Things that Matter in Billiards

VI.—TIME GAMES AND MATCHES versus FIXED POINTS

A reform in billiards, that might have a far-reaching and
beneficial influence on the game, would be the substitution
of a time limit in all games and matches for the present fixed
points system. The disadvantages of the points system are
that the proficiency and speed of players vary greatly and
also that, when anything important is at stake, much
time is occupied by the contestants with safety play and in
making up the mind preparatory to striking. It frequently
happens that, in private play on a public table, or at clubs,
two good players have to pay their shilling for a twenty
minutes hundred-up, whereas two players who occupy a
whole hour in reaching the same total are only called upon
to pay the same amount. Under the time limit the good
players could play a game of 150 up for their shilling and
the “duffers” would be asked to pay 2s. for their hour.

Time System and Handicaps

From this point another—and one of no small importance—
emerges. Everyone is in favour of the sizes and
shapes of pocket openings being standardized in order that
handicapping may be properly and scientifically carried out,
no matter what might be the table upon which the averages
that form—or should form—the basic principle of the handicapping
have been scored. True, the nature of the table so
played upon is supposed to be taken into consideration in
framing the handicaps, but this must be, at best, an uncertain
and unsatisfactory expedient.

If, therefore, scientific handicapping based on averages
requires for its entire success a standard pocket width, the
adoption of the time limit would seem to be an essential in
the bringing about of this desirable result, and it is equally
certain that, until the play on public and club tables is
charged by time, uniformity in the size of pocket openings
cannot be hoped for. In order to make their tables pay on
the points system the owners of many public tables favour
large pockets, whereas under a time system there would be
no object in doing so.

Quite apart from the question of handicapping, many
hotel-keepers and others are already changing from points
to time, and we believe there is no case on record in which, the
time system having been once adopted, any departure has
been made from it.

How to Arrange Starts

The question may be asked: “How are starts to be
arranged when play is for a fixed time? But this point
really presents no difficulty? Fractional precision is not
called for, and the rest is merely a matter of almost instantaneous
mental calculation. For example: A 4 average
man gives a 3 average man 25 in one hundred, or a quarter
of the game. They agree to play for half-an-hour and the
4 average man has to make one-third more points than the
other in order to win, or the 3 average man has to make
three-fourths of the points made by the 4 average man.
Similarly, 5 would give 4 one-fifth of the game, 6 would give
5 one-seventh, and so on. It is merely, up to the” owing ”
stage, a matter of 100 divided by the start.

Objections have, we know, been raised to the time limit
system, but these have mainly applied to the time, limit
associated with fixed points. It has been urged, for
instance, that if sessions were of fixed length, and were
neither to be shortened when one player was at his points
nor lengthened when both were behind their points, a long
match might either terminate a day or more before its time
and have to be declared drawn, according to the circumstances—
a result that would hardly be likely to prove satisfactory
to the public and that might seriously affect the
gate of the immediate match and the success of exhibition
billiards as a whole. But under the system of fixed time
versus fixed points this objection ceases to operate, and we
must, at any rate for the moment, confess our inability to
conceive of any substantial disadvantage by which the time
method could be accompanied.

Practical Test of the Time System

The system will, indeed, be seen in operation next month,
when, at the Soho Square Salon, Stevenson will allow
Diggle a start of 4,000 in a month’s play, and if this should
be found to turn out satisfactorily when extended over so
long a period and with players who are capable of making
breaks into the neighbourhood of the thousand, it will be
difficult for anyone to frame a coherent objection to the
adoption of the system under all circumstances and with
every class of player.

There is another point that is closely allied to the time limit,
and that is the question of scoring speed: Suppose
in the pending match that has been referred to,
Stevenson should score 30,000 and Diggle 25,000. If would
be a very simple matter to register the total time taken at
the table by one of the two men, and the balance of the
48 hours would be the time occupied by the other, assuming
that no abnormal cause of waiting—such as changing of
balls—intervened. If the result of this time-keeping were
that Stevenson was shown to have spent no greater time
at the table than Diggle, the merit of his victory would
from an important point of view, be greatly augmented.

As matters at present stand, the speed with which points
are collected, either by the winning or the losing man, finds
no record alongside the score.

The same thing applies in a measure to ordinary social
games. Amateurs meet each other for years on the 100 or
250 up basis and have no clear idea of their scoring speed,
whereas, if time games were the rule rather than the exception,
the constant effort would be made to score 100 within
20 or 30 minutes, and the ultimate outcome of such a system
and of such efforts would be brighter and better billiards.