I was just talking about this with some people when I played some on Sunday.
There was a young guy and an older lady who both came over to ask me some questions and I went to their tables for a little while to help them out.
I told both of them that the first thing I would do if I ever were to try to teach them is to have them spend an hour or so of setting up simple shots and hitting them HARD, over and over and over.
Everybody today has a tendency to "baby" the balls and they don't have a stroke. When it comes time to "let the dogs out", they don't have stroke enough to do it.
I play with TOI and I hit the balls firmer than most people. When I hit the balls you can hear it and you can hear it when it hits the back of the pocket. The tables at Brian's don't have the fastest cloth or rails, either, so you have to put some "ooomph" in the shot in order to drive the cue ball 4 or 5 rails without a spinning cue ball. My cue ball is usually travelling "flat".
Most of the people I see at the other tables have a "jab-type" stroke with little, if any, follow through. They hit the balls at a speed that they barely reach the pockets and they don't have enough "sauce" on the cue ball to ever get any kind of position.
I think everybody would benefit from spending some time actually "banging" the balls around the table in order to get the feel of how to let your stroke out. If you are bunting all the time, it's hard to hit a line drive or a home run when you get up to bat.
Man....I rarely agree with you on things but, on this one I TOTALLY agree. Nothing beats trying to watch a slow rolling player try and do a force follow up 7’ on a 9’ table trying to get shape on an end rail shot. They struggle to the point of shame. Because they have no stroke. As long as they keep the angles and the shots within reach they can play. But, past that forget about it.
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