Tuesday, April 6, 2010

John Makes It Look So Easy

I watched Schmidt's DVD of his 245 Straight Pool run a couple of years back, but that was before I started my straight pool league a year ago, so I didn't really understand his comments too much back then.

Now that I play straight pool more often, I wanted to re-watch his video, which I did on a Wed night last week. Then the next night I watched his 164 run that he commentates WHILE he is shooting.

He makes it look so easy! He runs rack after rack after rack.

I feel like I just pot balls around the table and can't to get too far (my highest run is only 28 - altho I admit I'm pretty proud of it).

I love these two tapes though - his thought process is very helpful! WOW!

I can say that the 164 video is invaluable if you haven't watched it. I don't recall him talking about the last three balls (triangle) so much in the 245 run, and in this video he explains SO much about little important things: getting balls off the rail, getting them off the rail before a second break, hardly moving the cueball, etc. I also noticed he hardly shot any balls up table to the top corner pockets. He didn't say why, but even if a ball could go into the top corner pockets, he still wouldn't shoot them. He always had a plan for them later.

I can't wait to play my next straight pool match after seeing the 164 vid!! I posted these comments in the 14.1 Section of AZBilliards.com and many people responded, including John. John thanked me for the kind words and then added: "Believe me the game is hard for me too and I still get a kick out of running 100 or more. I'm just like you guys - the game challenges me and is fun."

It's refreshing to hear that from Mr. 400 himself. And, it's very true what he is saying about Straight Pool, isn't it?

2 comments:

Samm said...

I couldn't believe it the the other day when he told me his high run was only 43 for a long time before he broke 100 (112). He tried it again later that week and broke 100 again.

I'll save the rest for the article, but I'm very inspiring....

Samm said...

p.s. I had no idea you had written this when I interviewed him on the 7th. Great minds...