why we miss- ?

[evergruven]

I guess there sure could be many reasons why we fail to pocket balls and/or get position
and likely it depends on who's shooting, etc..but I'm wondering if instructors could/do boil those reasons down? if so, what's the list?

 

[bbb]

not hitting where you are aiming......ie stroke flaws
i think is the biggest reason for missing among non pro's
.....................................
position failure can be lots of things
poor speed control which can be affected by hitting the object ball alittle thinner or fatter than intended
or your mastery of speed is not fine tuned enough
not accurate tip placement getting more/less spin,,hitting higher/lower than intended
not understanding the exact track the cue ball will take with the speed/spin you are using
jmho
lets see what the experts say

 

[Bob Jewett]

I guess there sure could be many reasons why we fail to pocket balls and/or get position
and likely it depends on who's shooting, etc..but I'm wondering if instructors could/do boil those reasons down? if so, what's the list?

What errors do you see in your own game?

 

[boogieman]

I am not an instructor but this is kind of how I see things:

At all levels lack of stamina and focus can cause misses. If you're tired and not giving your full effort it can bite you in the butt. It's dumb the amount of focus and intricacy this game requires, but that makes it fun. Some people focus easier than others. We either have to train our focus/stamina or just figure out enough band-aids to keep it at bay.

1. In the beginning I think fundamentals are the main reason we miss. That and the fact we just don't know the shots. We're learning the game but for the most part we're ignorant. I don't mean stupid, we just don't know things. Fundamentals and staying down are very important at this point as is closely watching the result of the shot (while staying down). Staying down keeps us from moving the tip slightly (or severely) as we raise up and also gives our brain/subconscious time to program and remember what happened.

2. At a certain point in our pool "career" I think fundamentals are a secondary reason we miss. It's not really fundamentals that caused us to miss once we are proficient but they can be a reason especially if we're not consistent. It can be bad habits creeping back in. That chicken wing demon we thought we had exorcised pops back up etc. I think at this point it becomes that we lack the knowledge of the shot or how the CB behaves. KISS at this point. Figure the tangent line and ride it, bend it forward or backwards. At this point in our "career" we are missing because of English/side spin or mental errors creeping in. Lack of confidence, too much adrenaline from being close to winning, etc. Fundamentals are still being grooved in but they are decent at this point.

3. At this level of proficiency misses come from trying too hard to get shape. Too much english, too much speed, spin etc. We can get really good shape on the next ball but missed the OB. Back up. You're not to the point of pro level pin point shape yet. You're close at times but you gotta make the OB. Shape means nothing if you miss. The balance here MUST be to make the OB or you're done. You miss the OB and the opponent runs out. MAKE the ball! Focus on making the OB and just put some effort on shape, don't force it. Fundamentals are getting better, they should be almost natural now, but you have to keep them reigned in. Make sure you're not popping up. These damn bad habits! Gotta really simplify things here.

4. You've learned to MAKE the OB. Congrats! Now it becomes about learning more shots, practicing them sufficiently, not s##ting the bed with letting bad habits creep in. Getting better shape (but remember you make the OB still) Focusing, keeping mental errors at bay, learning to harness adrenaline or letting it wash over you. Honestly I don't know what you do past this point, but this will get you at least a threat in local tournaments and league nights. I'm guessing just working on consistency and learning to recognize and work on weaknesses in our personal game goes a long way here.

EDIT: Please feel free to correct anything dumb I've said, lord knows I don't know much about this game!

 

[FranCrimi]

I think there are two types of missed shots:

1.) Unfamiliar or difficult shots that we haven't quite figured out yet, whether it's our own fundamentals in relation to the shot, or the physics of the shot --- so we're guessing.

2.) Shots we've successfully made many times before.

#2 Is the one that drives amateur players nuts. Pros know why, when #2 occurs. It may make them angry when it happens, but they're not confused about why.

A player's pre shot routine isn't just something physical. It's also a sequence of thoughts a player has from the time they approach the table, all the way to the their execution stroke. Once that mental sequence falls out of order, the player must stop and restart the mental process to put things back in order. If not, he is at risk for a miss.

You've heard the term 'commit to the shot.' Every player must make this their mantra.

Commitment to the shot occurs at end of the decision-making process and must occur BEFORE the player steps into his stance. That means that the player is 100% positive on what he wants to do before stepping into the shot, even if he's just guessing. He has to be committed to his guess. That commitment must be consistent through the entire mental process the player goes through when he's down on the shot and preparing to shoot. If there is ANY distraction or wavering from that commitment, for any reason at all, the player must get up and start the process over and do what he needs to do to commit to the shot.

And by the way --- there's no such thing as 70% or 80% or 90% commitment to the shot. That won't fly in competition. You are either 100% committed or zero percent committed.

