Reflections on Recent One Pocket Action

We managed to arrange some local one pocket action. We had four players (including me) and we ended up playing for roughly four hours. This was my first real one pocket experience. I had played couple of practice games, but this time we had a little bit of money on the table. It's not that I can't play seriously when there's no money involved, but the money did make the game a tiny bit more serious this time. It felt like a mini-tournament.

Anyhow, being that I'm a complete newbie when it comes to one pocket, I was expecting to be confused most of the time. And I sure was. Not so much that I didn't have a decent chance at winning, but I often found myself in a situation where (a) I didn't know what to do know (b) most options required a skilled shot. I find it ironic that some people think that one pocket is boring. To my opinion, not knowing what to do, having huge amount of strategic choices and having to execute very difficult shots is the exact opposite of boring. Sure enough, you aren't pocketing balls all the time in one pocket, but I find it exciting and inspiring that I have no idea of what to do in a given situation.

All of us four happened to be pretty equally skilled, the matches very pretty even all the way through. I had the least actual one pocket playing experience. My inexperience did make a quite big difference as I made couple of really poor shots in situations where an safer option would have been available. Those mistakes were really gross. One was selling out after the opponent's break shot. I was trying to clear balls out of his pocket, but I didn't control the cue ball and left him a pretty open table. He didn't run out from that, but made like five or six balls (if I remember correctly). The other was an attempt to de-pocket a ball when my opponent was on 7 points. I should have had just pocketed his ball and followed the cue ball into the pocket and kept myself alive in that game.


I recently read most of Jack Koehler's Upscale One-Pocket, but I still managed to make mistakes that resulted from not following Koehler's advice. One of his suggestions is that, in general, you should use kick-shots primarily for moving balls, not pocketing them. Especially if you aren't experienced with kick shots. I saw this principle in action many times. It is just too easy to miss the object ball too much with a kick shot and possibly give the opponent an easy shot.

Those slow, soft kick-shots are quite rare in rotation games and in 8-ball. Usually kick shots are just trying to clear safeties in those games and most often they are hit with some significant speed. In one pocket, kick shots typically require more finesse and I personally don't have much experience with those shots. It's often too easy to sell out with them.

In general, I think I wasn't careful enough at all. There were situations where I didn't know what to do, but there were some pretty easy, simple safeties that I didn't execute carefully. I left too many easy short-rail banks. There's a huge difference in leaving a bank where the opponent can or can't control the cue ball. If the bank has just a bit too much angle, making the ball becomes somewhat more unlikely and the cue ball control is that much harder.

All in all, it was a nice experience. I won one match and lost the other two 2-1 and I was happy that I didn't get completely slaughtered. I hope to get more one pocket action going in the future. We have a bigger tournament in the start of June. Like one of the fellow players yesterday said, the chances of winning that tournament are effectively zero for all of us. The skill difference is just that big. But I hope it will be a nice experience.