How do you do it? I’m a lefty by the way, so I assume I will do everything backwards.
Here’s a couple of links describing the shot.
http://www.billiardworld.com/masse.html
http://www.fcsnooker.co.uk/advanced/masey_shot/masey_shot.htm
Thanks, I see now my problem was wrong english. Any personal accounts of people adept at this would help too. Thanks for the sites.
There is one important thing to remember when you decide to practice masse shots (or jump shots).
You might want to practice these on your own table because many establishments will not allow you to play them as the risk of tearing the felt is very high as is the replacement cost of said felt.
Getting caught doing this can get you ejected from the premises.
As a decent stick I offer some words of advice: learn to control the cue so that you don’t need to shoot* radical* massé shots. Of course if you are snookered then imagination and rails are probably better friends to you to avoid a table scratch in strict pool rules.
For real fun in my book, and a shot I use ever once and again, is a nice table length soft massé. Use it when you have a duck in one of your corner pockets and an opponent’s ball just eclipses the view of it. Strike the cue below center and towards the side that you want the cue to curve. A firm stroke will get about an inch or so of clearance around the obstructing ball.
The best time to use this, at least I think so, is when the opponent has walked away thinking she has you snookered. Call the shot, smack it home, and never let anyone know you just threw a “table-length” slider over the plate.
My two cents is to not hit too hard, and don’t follow-through too much. A friend of mine was doing a masse on another friend’s table, and his tip tore the cloth on the follow-through.
I have Simonis cloth on my table that’s now five days old, so when I tried the first masse on it a couple of days ago, I was very careful. I don’t want to ruin a several hundred dollar cloth job with a low-probability shot.
I only practice this on my own table, which I need a new cloth badly, so if I do rip it its a good excuse to replace it.
My experiences YMMV:
once I go more than a cue tip width away from the center of the ball you begin to get a diminishing return on the quality of my shot.
it is also very rare that I come across a situation that a 1/2 masse won’t work for – come down on the cueball at about a 45’ angle on the same side you want the ball to curve. I generally have to aim a little to the side of the ball I want to go around (if I want to curve left I strike the cueball on the left side, aiming just to the right of the ball that is blocking the object ball)
I’ve been playing for 6 years; my brother and father much longer. We usually play once to twice a week. Not yet have any of us come close to tearing the felt when taking a shot like this, and they cannot recall a time in their past that they tore the felt on the table. Just use a little care and you should be fine.
By the way, cw, if you’re replacing the cloth, I highly recommend springing for the Simonis 860. This made a huge difference in how my table plays. It used to be an average home table, now it plays like the ones in the upscale pool halls.
Most billiards places charge about $250 extra for Simonis, but http://www.diamondbilliard.com offers it for about $150 total, and then you can get it installed for around $150 if you shop around.
The OP’s already been answered but I’ll add a couple things.
Robert Byrne has a good beginner’s book on pool which does a decent introduction to masse shots among other things. His introductory video demonstrates a masse nicely also. In general, half masse is the most you’d ever need in a real game. Learn to use the rails.
The pool halls I play at don’t allow masse/jump shots and I don’t allow them on my own table either. Concern over tearing the cloth is the standard reason given but but I think it would be pretty hard to actually damage the cloth like this. Masse and jump shots drive the cue down into the table and all this will do is give you a big chalk mark on the table. I’ve seen people break so that the cue slides along the cloth hard enough to bend the shaft and they don’t tear the cloth so it can’t be easy to do.
Simonis is good cloth but Granito is comparable in price and quality. Shop around and you might find it slightly cheaper than Simonis. I’ve only heard good things on rec.sport.billiards though I use Simonis myself because I bought my table from Diamond and that’s what they sell.
If you really want to enjoy the game, stay away from Mali/Champion/Forstman or other cheap brands. There is a huge difference.
The 99 Critical Shots in Pool : Everything You Need to Know to Learn and Master the Game
By Ray Martin – excellent book
Don’t laugh, but you might want to obtain a recent version of “Virtual Pool” (3?) for your PC
It allows you to practice masse shots to your heart’s content, setting them up however you want. There are even some programmed in. It’s close enough that it’ll give you an idea of how to do them for real, and a lot cheaper than ripping felt (as mentioned above).
When doing shots where you have to elevate your cuestick, there are a couple of ‘tricks’ that will help out a lot. First, don’t use your normal stroke, unless you are very tall. It can be very uncomfortable to try and get a high cuestick elevation while swinging your arm under your shoulder. Instead, stand a bit more to the side, and use a ‘sidearm’ type stroke with your elbow out 90 degrees from your body.
Bridging a Masse’ or jump shot is difficult as well. One trick I learned to get a much more stable bridge is to actually put your forearm on the table if you can and bend your arm, rather than holding your arm straight.
The key to consistency in any shot is to maintain a consistent stance and stoke, and to find a stance and stroke that you can do comfortably. If you are stretching, on your tiptoes, half off balance, you can’t hope to be consistent.
Masse’ shots are useful, but generally only if you have to avoid a small portion of another ball. A full masse’ is not very controllable, and is best left for trick shots. And if the ball you have to go around is the right distance away, a small jump may be a better solution. Not a high, full ball jump, but just a slight cueball elevation to jump the ball maybe 1/4" or 1/2" into the air.
A big second recommendation for Byrne’s ‘Standard Book of Pool and Billiards’, and his ‘Advanced Book of Pool and Billiards’. Byrne is an engineer, so he’ll give you the straight dope that explains things properly. The problem with too many pool instruction books (or pool instructors) is that they are often done by people who don’t have the foggiest notion of physics, but are good instinctual players. That means they have a lot of wrong ideas. For instance, many old-timers believe that you have to learn to ‘snap’ your wrist in order to get extra spin on the ball. Byrne knows better, because he approaches the game like a physicist rather than a bar hustler.