Basic Pool: The Ultimate Beginner's Guide (Revised and Updated)

Copyright © 2011 Laurence S. Moy

Foreword to the 2016 edition © 2016 by Laurence S. Moy

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10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Tom Lau

Cover photo credit: iStockphoto

Print ISBN: 978-1-5107-1230-0

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-1231-7

Printed in China

Dedicated

to the memories

of Arthur Cranfield, Sr.,

and Mary Moy

Table of Contents

Introduction

Introduction to the 2016 Edition

Chapter 1: Getting Started

• The Basics

Chapter 2: Equipment Makes a Difference

• Table in the Back?—How to Select a Table in a Commercial Poolroom

• What to Look for in a Pool Cue

• Chalk

• Keep it Clean

• Must You Accessorize?

• Caring for Your Cue

Chapter 3: That Critical 20 Percent—The Mechanics of Playing Pool

• Stance and Torso Position

• Hand Position

• The Rear Hand

• The Bridge Hand

• The Stroke—What Will Separate You for Life from Every Other Pool Player (Whether You Like It or Not)

Chapter 4: Aiming Kept Simple—How to Make Your Shots

• The Point of Aim, the Point of Contact, and the Difference Between the Two

• Finding the Point of Aim Using the Arrow System

• Fine-Tuning Your Aiming—When and How to Make Adjustments

• Combination Shots

Chapter 5: Three Keys to Cue Ball Control: The Stop Shot, the Follow Shot, and the Draw Shot

• Your Reference Point: The Short Stop Shot

• The Follow Shot

• The Draw Shot

• The Long Stop Shot

Chapter 6: Moving the Cue Ball Successfully

• The Tangent Line and the Natural Path of the Cue Ball

• Speed Control

• Controlling Your Destiny—How to Alter the Natural Path of the Cue Ball

Chapter 7: English as a Second Language—Understanding and Applying Side-Spin

• Understanding English

• Applying English

Chapter 8: When Worlds Collide (And When You Should Make Sure They Don’t)

• Adjusting the Speed of the Cue Ball

• When to Separate Clusters of Balls

• When to Bump (Run the Cue Ball Into) Other Balls

• Choosing Not to Run Into Object Balls

Chapter 9: The Other 80 Percent—Thinking Your Way Through a Pool Game

• Relaxed Concentration

• Trust Yourself

Chapter 10: Straight Pool, Eight-Ball, and Nine-Ball—The Rules of the Games and Beyond

• Straight Pool

• Nine-Ball

• Eight-Ball

Chapter 11: Practice Makes Better (If Not Perfect)

• Meaningful Practice

• Drills, Exercises, and Competing

Chapter 12: Beyond this Book

• Instruction

• Videos

• Magazines

Glossary

Acknowledgments

About the Authors

Index

Introduction

Anyone can learn to play pool well. Many have started out with limited natural talent, but nonetheless developed into solid players. Pool is beautiful and democratic in that way. Anyone can apply his or her strengths to the game and excel since the game requires so many different types of skills. There is room in billiards and pool for those blessed with excellent hand-eye coordination, those with very little coordination but strong intellect, those who are systematic but not creative, and those who are creative but not systematic.

Yet some people have dropped the game because it is more difficult than many other pastimes, or struggled for years to reach an enjoyable level of proficiency. Even experienced pool players can at times become dizzy and frustrated with facets of the game. No knowledgeable person would deny that there is a great deal to learn about pool, potentially more than anyone could learn in a lifetime.

That being the case, how can a beginning player get a good start learning the game? Why do some players progress much more quickly than others? How can experienced players rely on coming up with their best play when it counts—under the pressure of competition?

Part of the answer to all of these questions is distilling the many elements of playing pool to their essentials. If you have ever picked up more than one or two books on pool, you’ve been subjected to excruciating detail on particular shots that you may, or may never, confront in a game. Since so many different possibilities can present themselves on the table, it is tempting to teach pool by trying to explain the game one shot at a time. The problem with that approach, however, is that the different types of shots and the different possibilities for how the balls can arrange themselves on the table are limitless.

While no book can teach you everything you need to know to become a good pool player, the chapters that follow approach pool with the goal of sharing concepts that you can use to create your own solutions when you step up to a table. These concepts—which address both the physical and the mental aspects of playing pool well—are presented in a fashion that allows a player to absorb these critical elements easily, and to be able to call upon them during the pressure of a game. By applying the following strategies for attacking the table, you will be able to adapt general principles of correct play to specific situations as they come up.

Playing correctly is the key, not how many balls you are able to run off the table in a row. I have taught many players, and have always told them that it is better to run five balls the right way than twenty-five the wrong way. If you learn to run five balls the right way, you’ll eventually run twenty-five. The success I have enjoyed at billiards—starting with a junior championship and working my way up to the World Professional Championship—speaks to the fact that if you learn to play correctly, long runs of the table will follow.

Whether your next game will be a tournament match or part of a night out with a group of friends is up to you. I hope that this book will help you to succeed at pool no matter what the context, which will lead to more enjoyment and, in turn, even greater success. Let’s look at the most critical elements in the game of pocket billiards: the essentials of playing pool.

