McManusFan wrote:With ball in hand, are you able to 'generate' a free ball? I.e. place the ball behind a colour so you can't see the final red, and claim free ball? I know you can't do this when placing the white in the D after an in-off but this might provide enough of an advantage to counteract balls being put safe from a foul and miss.
Good morning, McMF (this side of the world at least). First, keep in mind my most important point and that is that the Rule as written sucks. No other more accurate way to state it. Yes, as written, it works fine for the professional tour so nobody involved in the professional tour would seem to have any motivation to address the fundamental problems with the Rule that I stated previously. So any effort that I put into suggesting change is solely to come up with a solution that would allow for a properly written Rule that can be applicable to both the Professional game and also the casual amateur game. And these are only suggestions, certainly not set in stone, I am not married to any of these ideas other than that the Rule as currently written OUGHT TO BE CHANGED.
So, to address your specific query, I would say no, personally, I would be opposed to the concept of 'generating' a Free Ball as you suggest. Like Law in a courtroom, I feel that the Rules should properly follow standards of long standing precedent as much as possible. My earlier suggestion of dropping the 'endeavour to hit the Ball On' requirement goes against the grain of that, I absolutely admit, but this is only because historically, the 'endeavour to hit the Ball On' Rule has PROVEN to only be a suggestion, and not a properly ENFORCEABLE Rule. Professional Misses always occurred in the past, Professional Misses continue to occur in the present, and Professional Misses will continue to occur in the foreseeable future. So I take the bold step of suggesting maybe the 'Endeavour....' Rule should just be scrapped seeing as it simply is not obeyed anyway.
So I believe you reference the correct precedent that when a White in-off foul gives a player ball in hand from the D, Free Ball is only allowed when the player is technically snookered from any spot within the D. Likewise, with a full table ball in hand, a player should only be allowed a Free Ball if technically snookered from every possible White position on the table. And I believe that is virtually impossible. I can only foresee that being the case if a single object ball, say, the last Red, is surrounded by a minimum of three other balls not on, like a Red centered with Blue/Pink/Black around it touching or nearly so. Even if that last Red were surrounded by Pink/Black touching it on opposite sides, that is NOT technically a Free Ball situation. (I won't explain here, but you can ask why if you don't understand why this is so.)
However, it seems to me that a fundamental point is being missed. For any of my examples following, assume Player A is the one who laid the devious, very difficult snooker and Player B is attempting to escape said snooker (, or alternately, with BiskitBoy, allow ball in hand to Player A). I am inferring (perhaps incorrectly) that the concern you have is that allowing Player B to blatantly disregard 'endeavour...' and drive, say, the Yellow directly to a cushion is somehow conferring an advantage to Player B. I don't agree that is the case. Player B is simply following a strategy, though the path of that strategy is still very perilous and Player B is nearly certain to lose the frame no matter.
Table example same as earlier post: all colours on spots, last Red behind Black, Player A, winning but not quite by 'snookers required', leaves White behind Brown. Yes, if Player B drives Yellow to cushion, then A will require that Yellow to win. But consider all other consequences.....
If B gets Yellow safe as desired but in the process, leaves the last Red snookered, then A coming to the table does NOT need to pick up the White and play it from in hand. Instead, A can claim the Free Ball and play the White from where it came to rest, thereby (with Free Ball) driving the score up further so that now B requires snookers.
If B gets Yellow safe as desired and in the process also gets the White somewhere near the Black cushion so the last Red is NOT in a snookered position, then now A can go ahead and pick up the White to play it from in hand. If potting Red/Black is enough to leave B needing snookers, then A would opt to do that. But if Red/Black is still not enough points for snookers required, then guess what? A does not need to actually pot that last Red. Imagine how tight the next snooker will be when A places White six inches from the Red and drives Red all the way up into Baulk leaving White kissing the Black from behind. If and when B is unable to escape THIS very tight snooker, we are edging closer to snookers required if not having already crossed it.
So please don't think that driving Yellow to cushion gives B some sort of big advantage. It certainly does not. It is simply following a strategy, albeit a strategy with still a very low chance of success, without the tedium of Referees replacing balls to their previous position with every attempt to finally come to the foregone conclusion of snookers required. Honestly, I do believe that if a BiskitBoy change were PROPERLY written into the current rule set, the Professional game would almost certainly play out exactly the same way that it does now. I believe (my thought experiments only, obviously I have no way to test my hypothesis) that
professionally, we would only see a BiskitBoy ball in hand occur maybe once or twice a season; probably about the same frequency that the Deliberate Miss used to be called back in the olden days. I believe in very nearly every circumstance, any professional player would find it in his best interest to control his own destiny by replacing the balls and trying again and again to make the contact, just as occurs now. If Player B (snookered) opts to give Player A ball in hand, his situation is truly desperate.
On the other hand, myself as a low level amateur, I am terrible at escaping very difficult snookers. My best chance would often be to put my faith in my opponent's LACK of talent. (Not demeaning my opponent; I am simply stating that I know my opponent is as bad at potting balls as I am so I fully expect he will NOT run the table out on me.) I have stated from the beginning that I believe the BiskitBoy change would have very little effect on the Professional game. This would be especially true if the 'endeavour...' requirement is kept as Gninnur Karona suggests. If the Deliberate Foul were to be adopted as I am suggesting, then I believe the Professionals would actually then USE the BiskitBoy change occasionally, but still not very often.