What is pocket speed?

dabarbr

dabarbr

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
The other day I and and a friend of mine had a discussion on what pocket speed means. I would like opinions.
It seems to me that there is more than one defination as to what pocket speed is. Many believe that it means to roll the ball so that it it just gets to the pocket.

I believe that pocket speed means to deliver the hit so that the object ball has the best opportunity to get into the hole.

If that being the case then hitting the object ball with the speed to just get to the hole may have problems. The main problem would be that you are at the mercy of the table, meaning that at that speed the table would take it away from you if it is not truly level, especially if the ball has to travel a fair distance. Also if it encounters a bit of debri on it's path to the pocket it may cause the ball to go off course.

My idea of pocket speed would be to hit the object ball with the speed that it would be able to defeat any drift or unforseen obstacles between it and the pocket ( lint. pieces of chalk, etc.) and with not so much power that if it rubs the rail or hits the points at the pocket it will still go in.
If thats the case then that means that pocket speed will vary depending as to where the object ball lies. Balls closer to the rail will require a softer hit because the mouth of the pocket is smaller. Balls more toward the middle can have a firmer hit.

Of course many times it is necessary to hit with much more than pocket speed because of the position that is required for the next ball. For this reason we would like to position to locations that we can utilize pocket speed for position on the next ball.
If you were on game ball and no position is needed I believe you would want to deliver the shot with enough force to defeat any table roll and not so much force that if you rub rails it would still go in.
My main point is that pocket speed is not to have the ball just barly get to the pocket.

Do you disagree or agree with my opinion. I would like to hear other suggestions to this or any other ideas you might have.
 
For playing 1 pocket, pocket speed means just enough force to make the ball, because it is advantageous to jaw the ball if it doesn't drop.
In nine ball it's a whole different deal.
 
Table roll really has nothing to do with pocket speed IMO. The meaning would be how much speed can be put on the shot before the pockets won't take the ball, obviously not hitting the center of the pocket.

But as above poster pointed out, maybe different meaning for different games.
 
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I agree that pocket speed is just marginally faster than the speed required for the object ball to just barely reach the pocket. However, pocket speed is slow enough that, with the rarest of exception, if you miss, the ball will hang over the intended pocket. Mastery of pocket speed is especially important in one pocket, where hanging a ball over your pocket is, in some situations, a good result.
 
Pocket Speed(s)

dabarbr said:
It seems to me that there is more than one defination as to what pocket speed is.
Click to expand...

I'll offer up my definition. It is a range of speed with the lower bound being just enough to make the ball and the upper bound being soft enough that the ball does not hit the back of the pocket if cleanly pocketed.
 
bamadog said:
For playing 1 pocket, pocket speed means just enough force to make the ball, because it is advantageous to jaw the ball if it doesn't drop.
In nine ball it's a whole different deal.
Click to expand...
I totally agree in regards to one pocket.
 
I disagree with your opinion.

Pocket speed has always meant to me that if it doesn't fall, it is hung in the hole. The levelness of the table should have nothing to do with it.

What games is "pocket speed" most used in? One pocket and bank pool. In these games it is often advantageous to leave the ball hanging if you don't make it. But in other games, like 9 ball and Straight Pool, it is a disadvantage to leave a ball hanging if you miss it.

The reason I ask what games its most used in, is it wouldn't make sense to have different definitions of pocket speed based on game played or equipment used (crooked table). So since One Pocket is the main game where pocket speed is used, and the definition in that game is crystal clear, that same definition of pocket speed should be used across all games and all equipment.

What you are referring to I don't know if it has a name, but I have heard phrases that best describe it, such as: "hit the ball so it has the best chance to go". That would include a firmer stroke on a crooked table, or even english on the cue ball that when transfered to the object ball will cause it to spin off the pocket facing better and fall into the pocket (usually caused by inside english on the cueball on cut shots).
 
I like "just enough speed to fall into the pocket" because it isn't ambiguous; it's only about speed. I think it's also the default definition already.

pj
chgo
 
to me, pocket speed is:

The speed at which the object ball has the best chance of falling if it is hit poorly.

