Eight ball cut to the right
It’s not my plan to explain every league night I have, but more to explain when I learn things. This is mostly a reference for myself, so if anyone else is reading this bear with me. As league nights continue it is my assumption that I will learn less and less from each one.
So, not only am I on a Monday nine-ball league, but I’m also on a Wednesday eight ball league. Luckily, both leagues have home bars that are kid friendly so that I can bring my son on home games on weeks that I have custody of him. He took the APA scorekeeper’s clinic and actually really enjoyed it. We played a bunch of fake matches pretending to be random people. It got us both practicing billiards, but also had a fun aspect to it. I had custody of him on Wednesday, and it was a home game, so we were both excited to go. I brought him a score sheet, so he didn’t get bored and he absolutely loved it. Our league captain made a note of this and they compared sheets at the end. In a weird rarity, both sheets matched up and they decided that on days he was there he could have a job as our official scorekeeper. He was excited to be a part of the team. My new team really invited and involved my son in the process, and It was a pretty cool moment.
As for my match for the night, my game went hill-hill and I won with a cut of the eight near the spot from near the head rail. I was exhausted and wiped out. Mumm pool is exhausting, but I was able to mostly keep up the practice. It was a killer match. My opponent was so slow it was amazing. I kept everything up. It’s hard not to play to the pace of my opponent I’ve learned. I did lose a game by missing a hanging ball again. It was in the same corner as the shot on Monday and I missed both shots to the same side. It was exactly the same shot as Monday. It felt as if I was overcompensating for deflection on the shot.
I was concerned if I made the correct shot on the eight, so I took a picture of it. It was also a shot I wanted to practice so that I wasn’t as intimidated by it.
The days following my intensive training with Demetrius we continued to text back and forth. I had gained a mentor in my process and it was quite valuable to my journey. We had hit it off in the three-day visit and I felt we actually became pretty good friends. They say stress and trauma can bring people together, and those long days at the table tested us. Talking to Demetrius about this game he said I made the right shot and seemed to dismiss my evaluation of every game. He told me that I might want to consider it like learning a brand-new job, and to draw twenty boxes on a piece of paper and cross them off after each match. Try not to focus too hard on individual performances until I finish these twenty matches, and then look at my progress after that. There was an expectation that I would fail at the beginning while I was new, and to accept it and focus on doing the best I could until I got a few more matches under my belt. I needed to focus on playing my best pool. There was plenty of time later to analyze each match.
Lessons learned: I was intimidated by long cuts up the table (picture below of my eight-ball shot) and deflection was continuing to be a problem for me. More importantly, I found that I had a tendency to play to the pace of my opponent. I needed to dictate my own speed in the match and play pool however I played pool best, regardless of how my opponent played. I needed to dictate my own level of energy for the match, and honestly, I found that quite difficult to do. I also needed to realize that I was learning, and that failure is inevitable in the beginning.
So, not only am I on a Monday nine-ball league, but I’m also on a Wednesday eight ball league. Luckily, both leagues have home bars that are kid friendly so that I can bring my son on home games on weeks that I have custody of him. He took the APA scorekeeper’s clinic and actually really enjoyed it. We played a bunch of fake matches pretending to be random people. It got us both practicing billiards, but also had a fun aspect to it. I had custody of him on Wednesday, and it was a home game, so we were both excited to go. I brought him a score sheet, so he didn’t get bored and he absolutely loved it. Our league captain made a note of this and they compared sheets at the end. In a weird rarity, both sheets matched up and they decided that on days he was there he could have a job as our official scorekeeper. He was excited to be a part of the team. My new team really invited and involved my son in the process, and It was a pretty cool moment.
As for my match for the night, my game went hill-hill and I won with a cut of the eight near the spot from near the head rail. I was exhausted and wiped out. Mumm pool is exhausting, but I was able to mostly keep up the practice. It was a killer match. My opponent was so slow it was amazing. I kept everything up. It’s hard not to play to the pace of my opponent I’ve learned. I did lose a game by missing a hanging ball again. It was in the same corner as the shot on Monday and I missed both shots to the same side. It was exactly the same shot as Monday. It felt as if I was overcompensating for deflection on the shot.
I was concerned if I made the correct shot on the eight, so I took a picture of it. It was also a shot I wanted to practice so that I wasn’t as intimidated by it.
The days following my intensive training with Demetrius we continued to text back and forth. I had gained a mentor in my process and it was quite valuable to my journey. We had hit it off in the three-day visit and I felt we actually became pretty good friends. They say stress and trauma can bring people together, and those long days at the table tested us. Talking to Demetrius about this game he said I made the right shot and seemed to dismiss my evaluation of every game. He told me that I might want to consider it like learning a brand-new job, and to draw twenty boxes on a piece of paper and cross them off after each match. Try not to focus too hard on individual performances until I finish these twenty matches, and then look at my progress after that. There was an expectation that I would fail at the beginning while I was new, and to accept it and focus on doing the best I could until I got a few more matches under my belt. I needed to focus on playing my best pool. There was plenty of time later to analyze each match.
Lessons learned: I was intimidated by long cuts up the table (picture below of my eight-ball shot) and deflection was continuing to be a problem for me. More importantly, I found that I had a tendency to play to the pace of my opponent. I needed to dictate my own speed in the match and play pool however I played pool best, regardless of how my opponent played. I needed to dictate my own level of energy for the match, and honestly, I found that quite difficult to do. I also needed to realize that I was learning, and that failure is inevitable in the beginning.
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