Hitting object ball at correct angle, *plus* object ball hitting rail just right (if object ball has spin, it will change the bank), *plus* object ball hitting rail at correct speed (speed will change the bank angle), *plus* doing all this for the condition of the rails of the table you are playing on (rails vary from table to table). Also if the object ball is near a corner pocket, you may need to use more speed and English to make a bank shot than if it was further away from the pocket.
Since there is a lot more stuff which can go wrong with a bank shot, the cut shot would be the better choice by far.
I've seen many players have the above choice and choose a bank shot and miss. They do this time and time again. But some players are very good at bank shots. So good that they almost always make each bank shot. For these players, the bank shot would be a better choice.
Another example is combination shots. If the two balls are near a corner pocket, it is easier to make a combination shot. If the two balls are far apart or further away from the pocket, then the difficulty of making the shot increases to almost impossible.
I have practiced combo shots quite a bit, so I know this. When I see someone attempting a combo shot with one object ball 2 diamonds away from the pocket and 3 diamonds space to the next object ball, I know there is no way they will make the shot in most cases. (Unless they practice these like I do and know how critical the aiming is for the shot.)
In the following example, the 5/1 combo is almost impossible for many players. Any slight variation on the first ball hit will translate to a big variation on the second ball. The 2/3 combo is easier provided the player walks down to the end of the table and lines up the shot with his cue as if the 2 ball was the cue ball. Then he would know exactly where to hit the two ball to make the combo. (Many players fail to do this and will miss these short combos. Something about looking at these shots from a distance which causes a lot of missed shots...) With the 9/8 combo, if you hit the 9 just about anywhere, the 8 will go.
http://endeavor.med.nyu.edu/~wei/pool/pooltable2.html
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What he was saying was that cut shots are made more often than bank shots. So you would be more likely to make the cut shot in the pocket.
-Cut shot = Hitting object ball at correct angle.
-Bank shot = Hitting object ball at correct angle, *plus* object ball hitting rail just right (if object ball has spin, it will change the bank), *plus* object ball hitting rail at correct speed (speed will change the bank angle), *plus* doing all this for the condition of the rails of the table you are playing on (rails vary from table to table). Also if the object ball is near a corner pocket, you may need to use more speed and English to make a bank shot than if it was further away from the pocket.
Since there is a lot more stuff which can go wrong with a bank shot, the cut shot would be the better choice by far.
I've seen many players have the above choice and choose a bank shot and miss. They do this time and time again. But some players are very good at bank shots. So good that they almost always make each bank shot. For these players, the bank shot would be a better choice.
Another example is combination shots. If the two balls are near a corner pocket, it is easier to make a combination shot. If the two balls are far apart or further away from the pocket, then the difficulty of making the shot increases to almost impossible.
I have practiced combo shots quite a bit, so I know this. When I see someone attempting a combo shot with one object ball 2 diamonds away from the pocket and 3 diamonds space to the next object ball, I know there is no way they will make the shot in most cases. (Unless they practice these like I do and know how critical the aiming is for the shot.)
In the following example, the 5/1 combo is almost impossible for many players. Any slight variation on the first ball hit will translate to a big variation on the second ball. The 2/3 combo is easier provided the player walks down to the end of the table and lines up the shot with his cue as if the 2 ball was the cue ball. Then he would know exactly where to hit the two ball to make the combo. (Many players fail to do this and will miss these short combos. Something about looking at these shots from a distance which causes a lot of missed shots...) With the 9/8 combo, if you hit the 9 just about anywhere, the 8 will go.
http://endeavor.med.nyu.edu/~wei/pool/pooltable2.html
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