 

[dquarasr]

Not an instructor (as many of you know!!! )

Three reasons and they're all intertwined:
1. Stroke delivery flaws
2. Bad aim
3. Ignorance / inexperience

1 - If you can't deliver the cue exactly along the proper shot line / stroke plane you might miss. If you can't deliver the cue tip at the exact intended spot, you might miss. This is a part of, but not all of fundamentals.

2 - You don't "see" the proper place to deliver the cue ball. This is the other part of fundamentals in that fundamentals span both cue delivery and initial body and cue alignment.

3 - You don't fully understand the effects of physics on the path of the cue ball and object balls. Examples: how dirty balls might have more throw than clean, polished balls; how a certain table brand cushions bounce balls off them, or new vs old cloth; how much a shaft squirts and how much swerve might return the cue ball back to the intended line.

I'm tempted to add a fourth, lack of focus, but it can be argued that lack of focus is included in the three reasons. But I'd be OK if people want to make that its own category.

 

[R2PQZ]

Remember to oxygenate your brain! 50 years ago an old timer said people forget to breathe before shooting crucial shots. I am an old timer now and have always remembered this advice.

 

[bbb]

Remember to oxygenate your brain! 50 years ago an old timer said people forget to breathe before shooting crucial shots. I am an old timer now and have always remembered this advice.

Great advice
I think remembering to breath is very important
Actually a long deep breath can slow your heart rate and calm you

 

[FranCrimi]

Remember to oxygenate your brain! 50 years ago an old timer said people forget to breathe before shooting crucial shots. I am an old timer now and have always remembered this advice.

Great advice. Another is to not let the blood rush to your head. For example, if you drop a piece of chalk on the floor while playing, bend with your knees and try not to tilt your head all the way down to pick it up. I remember one time at a WPBA pro tournament, we were having some fun with the introductions --- doing silly things when our names were announced, and one player did a cartwheel. She wound up miscuing on the opening break shot.

 

[WobblyStroke]

There are many reasons for misses. We can list em here all day and there have been great examples above. What matters most tho, is understanding your game and why YOU miss. Then you can address these at the practice table. It's about plugging up the biggest holes in the boat first.

When I came back to playing after many years away and lost all the things I did at the table subconsciously, I assessed sessions and addressed my biggest holes. My progress was very rapid and it went something like this....

1. Develop a trustworthy reliable stroke that you can pull off the vast majority of the time. Without this, you won't have reliable feedback on your misses anyway. Be able to recognize when you simply don't swing your swing. Nothing to dwell on, just do what you meant to do on the next shot. If you keep failing, then you have an issue to address.
2. I struggled jacked up. So I added a warmup rack of jacked up shots to my initial warmup at the table and this quickly disappeared. As it turned out, it was more of a perception issue and than a stroking issue. But whatever the ailment, the reps will help get over it.
3. I struggled with shots when the CB is up against the rail. I hit a few hundred of these trying out different techniques suggested for this type of shot, switching to CB last sighting, etc. Solved my issue in short order by settling on a technique I could trust. Perception again was an issue as well with just the top bit of the ball visible and being slightly (initially too) jacked up.
4. Slight cuts down the long rail the length of the table tended to miss fat. So I hit a few hundred of those. When on my friend's pristine ball set from home, no issue. On dirty pool hall balls, I struggled with all the extra throw. Experimenting with overcutting and adding outside english allowed me to relearn how to reliably make these shots again.
5. A certain slight backcut angle gave me issue as I just saw it wrong and where I thought I should hit it was too thick. Again, hit a few racks of these and see what it should look like. This can work for any problem shot.
6. I was kind of guessing with how much english to use on Z shots for position and how to reliably head at a certain point on the second rail. Again, I hit rack after rack of these, ingraining the ball paths for natural angles and adjusting to specific targets on the rail knowing that a tip of english moves the second rail contact point a diamond on the equipment I was playing.
7. Started playing again and on pressure shots that I took extra time on I tended to miss. This was more about committing to my PSR and rhythm and timing when I get down over shots. I made a lot more of them when I approached them the same way as all others.

By assessing the biggest holes in my game, it took just a few months of playing a couple of times a week to get much much better. So much so, that 'hustler' and 'sandbagger' were thrown my way quite a bit since I improved over 100FR points in terms of level of play in that time. While it is important to realize that shaking off rust and relearning something you were proficient at before will take a lot less time than building up those skills to begin with, a systematic approach to plugging big holes in one's game is going to speed up progress massively.

So many players miss the same shots in the same way for years. Don't be that guy. And yes, you can have a really nice stroke and suck at pool as I got that stroke in order in a hurry. I still had many issues to address in my game to even get it to a point I would bet a nickel on myself in competition.

