Let’s talk first about the break in Nine Ball (figure 4.1). If you’re right-handed, the best place to set the cue ball is on the right side of the table. If you’re left-handed, the best place is probably on the left side. But that’s just a starting point.
Cue ball placement is also influenced by your stroke—whether you more often put left english or right english on the cue ball. Without getting too complicated, if you’re a right-handed person who tends to put left english on the ball as the cue stick swings through and crosses over, especially when the ball is hit hard, you’re better off putting the cue ball on the left side of the table or moving it in toward the center. Anywhere in this area at all and left english automatically comes into play on the 1-ball. This results in a better stunning effect to kill, or stop, the cue ball after it hits the rail. If, on the other hand, you tend to put right english on the ball, you’re best off breaking from the right side of the table, again anywhere from the side rail to the middle of the table.
Players used to break from the center of the table until they discovered it’s easier to make the corner ball from the rail. Various schools of thought remain on this.
Some players still prefer breaking from closer to the center of the table to achieve what they feel is the fullest hit on the 1-ball. Remember that the most important part of the Nine Ball break is a solid—and we do mean solid—hit on the 1-ball. Shooting the ball from either side means you’re hitting the 1-ball from an angle instead of head-on. You might thus glance off the 1-ball more than you would with a head-on hit from the center of the table. With the cue ball on the foot spot it’s much easier to get a solid hit on the 1-ball because you’re shooting at the whole ball, as with a straight-in shot. If you move the cue ball to either rail, it becomes more difficult to get a solid hit on the 1-ball.
A good way to practice getting a solid hit is to visualize your cue ball driving right through the 1-ball into the rows of balls behind it. This should also help you focus on your follow-through as you execute your break shot.
Let’s get back to those tendencies in your normal stroke. Suppose you naturally put right english on the cue ball, whether by accident or design. (Very few players in fact hit absolutely dead center on the cue ball because of variances in crossing over in their stroke, having a dominant eye, and so on.) In this case you would use just a bit of low-left english for your break shot. This is because your natural ten-dency is to cross over the cue ball with your cue stick. Without the compensating english, your timing would have to be perfect to hit dead center on the cue ball in order to attain a stunning effect (to hit the 1-ball solidly, with virtually no spin). In other words, you’re trying to prevent spin on the cue ball; you want the cue ball completely dead, with no sidespin whatsoever. This allows the greatest transfer of power and the most control.
Years ago you could see top players dig the cue stick into the bed of the cloth after they broke. This is not recommended. Figures 4.2 and 4.3 illustrate the differences.
The player shown in figure 4.2 employs the method of digging the cue stick into the table. We believe this actually slows the cue stick down rather than speeding it up.
You also risk breaking the spine of your cue shaft, making it susceptible to warping.
A better move is to raise the cue stick, bringing it up on your follow-through, as
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E4276/Kanov/fig.4.01/296099/alw/r1 Figure 4.1 Various cue ball positions for the 9-Ball Break.
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Figure 4.3 2007 BCA champ Dennis Orcollo breaks without pressing his cue into the table, with impressive results (and less stress and strain to his cue).
Figure 4.2 World champion Jasmin Ouschan presses her cue into the table on her break shot.
photo by Jerry Forsythphoto by Jerry Forsyth
employed by contemporary players like Dennis Orcollo and Johnny Archer. What you then accomplish is to put just a touch of forward spin on the cue ball. You want to hit that 1-ball as solidly as possible, and when the cue ball grabs, making contact with the cloth and the 1-ball, it will more or less just die in the center of the table, which is the optimal place to have the cue ball after the Nine Ball break. It stands to reason that if the cue ball is in the center of the table, your chances of having a shot at the lowest numbered ball are much greater.
Most top pros today break from the side rail, with the goal of pocketing the corner ball (shown in figure 4.4) so that they may continue shooting. You’ll hear some commentators say that professional players intend to try to make the 1-ball in the side. That’s ludicrous. What they’re trying to do is control the 1-ball, keeping it near the cue ball for their first shot after the break. They don’t necessarily want to make the 1-ball, because they have no control over the 2-ball! The 2-ball could be anywhere in the rack except in front where the 1-ball is or the center where the 9-ball is. So it makes sense that if you make the 1-ball, there’s no guarantee of a shot at the 2-ball.
Can you predict where the balls will land on the break? Not all of them. But let’s say that you hit below center on the cue ball. What happens most often is that the 1-ball will go above the head spot, and the cue ball will go to the bottom of the table, as shown in figure 4.5. Now let’s say you use follow instead. The high ball will have the effect of sending the cue ball forward and the 1-ball to the bottom of the table.
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Figure 4.4 The most likely ball to go in on a Nine Ball break is the corner ball in the rack—it
Neither option produces an optimal shot on the 1-ball. What you want to do is to hit the cue ball as close to the center as possible into the 1-ball. You’ll be attempting to send the 1-ball either to the right or left rail, close to the side pocket. (Old-time players would call this trying to trap the 1-ball near the side pocket.)
You’ll discover that although weaker players don’t hit the balls as hard on the break, the balls still seem to gravitate toward a pocket. Yet you might see a very powerful player hit the balls 30 miles an hour and the balls seem to stun themselves. Think of it this way: If you hit the balls too hard, the balls will explode, then implode, then explode again. The energy gets trapped within the rack, rather like exploding a firework inside a can. There’s plenty of noise but not much action. Thus, players with powerful swings never want to hit the balls with 100 percent of their strength. Accuracy is the key. The more solidly you hit the 1-ball, the better your chances of making a ball.