Babe Cranfield

Syracuse, New York

2002

Introduction to the 2016 Edition

Pool, both today and yesterday, represents many things. It is the stately champion of billiards’s Golden Age; the pastime of twenty-somethings at a trendy nightspot; the friendly game at the local pub; the international competition held anywhere from China to Europe to South America; the quiet family game on a Sunday night; the noisy league match at the local pool hall; and so much more. Pool has remained popular over the generations for a reason. It challenges the mind. It’s fun. It allows casual players to laugh and socialize. It calls for serious players to bear down and focus. It exercises both sides of the brain, as well as the body.

Basic Pool grew out of interest in having Arthur Babe Cranfield, former World Champion, share his knowledge of the game with a broader audience. Babe always taught interested students of the game, and did so for free. I was one of those students, but was not alone. Babe generously instructed many on how to play more skillfully, and in many instances invited these students into his home to meet his family and, eventually, to share not just love of billiards, but friendship as well. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting other Babe Cranfield students, and we enjoy a special bond as alumni of Babe Cranfield’s informal billiard academy. Babe shared his knowledge in other important ways. Starting in his early twenties, and continuing for over fifty years, Babe entertained thousands by giving exhibitions on countless college campuses, poolrooms, and other venues all over the country. But a book would spread his insights about pool to an even wider audience.

Babe’s specialty was straight pool, or 14.1 Continuous Pocket Billiards, the championship game of pool’s first Golden Age—the 1930s through the pool surge of the ‘60s engendered by crowds seeing Paul Newman and Jackie Gleason cross cues on the big screen in The Hustler. (In fact, straight pool was the game Fast Eddie Felson and Minnesota Fats played in the movie.) Babe was a champion at straight pool, but he was a master of all the pool games. This book addresses not just straight pool but also eight-ball and nine-ball, games that today’s players continue to love. As has always been the case, pool continues to come up with new and different games. Players are now enjoying games like 10-ball and Chinese eight ball. Some players continue to love older games like cut-throat, rotation, one-pocket, and bank pool. There are literally hundreds of games to be played on a standard pocket billiards table, but understanding the rules and strategies for playing straight pool, eight-ball, and nine-ball is a solid foundation for playing all of the games well.

When Babe and I wrote this book in 2002, pool was in a state of flux. The game had enjoyed a revival in popularity that had begun in the mid-1980s after another successful film, The Color of Money, was released and earned Paul Newman his first Academy Award. The movie was based loosely on a book by Walter Tevis (also the author of The Hustler, the inspiration for the movie of the same name). So the game and its fans have owed Mr. Tevis a large debt for driving interest in pocket billiards over the decades. But by the time Babe and I started working on this project (initially titled Essential Pool), pool rooms were closing and interest in the game was waning. It did not seem like a fortuitous time to write a book celebrating the game of pool.

But the book and its predecessor, The Straight Pool Bible, the first book dedicated exclusively to the game of straight pool, found a following, and both sold well. It seems that, despite all of the new distractions (video games, online games, games on phones, and whatever else has been dreamed up from generation to generation), pool endures. For one thing, there are so many dimensions to the game: the social aspect, the competitive angle of pool, the mystique that comes with a game that can embrace both high-stakes gambling on the one hand, and the grace and dignity of billiards played in a tournament or club setting on the other. All of these different facets of pocket billiards draw different people to the game.

What keeps people playing and loving the cue sports are the rewards and complexities of the game itself. One basic fact has remained true throughout billiards’s long history: Whether you are a fun player or a serious player, the game is more enjoyable when you play better. With all of the information available today, there’s no excuse for not playing better. Today’s challenge is not finding information, but rather figuring out how to filter out all the extraneous details in order to get started or to improve in an efficient way. Babe valued keeping pool simple and distilling the game to its basics. This book is our effort to bring those lessons to everyone. It’s my honor and joy to help to spread Babe’s love for billiards to a new generation of players. We hope that this book helps your game, and enhances your love for billiards. Welcome to Basic Pool.

—Larry Moy

New York, New York

2016

CHAPTER

1

Getting Started

As with any other demanding game, your rewards in pool will increase as you improve. As you become more accomplished, the game has an uncanny way of revealing its possibilities and nuances. In pool, perfect execution is not enough. You must be constantly striving to gain knowledge, and you must develop the ability to create solutions to problems that you have never seen before. All of this can make the game seem overwhelmingly daunting and difficult. Those same qualities, however, make pool interesting at all levels of play. There will always be new ways for you to develop as a pool player. The game is rich in its intricacy, variety, and challenges; it is a true lifetime endeavor, impossible to outgrow.

Today, pool is being played in a wide variety of settings: in poolroom leagues, in team competitions, in bar leagues, in weekend tournaments, in clubs, in homes, and in commercial poolrooms. No matter which of these settings you prefer, if you want to improve at pool, you will need to find a place—and the time—to practice on your own. You will never get much better at pool if you only play games and never practice, since you will be depriving yourself of the chance to experiment with different approaches. Once you reach a certain level, it will become absolutely necessary for you to compete against others, in addition to practicing alone, in order to continue to improve. In an ideal world, you would have the time and the money to practice on your own, play against other players, and receive personal instruction.

Even if this is not possible, you can become accomplished at pool if you are willing to practice it