Tight 4.5 Inch Pockets Vs Loose 4.5 Inch Pockets

DrCue'sProtege

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Let's use the Gold Crown as an example.

Is it possible for a Gold Crown IV with 4.5 inch pockets to play much tighter than a Gold Crown IV with 4.5 inch pockets?

And yes, you read that right.

r/DCP
 
Yes. Rail cut angle can make a pocket more or less accepting of balls for a given opening. Repost in the mechanic section and you’ll get way more details.


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Of course. The ball must make it all the past the lip. I say BFD. 4.5" apertures are too big to aim at. They don't even tickle my pool sense.
 
Let's use the Gold Crown as an example.

Is it possible for a Gold Crown IV with 4.5 inch pockets to play much tighter than a Gold Crown IV with 4.5 inch pockets?

And yes, you read that right.

r/DCP
The pocket facing angle (PFA) can make a huge difference even if two tables have the same pocket mouth measurements. A 140° PFA 4-1/2” pocket will play way more forgiving than a 143° PFA 4-1/2” pocket.
 
Yeah yeah, cheat the aperture. Graze the cushion, make the best angle, yada yada...
Technically, absolutely straight in is pretty unlikely so there's your angle built in. It's still pool. shoot the angles that present themselves. Further, how many times have you followed or drawn the ball 180 degrees picture perfect coherent? end rant/

This was a continuation that got cut off. Not firing at ChrisNC or anyone else.
 
Let's use the Gold Crown as an example.

Is it possible for a Gold Crown IV with 4.5 inch pockets to play much tighter than a Gold Crown IV with 4.5 inch pockets?

And yes, you read that right.

r/DCP
There’s a sticky at the top of the forum that details hiw to figure out a table’s Table Difficulty Factor (TDF).

I can’t figure, for the life of me, why it is not a standard notation for things like straight pool high runs.
 
It becomes pretty academic if you just play with 4.25” pockets which is becoming more popular.
Anytime the pocket opening doesn’t allow 2 OBs to pass thru is my preference and seems fair.
When the pocket is more than twice the width of the object ball, it even sounds a bit generous.
 

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There the opening angle and the down angle and depth. Theres a lot more going on that the distance between the tits. It all effects how the pocket takes a ball.

All this nonsense about pocket size is mostly noise from uneducated people who didn’t know what a pocket “size”was until they read something online. And now they have only a slight idea of what’s going on. Which is why this is my first and last post about pocket size. I’m not an educator.

RKC knows his stuff on this topic. Ask him…..

Fatboy
 
There the opening angle and the down angle and depth. Theres a lot more going on that the distance between the tits. It all effects how the pocket takes a ball.

All this nonsense about pocket size is mostly noise from uneducated people who didn’t know what a pocket “size”was until they read something online. And now they have only a slight idea of what’s going on. Which is why this is my first and last post about pocket size. I’m not an educator.

RKC knows his stuff on this topic. Ask him…..

Fatboy
RKC is the goto expert for authentic. To me though, pocket traditions don't really cut it. If I hit the pocket I want the ball to drop. The patterns are far too enjoyable to let a hanging ball ruin. I'd be happiest with loose, sub 4"ers.
 
I think that the original Brunswick GCI got it right - the game was 14.1 and you had to develop a stroke and actually learn how to play the game correctly to be successful . ESPN and 9 ball changed everything - just be able to count 1-9 and the game became easy - so now they had to fool with pocket openings.
You cannot run 16 balls on 5 inch pockets if you don’t understand 14.1 but you can run 1-9 all day long on that same table with just a bit of pool knowledge- THIS is the true difference in the game today - it is not the pockets - it’s the game being played.
 
There the opening angle and the down angle and depth. Theres a lot more going on that the distance between the tits. It all effects how the pocket takes a ball.

All this nonsense about pocket size is mostly noise from uneducated people who didn’t know what a pocket “size”was until they read something online. And now they have only a slight idea of what’s going on. Which is why this is my first and last post about pocket size. I’m not an educator.

RKC knows his stuff on this topic. Ask him…..

Fatboy
but isnt it conventional wisdom that "size "matters.......;)😂
 
RKC is the goto expert for authentic. To me though, pocket traditions don't really cut it. If I hit the pocket I want the ball to drop. The patterns are far too enjoyable to let a hanging ball ruin. I'd be happiest with loose, sub 4"ers.
You either play world-class level or you're full of shit. Based on what you said about cues and balance point effects i'm leaning towards the latter. Pool on pockets that tight is a joke. Its all just 'cinch' pool where cheating the pocket to play shape(a HUGE part of the game btw) is impossible. I play in a room with 10 GC4's that a former mgr. tightened 6 of them to about 4 1/8. Ridiculous. Even the good players hate them, avg. Joe's can't make a ball. Literally, cannot make a ball. "Loose sub 4"'rs" WTF. Yeah right.
 
You either play world-class level or you're full of shit. Based on what you said about cues and balance point effects i'm leaning towards the latter. Pool on pockets that tight is a joke. Its all just 'cinch' pool where cheating the pocket to play shape(a HUGE part of the game btw) is impossible. I play in a room with 10 GC4's that a former mgr. tightened 6 of them to about 4 1/8. Ridiculous. Even the good players hate them, avg. Joe's can't make a ball. Literally, cannot make a ball. "Loose sub 4"'rs" WTF. Yeah right.
Jason Shaw ran a billion balls on equipment just like that ....
 
You either play world-class level or you're full of shit. Based on what you said about cues and balance point effects i'm leaning towards the latter. Pool on pockets that tight is a joke. Its all just 'cinch' pool where cheating the pocket to play shape(a HUGE part of the game btw) is impossible. I play in a room with 10 GC4's that a former mgr. tightened 6 of them to about 4 1/8. Ridiculous. Even the good players hate them, avg. Joe's can't make a ball. Literally, cannot make a ball. "Loose sub 4"'rs" WTF. Yeah right.
Loose sub 4 = very shallow

The cue balance thing was prefaced by a previous post that acknowledged " the hit is the hit is the hit "

World class and FOS doesn't equate. With CPG and good cloth, shots go <on the line they're shot>. I don't have to bother with hitting the pocket. The balls go where the points line up. The difference is knowing how the points line up. Cheating the pocket is just a matter of shooting the ball on that line. The tighter the pocket the less slack you have is all.

So you gotta play cleaner patterns and pick your good landings. The game you're talking about is long gone - as are the champions of that school. The homework to get to freewheeling it these days is an order of magnitude higher. Shaw's a good example. He's so prepped he's in the 8s.

I'd also add that ain't the half of pool.
 
Jason Shaw ran a billion balls on equipment just like that ....
14.1 was never intended to be played on tiny pockets. 4.5" is about as snug as you would want for straights. I just think that most people that say they love 4" pockets are keyboard run-out artists talking out of their ass. I hear this shit from league players all the time and when i see them play they'd be lucky to toss a peanut in the grand canyon.
 
Jason Shaw ran a billion balls on equipment just like that ....
Not sure what you're saying but JS's record table has 4.9" corners and 5.3" sides combined with a GC's short shelf. Pretty soft table for a player like Shaw. If it was 4.5" D's he might have had a smaller run but still in the stupidly good category.
 
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