I just wanted to add... The bridge adjustment is limited to finger placement alterations. I do not move the heel of my bridge hand. If something that drastic is required it will result in a complete reset.
System .v.s. Experience
- Thread starter The_JV
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Am I right in assuming, from your descriptions, that english is only “required” for position.
Is this adjustment accompanied by a back hand move to maintain a center ball line, or are you now putting a small amount of side on the cue ball?
You don't respond because you wouldn't bet no matter what. But beyond that it's just a colloquial way of saying that someone is confident in their position and willing to risk something trying to prove it.
Of course one would want to eliminate as many variables as possible. That doesn't mean that having some variables can't yield helpful data.
All of my "bet" propositions are only made in service to showing the practically of the system in terms of performance. Not to reveal the underlying "quantum physics" (joke) that may explain why it works. I get tired of your insinuations that people are so self-deluded that they are "magically" seeing clear improvement in their aiming and shotmaking through fully subconscious means and the idea that those charging for instruction are frauds and those learning it are cult-members. Every time I think you might have backed off of that you make another snide-remark that shows you haven't. So my response is always going to be "bet something" when you do that.
My point remains that the practical effect of learning and using a system is reflected in performance metrics. We CAN set up shotmaking tests. We can isolate the aiming process and determine whether someone gets on the correct shot line or not. We can set up controls such as marked shot positions and ghost ball templates to determine whether a person can be successful when the line is marked for them. There are many ways in which we can useful data despite not being able to set up a perfectly controlled environment with an ideal set of conditions.
And IF you were willing to do any of those things then these conversations would be quite different, more positive and more productive IMO.
yes... However, if position is forgiving or inconsequential, I do tend to throw cuts with outside english. I'm ambidextrous in terms of english so my default use of outside I believe is just due to being a hair more automatic for me.
Yes... My cue is fully shifted to the altered shot line. I do not backhand aim/spin/whatever. The notion of it actually sends chills down my spine...lol
Sounds to me that your default is a slight off center hit, usually to the outside, shifted parallel to center ball.
Is that reasonable?
I'd bet almost anything that the CTE instruction from these pro's starts with "Here's how I do CTE..."
I wouldn't say that's the default. That implies that I start from there then adjust.
My default is center ball, and if there are no other considerations then I'm a hair more likely to shift to the outside on a cut shot. If I had to put a precentage on it. I'd say I have 55/45 tendency to go outside on the inconsequential shot. I purposely make an effort to mix in a healthy amount of inside attempts on the inconsequential to keep it in tune.
I prefer not to depend on my subconscious to make adjustments, micro or otherwise. I prefer to get on the right line and focus on the delivery deliberately until such time as I am getting on the right line and stroking correctly without the need to talk myself through the shot.
I honestly believe that we tend to lean on the "subconscious" too much. Yes the subconscious is real and does indeed direct a lot of our actions in the background. But if we start to think about free will and determinism we get into the debate about whether a human is making conscious or unconscious choices. I prefer to think that humans have the ability to be almost fully conscious and able to control their actions - as long as they have trained to do just that. What I mean is that there are some things that we cannot control fully control such as willing yourself to stop breathing completely. But you can systematically train to hold your breath for a very long time using techniques developed by people who had a need and desire to do just that.
So when it comes to pool I think that we have often said and been told that the holy grail is getting into a space we call the zone where all of the activity is subconsciously driven and correctly executed. And the inverse of that might be the player who gets fully tilted and couldn't drop a ball and have it hit the floor to win. But one thing I think that pretty much everyone agrees with is that the more a person trains to build skill the more that the subconscious has to work with when applying those skills. So it then stands to reason that the more good tools a person has to train with the more opportunity there is for the subconscious to use those tools as well.
Thus the directed activity of applying an aiming system super consciously could lead to the subconscious applying it automatically to put a player into the zone. And any microadjustments that might need to be made which a person should be able to identify and do consciously could then that is something that the subconscious could do because of the fact that the user has consciously identified and trained on them.
Stan calls this "pool sense". I just find that for me I very rarely find myself in the zone without consciously buying a ticket to it.
I think I confused the issue.
If english is not needed for position, on what percentage of shots would you use center ball?
You would lose that bet. There are things happening that you are not privy to because a lot of pros don't think you are worth engaging on this topic in this format. They don't care what you think about CTE or any aiming system. You and your opinion are completely meaningless to them because it has no material effect on their activity as a player. They don't lose or gain a single student based on your words. They don't win or lose a single game based on your words. They don't gain or lose any opportunity to play in any event based on your words. Guys like me like to engage guys like you for reasons of our own but the pros I know don't care about you, don't know your name and have zero incentive to do anything with you. But here you are stating that you would "bet" with zero intention of actually betting because you know that you will never ever be called on it because if you were you would wriggle out by stating that they would obviously switch up their message to win the bet.
But the fact is that there are professional players teaching CTE just as Stan does. Not "their version".
The other day I had a lengthy conversation with one of these teaching pros. I mentioned some of your positions and even your name and he said, "why do you bother with those people because every minute you spend talking to them is one less minute you could be playing?"
You know, even though I had given him an answer of because I think that the negative assertions need to countered, I don't think that I fully understood his answer until right now.
I know you didn't ask me but my answer is that I don't have a precise number because the choice to use spin to gear a ball in is really shot specific. For example sometimes I just like hitting a ball full and spinning the object ball in with throw because it gives me a much larger target than whatever cut angle the center ball hit is on. If I had to guess I would say that currently it's about 20-30% of shots where I am using spin for throw purposes but position is almost always part of the decision.
Another observation.
Despite the fact that I directed this question to the system guys, none of them would even tell us whether their default aim line and shot uses center ball?
Huh? I NEVER said that there isn't an experience input. However there ARE shots for which a person's "experience" might be really inadequate meaning that they have very few attempts and very few successful attempts or even negative in that they have never successfully completed it.
When a player learns CTE and their success rate on that shot improves dramatically what part then does their experience play in that dramatic positive increase?
I didn't know you did a laser video. I will go to your channel and look it up.
For sake of clarity... In my mind "center ball" = no siding.
Any shot that requires minimal cut angle gets a center ball shot. I'm struggling to word a measureable value to what I consider 'minimal cut angle'...lol
If the OB requires enough cut angle that it's worth giving thought. I will play it with some level of siding. That said, now that I'm thinking about it. I rarely hit inside english with draw. Inside english is nearly always accompanied with follow. Outside english I'll play with either draw or follow
I presented a game ball scenario, with the object ball mid table, and about a half ball or 30° cut Into a corner pocket, only ball left.
Do you use center ball?
Huh? First of all I didn't SEE your question except in other people's threads. But Stan has said a billion times that CTE is a center ball aiming system meaning that the line produced is a center cueball address.
Pretty sure that most of the other systems, 90/90, SEE system, stick aiming and so on are that way as well.
I would also posit that any aiming system that works in producing a center ball shot line could also be tweaked to reliably produce shot lines with spin. Isn't the premise of the post you made a few weeks ago on how you aim?
In that case I would NOT use spin to gear it in. My experience is that mid table cut shots are the hardest to get the overlap/spin ratio right on. I would try to use a strict center ball line given by using the CTE method or maybe 90/90 depending on which one I want to use.
I agree... I believe one of my greatest attributes is being to recognize when things aren't going 'automatically' and revert to the same PSR and concious adjustment of my aim that I've had for decades. It's slows me down a good deal, but I can pull myself out of bad days when doing so.
Well, we have a few here have already spent a decade and hit a million balls with one aiming system .
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How do you know? And if they have then how has their proficiency changed during that time?