BILLIARDS
Guest Column by Steve Albini
The rules of billiards, for those of you who've
been asleep since the year 1400, are simple: The
game is played on a 5x10 foot pocketless table,
using two cue balls and one red ball, all slightly
larger and heavier than a pool ball. About the
size of one of my testicles, say. Each player uses
one cue ball throughout the game. The two cue
balls are differentiated by the presence of a dot
on one of the balls, called the black ball. (Not to
confuse you, but the black ball is sometimes
amber colored). The player shoots to make his
cue ball touch the other two balls in any
order. This is "completing the billiard."
In three-cushion billiards, the most
beautiful and difficult game known to civi-
lization, the cue ball must also touch at
least three cushions before completing the
billiard. For this noble and graceful stroke,
the billiardist earns one point and the right
to try again.
Three-cushion billiards is so difficult that
runs of more than five points are extraor
dinarily rare. If a player runs more than ten
in any billiard room in the country, locals
will talk about it for weeks.
What does all this have to do with rock
music? At least as much as skateboards.
One of the best things about billiards is its
vocabulary. Here are some useful terms:
Average: The average number of billiards a
player scores in an inning. A good local player
will average 6 or 7, meaning that in ten visits to
the table, he will score six or seven billiards.
That also means he misses 60% of his shots. A
world-class tournament player will average 1.2
or so. The game is so tough, and therefore
beautiful, that the best billiardist in the world
will miss almost half the time.
Shit: Noun, verb or adjective meaning luck. "I
shit one this inning." "My shit game is improv
ing." "He was raining shit on me all day." When
an Asian billiardist shits one in, he apologizes by
bowing slightly toward his opponent. Americans
usually say, "Well, get up and fuck me then," or
"Of course I played it that way, cocksucker."
English: Spin on the vertical axis of the cue ball
as it rolls forward on the horizontal axis. English
is induced by striking the cue ball to the left or
right of the vertical axis. English is used to make
the ball carry itself around the table by spinning
off the cushions and to distort the natural
rebound angle off a cushion.
Maseé: A stroke made with the butt of the cue
elevated and striking the cue ball off-center to
induce extreme English. Massé strokes cause
the cue ball to curve, sometimes dramatically.
Bank: Shooting the cue ball so it hits three cush-
ions first, and then touches the other two balls
directly. Also called an "air ball."
Belgian: Someone from Belgium. In billiards
(and only in billiards), this is not an insult. The
most common insult in billiards is "Canadian."
Natural: A relatively easy shot where the cue
ball follows a standard path around the table,
rather than across it or along one rail.
Draw: Spin on the horizontal axis in the oppo-
site direction of a normal roll with respect to the
cue ball's travel. Draw is induced by striking
the cue ball below center with a smart stroke.
Also called "low ball."
Follow: Spin on the horizontal axis in excess of
normal forward roll, induced by striking the cue
ball above center. The opposite of Draw. Also
called "high ball."
Dead Ball: When a ball is struck so that it slides
along the cloth, neither rolling forward nor
rotating backwards nor spinning as with English,
it is called a dead ball.
Big Ball: When a ball is near a corner or a rail, in
a position that makes scoring on it possible by
several paths, it is called a big ball. Sometimes
called a melon, peach basket, Tad or other noun
implying size. "A natural so big a monkey could
shoot it with a broomstick in his ass."
Doubling A Rail: Making the cue ball touch a
single rail more than once, with each contact
counting as a cushion for completion of the bil-
liard. It is possible with extreme follow to make
the cue ball touch a single rail as many as four or
five times. With Maseé, ten is not impossible.
Egg: Someone to be beat. Please do not hold
me accountable for billiard humor.
Kiss: When the first ball hit by the cue ball travels
and collides with either the second object ball or
the cue ball again. Sometimes shots that would
score otherwise are kissed out, and sometimes
horrible misses are kissed into scoring-usually
when my opponent only needs one point to win.
A "kiss-back" is making use of a kiss to make
the cue ball take an otherwise impossible angle.
Ticky: In Japan, "Tikitiki." Any of several pat-
terns played out of a corner wherein the cue ball
hits a rail first, then the first object ball, then two
more rails in the corner before scoring on the
second ball. Some tickies are the only shots in
billiards that can be called "easy." You should
hear the hoots when somebody misses one.
What strikes the uninitiated most about bil-
liards is how staggeringly boring it is. For those
not involved in the game, billiards is as dull as
bridge. Well, not quite. Players, often Belgians
or arthritic old timers, take forever to shoot, and
the balls keep rolling for a long time, so the
game is torturously slow. Billiards has only sub-
the charms; the beauty of a well-controlled
shot or the drama of a high run. About the
only display of emotion the players allow
themselves is the occasional thumping of a
cue stick on the floor or snapping fingers.
billiards slang for "nice shot, fuckface."
My pal Dave DuVall (5) and I (on a good
day, eh, 6) hit the road to see the USBA
national Billiard Tournament last August in
San Jose. Since we were both broke, out of
work and bored billiardists, we thought the
worst thing that could happen to a summer
would be to waste it in Chicago when there
were billiards and poontang waiting on
the coast. That neither of us had a valid
driver's license just added a little spice.
The trip out took two days, we took turns
driving and sleeping, and the boredom at
times was so stifling. I once let DuVall play part
of an All tape. For penance he had to listen to
the Jesus Lizard and Minutemen for a few hun
dred miles. Neither one of us remembers driv
ing through Nebraska, which says a lot about
our mental condition and Nebraska's character.
Anyway, once there, the tournament was a
deck of aces. The best in the country (with a few
notable exceptions) were there, and every one
of them played splendidly. Everywhere were
loud boasts and bubbles of bullshit from players
and hangers-on. I filled several dozen pages
with diagrams of unusual shots. Sang Lee, a
Korean-American whose play has dramatically
improved in the last two years, won the tourna
ment easily with an average of 1.46-among the
best in US History. My dick was soooo hard.
If billiards or its lowbrow offspring, pool, inter-
ests any of you, I highly recommend Robert
Byrne's three outstanding instructional books,
his biography of hustler Danny McGoorty, and
any tournament videos of Sang Lee, Tjorborn
Blomdal, Raymond Cuelemanns, Nabuaki
Kobayashi or Richard Bitalis you can find. An
excellent video catalog is available from Accu-
Stats Inc (800) 828-0397.
I will of course play any of you pip-squeak
sidewalk surfin' hat backwards motherfuckers
for money if'n you're ever in town and if'n you
get the nuts.
BULT THROWER
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