Lou...the tangent took me above a ball that is out of the pic to the right. Bad perspective.
The angle was a hair much.
I prob could have sent the CB into the kitchen and attempt to freeze it and concede a shot to his ball to the right, but he clicked a few in already...so I was gun shy.
My initial thought was to take an intentional and protect ny balls, but I was 0 for "a lot" with that move at that point. Since I couldn't freeze to the rack, I couldn't guarantee to not leave something.
My CB control can't compete with his...it's taking a knife to a gun fight. Didn't you play Eff in one hole? Can you shed light on how that firepower affected your strategy, if at all?
I felt every intentional hurt me a lot more.
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Screw the tangent line. If the ball is froze, shoot through it to get the right line, or jack a bit more and go off the ball and masse it back to the cluster.
In the Efren match I played more aggressively than I might have against mere mortals. In particular, if he left a bank I went for it. It happen to pay off that day because I made like almost every bank I shot at.
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This is from a trip report from, I think, the 2000 US Open 1pocket Tournament, up in Kalamazoo, picking it up on day two of the event.
(insert flashback music):
Saturday morning I headed over to the Playground and just tried to get my mind set before my match with, arguably, the greatest all around pool player of all time. When I got to the tournament room, the line was: you could bet either way, whether I'd get to one. I decided that that's what I'd shoot for: to take one game off Efren Reyes. I'd told AllenB, the night before, that I would really appreciate it if he could snap a photo of me lagging with Efren, to prove to future generations that this match had actually taken place. Alan said no problem, and, a man of his word, was there setup in time with his camera and tripod to capture the moment and has already sent me the photo.
Well, we were put on table two, right in front of the largest section of bleachers and they were packed. Everyone wanted to see Efren play. I was just along for the ride. I put down a good lag, but Efren put the ball within an inch of the rail. I looked at my watch. It was one o'clock.
The first game did not go well, for me. He broke the balls well, and I was under the gun the entire game. When he didn't have a shot, he'd gently spin the cue ball one or two rails and snuggle it up against a ball. I, and the crowd, laughed out loud at the positions he'd put me in. I lost the first game 8-0. It was while I was racking the balls to break (it was a rack your own tournament) that the dawning realization came upon me that it was quite possible that, not only could I lose the match 4-0, I could, conceivably: lose the match against a player of this caliber WITHOUT SCORING A SINGLE BALL. Oh, the humiliation. What do you tell the guys back at the pool hall? What will everyone back on RSB think? That you got a chance to play Efren Reyes and didn't score a single ball!!?? Suddenly, not only did my goal of winning one game seem like the only way to maintain my dignity and salvage the honor of RSB, but it also seemed a goal that was now, on further reflection, very, very far away.
I broke well the second game. Shortly after the break, he left me frozen on the side rail just above my pocket. I looked at the rack for a long time. There was an unfrozen three ball combination that just might go. But the only way to hit it right was to send the cue ball into a fourth ball and then have it carom into the third ball in the combination chain. I'd have to hit it at warp speed to get enough energy on the shot to get the last ball in the combination to the pocket. If it didn't go, I was toast, because the stack was going to explode.
IMO, one of the more beautiful shots in pool is when a cluster of balls is stuck hard and the object ball eventually emerges from the stack and slowly begins marching towards it's assigned pocket. Despite shooting with brio, the two ball virtually crawled towards it's destination with total mayhem all around it. As I watched the shot, it seemed as if all the other object balls, and the cue ball, were moving and every single one of them wanted to kiss out the two ball. But somehow it made it safe and sound to its destination. The ball dropped. The crowd burst into applause.
Still, the balls were spread too wide for me to get out. As the game progressed, we got to the point at which I needed two and Efren needed one. And then, something began to become apparent to me, and then to everyone in the stands, and eventually to Efren: Lou was banking well today. Real well. Well, actually, I started banking like god.
Efren kissed into a shot and sold out the last two balls. A modest cut shot with moderately difficult position on the out ball. I missed. All I could hear in the stands were muttered, "Well, he had a chance..." A few innings later, I missed a thin hit to play safe and had to spot a ball. Now I needed three. But then it happened. I banked three and out to take the second game. The monkey was off my back.
Efren took the next game. Twice he tied me up so bad that my only option was to kick three rails and then two rails for an intentional scratch. But I pulled both of them off. The crowd started applauding my shots and the increasingly ridiculous accuracy and consistency of my bank shots.
I took the fourth game 8-0 to tie it up at 2-2. The fifth game we went down to the last three balls, all down table on the side rail just below the side pocket on his side. I needed all three and went for the home run: a carom and combination bank that would send two towards my hole and the third up table to my side. The shot went kaablewwweee, and left Efren straight in. Nonetheless, my banks continued to go, as if on wires.
The last game was another battle, but he was just too strong. I lose 4-2. I looked at my watch, it was 3:30. I had just wrestled with Efren Reyes, in a race to four, for two and a half hours and taken two games off him. I swear I'm not making this up, but during the match Buddy Hall was playing on one side of us, Steve Cook on the other, and during the course of the match I got at least six rounds of applause from the crowd for my bank shots. There was not one round of applause for Hall, Cook, or Reyes. Buddy, in particular, kept looking over wondering what the hell was going on.
As I shook Efren's hand after the match, he said smiling in the high clipped accent he has, "Louis bank good. Miss straight in." That about summed it up.
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Just as a footnote to that story, the week before the tournament I was showing a local guy how to shoot the twist back bank where the CB is in the jaws of your pocket and the OB is a few inches down and near the end rail. So after I explain he asks, "Do you shoot this shoot for the money?" And I go, "Oh sure. You hit it right and it has to go." Well, one week later I've drawn Efren and that exact shot comes up and I'm staring at the shot, chalking my cue, stalling, and laughing to myself thinking, "Well, how does it look now, asshole, against Efren and in front of a couple hundred people, at the US Open?" So I made myself shoot it and it went and everyone applauded.
And, just to apply the moral of that story to your situation: "shooting a bit more aggressive" isn't limited to shooting balls in. It also applies to your safety play too. I think you had to shoot to freeze him up against the cluster
Lou Figueroa
