Short vs Tall in Stature, any advantage?

Pangit

Pangit

Banned
Generally speaking, there are expections.

I have a friend that's 6.5 ft tall with long arms...as he say's "don't need a crutch" the mechanical bridge.

Snooker, no one shy's away from the rake, it's embraced. Part of the game

"Jacking" up over a ball to legally hit the white...keep one foot on the floor. Seems like a real disadvantage to short people??

Tall people have to crouch down to get a good look at things to play devil's advocate. I think it's clearly an advantage to be tall.
 
I am 6'6" and in some cases being tall in pool is nice (reach, etc.). A downside is if I want to use a normal to long bridge, I either have to choke up on the stick which affects my stroke negatively, or my back hand only has two fingers on the butt of the cue.

This issue can be silver with a longer cue but then reach issues are solved with a mechanical bridge (which I also need sometimes), so I guess it evens out more or less.

Another issue with tall that is non-pool related; I find myself having to get things off of the floor much more than from up high.. and when I drop things they fall down.. the floor is a long way down for a tall person but it seems like I always need to get to it! Also, IMPOSSIBLE to blend in with a crowd.
 
Pangit said:
Generally speaking, there are expections.

I have a friend that's 6.5 ft tall with long arms...as he say's "don't need a crutch" the mechanical bridge.

Snooker, no one shy's away from the rake, it's embraced. Part of the game

"Jacking" up over a ball to legally hit the white...keep one foot on the floor. Seems like a real disadvantage to short people??

Tall people have to crouch down to get a good look at things to play devil's advocate. I think it's clearly an advantage to be tall.
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Jose and Santos seem to hit 'em pretty good, don't you think? :D
 
I'm 6'3''. It is a big advantage for stretching to the table, etc. It is even an advantage because tall people have most of the time long fingers and can make good solid bridges. (though I have seen tall dudes with fingers fat as sausages that can't make a looped bridge properly :p)

The hard part when you are tall is to learn the correct stance/posture on the table. Most short people can have good balance without working on too much on their feet positioning. On the other hand, a tall guy who studies the fundamentals of his game, must pay more attention on his feet and experiment with their positioning in order to get good balance.
 
JimmyWhite said:
I'm 6'3''. It is a big advantage for stretching to the table, etc. It is even an advantage because tall people have most of the time long fingers and can make good solid bridges. (though I have seen tall dudes with fingers fat as sausages that can't make a looped bridge properly :p)

The hard part when you are tall is to learn the correct stance/posture on the table. Most short people can have good balance without working on too much on their feet positioning. On the other hand, a tall guy who studies the fundamentals of his game, must pay more attention on his feet and experiment with their positioning in order to get good balance.
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Have you ever noticed how Jose and Santos place their chin right on the cue stick? I think this might be helpful to be able to see up front and close like that. :)

Of course, those reach shots for the short guys are brutal. In the old days, players were allowed to climb up on the table, on all fours. I don't think they allow players to do that anymore. It used to be a pool societal norm. :D
 
JAM said:
Have you ever noticed how Jose and Santos place their chin right on the cue stick? I think this might be helpful to be able to see up front and close like that. :)
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I play that way too. If you have the correct stance, you can go all the way down however tall you are. I also hit my head on the ceiling when it is too low :D

Mark Selby...also, Johnny Archer ;)
 
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I'm pretty short, 5'8, and my reach is better than alot of taller people than me. Never had to use the rest where a ~6'3 guy shouldn't.
 
Tall

Pangit said:
Generally speaking, there are expections.

I have a friend that's 6.5 ft tall with long arms...as he say's "don't need a crutch" the mechanical bridge.

Snooker, no one shy's away from the rake, it's embraced. Part of the game

"Jacking" up over a ball to legally hit the white...keep one foot on the floor. Seems like a real disadvantage to short people??

Tall people have to crouch down to get a good look at things to play devil's advocate. I think it's clearly an advantage to be tall.
Click to expand...

Tall people are the first to know when it starts raining!
 
In normal play I think being tall is a disadvantage because you have to bend more and this can create fatigue on the long run. Also I noticed a lot of tall guys use questionable stance in order to get down on the shot.
Being short ( not too short, like 5-7in is ok) is better for normal play, but you have to use both hands or the bridge more often. I'm bad with my opposite harm so I use the bridge more often. Also a disadvantage in being short is that a lot of people try to avoid using the bridge as much as possible and they instead try to reach the shot and this usually cause using a punch stroke which can result in disaster sometime.
I think the perfect height to play pool is somewhere around 5ft9in - 5ft10in.
 
I'm 5'6" and the tallest in my family<<<<I'm the youngest of 10!!! :)...no short jokes!.....In all honesty, I never wanted to be any taller. Very early on I did learn to play righty.....I am a lefty, and that makes a HUGE difference....I only use the bridge on a few shots I can't reach. I practice righty and play about 75% my normal speed righty.....FWIW my reach is 2" wider trhen I am tall!.....i guess that means something?.....no monkey jokes either!! :)

Personally, being short vs like 6'2" and up....I'd rather be short because I just imagine back issues from bending down to the table etc.

My best friend growing up was 6'3"....he hated it. Like said above....you can't hide anywhere being real tall. I'm a plumber, and if I was tall it would SUCK! trying to get into vanity cabinets, under kitchen sinks, into crawl spaces....no thanks! :embarrassed2:

G.
 
No I don't believe so, atleast not at the highest level. Johnny Archer and Efren I think are good contrasting examples of this.
 
I'm 6'3" and I can reach just about every shot on the table. Getting down low on shots it hard on my back after several hours of play. In some pool rooms the tables are too close and I can't get down all the way to make my shots. There is a private club that I go to sometimes and the tables are about 1" taller and it's amazing how much easier it is for me to play.
 
I find that table height can be a big factor when you are tall. I can play alot longer at the pool hall that has their tables about an inch higher then the other places I visit.

And that was something that one of my friends said just the other day. He is on the short side and he told me he hates to play at Banana's because the tables are higher.
 
Real tall gives you a big advantage in rotation games, but is not an advantage in other games.
 
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