Usually it is referenced when talking about just under the maximum speed limit of the pocket.

If you hit a ball with pocket speed in mind, you are ensuring the pocket will hold a less than perfectly aimed ball...

The faster the ball is traveling, the more likely the pocket will spit it out. So, pocket speed is anywhere under that speed /shrug
 
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custmqs said:
I'll offer up my definition. It is a range of speed with the lower bound being just enough to make the ball and the upper bound being soft enough that the ball does not hit the back of the pocket if cleanly pocketed.
Click to expand...

I generally agree with you. That speed JUST enough to allow the ball to drop implies a super-exact speed...such that merely, say, 1/8th of a turn is the difference between the ball falling or not.

I don't believe "pocket speed" is intended to be quite that exact.

I would offer the definition that the ob does not hit the back of the pocket AND does not jaw out if the ob strikes a facing.

Regards,
Jim
 
av84fun,

Quite right. I've always understood pocket speed to mean some speed that does not allow the OB to hit the back of the pocket.

Russ
 
Pocket speed, aka lag speed (or a 1-speed to those who have studied SPF training), indeed refers to the OB not hitting the back of the pocket. I also define it as the least amount of energy you can give to the CB to pocket an OB, regardless of whether the OB is far from the CB, and close to the pocket...or close to the CB and far from the pocket...it just drops off the end of the slate. We rarely play pocket speed (with some exceptions in banks and one pocket), as many tables have some roll, and most players want to take table roll out of the equation. That said, I also believe it is important to practice the lag, so that this speed stroke, as a baseline, is clearly understood. It has many applications in games like 8-ball, 9-ball, and 14.1.

Scott Lee
www.poolknowledge.com
 
Scott Lee said:
Pocket speed, aka lag speed (or a 1-speed to those who have studied SPF training), indeed refers to the OB not hitting the back of the pocket. I also define it as the least amount of energy you can give to the CB to pocket an OB, regardless of whether the OB is far from the CB, and close to the pocket...or close to the CB and far from the pocket...it just drops off the end of the slate. We rarely play pocket speed (with some exceptions in banks and one pocket), as many tables have some roll, and most players want to take table roll out of the equation. That said, I also believe it is important to practice the lag, so that this speed stroke, as a baseline, is clearly understood. It has many applications in games like 8-ball, 9-ball, and 14.1.

Scott Lee
www.poolknowledge.com
Click to expand...
That and wife spending the cash in your pocket. Pocket speed.
 
dabarbr said:
The other day I and and a friend of mine had a discussion on what pocket speed means. I would like opinions.
It seems to me that there is more than one defination as to what pocket speed is. Many believe that it means to roll the ball so that it it just gets to the pocket.

I believe that pocket speed means to deliver the hit so that the object ball has the best opportunity to get into the hole.

If that being the case then hitting the object ball with the speed to just get to the hole may have problems. The main problem would be that you are at the mercy of the table, meaning that at that speed the table would take it away from you if it is not truly level, especially if the ball has to travel a fair distance. Also if it encounters a bit of debri on it's path to the pocket it may cause the ball to go off course.

My idea of pocket speed would be to hit the object ball with the speed that it would be able to defeat any drift or unforseen obstacles between it and the pocket ( lint. pieces of chalk, etc.) and with not so much power that if it rubs the rail or hits the points at the pocket it will still go in.
If thats the case then that means that pocket speed will vary depending as to where the object ball lies. Balls closer to the rail will require a softer hit because the mouth of the pocket is smaller. Balls more toward the middle can have a firmer hit.

Of course many times it is necessary to hit with much more than pocket speed because of the position that is required for the next ball. For this reason we would like to position to locations that we can utilize pocket speed for position on the next ball.
If you were on game ball and no position is needed I believe you would want to deliver the shot with enough force to defeat any table roll and not so much force that if you rub rails it would still go in.
My main point is that pocket speed is not to have the ball just barly get to the pocket.

Do you disagree or agree with my opinion. I would like to hear other suggestions to this or any other ideas you might have.
Click to expand...

Where are you people from?