Just think about how much better you would be if you plugged up one leak in your game every month, let alone every week as that is possible for some. Track your misses. Look for resources on solutions if you don't already know them but just aren't applying them correctly. And attack your weaknesses in practice.

Rereading this, the 100FR point level jumps seems like a lot, but really, if you look at a player who misaims several types of common shots, misses most shots jacked up or off a rail, and can't reliably hit within a diamond of his target on the second rail for position vs a guy who doesn't have those common glaring holes in his game, 100FR points may be understating it. And the craziest part is, that bad player who missed all those shots and messed up shape a ton had the exact same stroke as the guy a few months later. There are indeed a lot of reasons for missing. Stroke is most important, but even when you have reliable cueing, you can manage to be pretty bad at this difficult game we love.

Take notes on your sessions and attack your specific weaknesses.

 

[BilliardsAbout]

I guess there sure could be many reasons why we fail to pocket balls and/or get position
and likely it depends on who's shooting, etc..but I'm wondering if instructors could/do boil those reasons down? if so, what's the list?

One big reason for missed shots: It's not been that long (compared to how long pool has been a game/sport) that players have discussed collision- and spin-induced throw that causes missed shots. And still now, most players have no idea about throw.

Since ways to counteract throw include pounding the balls hard, adding outside english and overcutting shots, many players adapt one or more of these in their game consciously or subconsciously, then miss balls often based on lack of throw (compensating for nothing) or the other way, overcompensating. In addition, due to aiming challenges, most amateurs (weaker amateurs) miss mostly on the overcutting side, rather than hitting balls too thickly.

I've encouraged quite a few players to slow down/soften their grip and strokes and aim for a thicker cut on the OB than they'd otherwise plan for, to gain feel and touch.

Not trying to change the topic but aiming many cut shots starting with the line of centers then adjusting as little as possible is a help here, too.

 

[garczar]

I guess there sure could be many reasons why we fail to pocket balls and/or get position
and likely it depends on who's shooting, etc..but I'm wondering if instructors could/do boil those reasons down? if so, what's the list?

NOT a teacher but i see a lot of mid-to-lower level players everyday. I'd say the vast majority have NO CLUE how to find then drop down on a shot line. They chalk(sometimes) then just haphazardly get down and whack it.

 

[evergruven]

appreciate all the responses. I like the way fran put it, I can visualize almost all of my misses stemming from the two things she mentions

What errors do you see in your own game?

I've been watching video of my play, and try to figure out what I'm doing right/wrong. it's an ongoing process, but I'm seeing a few things

even after a good amount of dedicated play, I still encounter a fair number of shots I'm unfamiliar with- either how to hit it, or not sure exactly where the balls are going
related to this, my shot selection is getting better, but I do still regularly make mistakes in that department- which balls to hit, and how
I usually hit them ok, but my body is often challenged by blind cuts- sometimes I tilt my head and my elbow flares out when hitting these (and occasionally other) shots
my cue tip/stroke stutters/hesitates after getting through the cb..could be a symptom of a stroke flaw? trying not to, but I do it quite a bit so not sure
over the past year(?) or so, I've switched to looking at the ob last- it's working pretty well I think, but I sometimes have trouble on long shots with it

NOT a teacher but i see a lot of mid-to-lower level players everyday. I'd say the vast majority have NO CLUE how to find then drop down on a shot line. They chalk(sometimes) then just haphazardly get down and whack it.

great point. some here might recall from seeing me play that I've been known to shuffle my feet when getting down on the ball, not as much lately
I started looking at the ob contact point when getting down on the shot, and often my feet/body find their way to what feels good. not always, but often
and I can relate to missing when my body feels out of place, which goes back to commitment- trying to get up when I don't feel right, start over

 

[FranCrimi]

NOT a teacher but i see a lot of mid-to-lower level players everyday. I'd say the vast majority have NO CLUE how to find then drop down on a shot line. They chalk(sometimes) then just haphazardly get down and whack it.

Why do you think that is, given that there is so much information that's easily accessible?

 

[garczar]

Why do you think that is, given that there is so much information that's easily accessible?

Most if not all of the players i'm referring to don't watch videos or have a big desire to improve. Weird i know but that's my conclusion. And if i offer to show them a lot get all offended and say they don't need/want any help. I just smh and walk.

 

[FranCrimi]

Most if not all of the players i'm referring to don't watch videos or have a big desire to improve. Weird i know but that's my conclusion. And if i offer to show them a lot get all offended and say they don't need/want any help. I just smh and walk.

I believe you. I think that when we talk about why people miss, we should eliminate considering the ones who don't care and don't even bother to try. As an instructor, I walk away from those who want me to make them better without them doing any of the work. They're not players and don't count along with players who actually try.