I believe it was Don Feeny, who used the term 'make speed' as in make it,
to describe shooting hard/soft enough that, if there were no pocket
or rail, the ball would roll less than one foot beyound the actual
pocket opening.
But that is something else again.

The term pocket speed has been defined for longer than any of us
have been alive. It means: hitting the ball so that, if it doesn't fall,
it remans 'hung up' in the jaws of the pocket.

As explained by Iusedtobe..., this is a tactic in one pocket and bank pool.
I would add, it can also be used to advantage in 8 ball.

Anyone who grew up in a room where one pocket was played
knows about pocket speed. It is also more sensitive in onepocket
than Bank, in that you don't want merely to block the pocket in case of a miss. You want the ball to be impossible to dig out.

That might be why I tend to think of a definition in terms
of result given a miss. If the result wern't the motovation, there
wouldn't be any reason to shoot that softly.
Dale
 
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The correct answer is:

dabarbr said:
The other day I and and a friend of mine had a discussion on what pocket speed means. I would like opinions.
It seems to me that there is more than one defination as to what pocket speed is. Many believe that it means to roll the ball so that it it just gets to the pocket.

I would like to hear other suggestions to this or any other ideas you might have.
Click to expand...

Anyone who watched the DCC short rack bank finals between Jason Miller and John Brumback will recall the commentator, Mark Wilson, a former touring pro and teaching pro define what is meant by "pocket speed". Excuse my para-phrase, but according to Mark it means, hitting the object ball with adequate force to ensure that when it hits the inner pocket facing, it bounces off one facing and either directly into the pocket or it will bounce off the first facing and into the opposite facing and then into the hole. In either case, it will always drop into the packet and not have a third facing bounce wherein: it will not drop into the pocket, but instead "jaw up" and come to rest on the pocket lep without dropping. The top bankers of today understand this ball action very well but unless they are banking a short one railer into a corner pocket, they would prefer to hit the bank hard and overcome the problem of jawing the ball, by reversing the english on the long rail bank so that if the object ball does hit the inner facing, it will be spinning in the disired direction, (depending on which corner it is being shot into) thus, bouncing off the facing and diving into the pocket like a rat diving into a hole. And yes, there is no such thing as pocket speed into a side pocket because there is minimum inner facing.

IMO: Mark Wilson is one of the best teachers out there and can more easily impart the physics of the game to a student better than anyone I have ever come across and or took lessons from.

Cross-Side-Larry

"Learn from the best, and beat the rest"
 
for me the key thing with pocket speed is if the shot is not hit directly into the heart of the pocket, maybe hits rail first or the jaw first, then it will still go in. that is the key thing. that's why in commentary it's remarked often that the ball was not hit perfectly but it still went in because it was hit at pocket speed. whether the ball hits the back of the pocket or how far it goes off the edge of the table is somewhat irrelevant. those things may be true, but they are just by-effects of the whole point of you hitting a ball at 'pocket speed' in the first place.
 
Well, obviously there is a disconnect here. All I know is there would be a LOT of arguments if a "ball hanging in jaws" guy and a "speed with best chance to make it guy" got in a partners 1 pocket game!

I think the latter scenario is better called "make speed". Leave pocket speed to mean "hanging in the jaws if you miss".
 
as it happens . . .

I had a several month lay off, now I can take a stab at playing for a few weeks, and then a two month lay off following some whittling. Just my way of saying that my play wasn't the best today. Playing on a good Diamond nine footer at Buffalo Billiards, slow rolling the long rail shots into the corners was deadly, pocket speed by one definition. Banks into the corners and the easier side pocket banks were shot much the same.

However the off angle and more difficult side pocket shots were skidded into the rail and side pocket with excellent effect. I blew completely past most of the collision and rail induced english. At the moment with a lot of rust on my game this was the best "pocket speed" for me.

What I normally consider pocket speed is different however. I believe defining it as the speed that gives the best chance of falling is the best definition. It is very hard to jaw a ball shot at pocket speed. To give one more speed description, if the pocket wasn't there, the ball would roll less than eighteen inches further on the longer shots with a chance to roll off, less than a foot further on the shorter shots.

Hu
 
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