The theatrics of snooker have no precise equivalent elsewhere
March 25, 2025 1:43 AM Subscribe
Most mainstream sports, while awe-inspiring at the professional level, also tend to serve as fun and accessible pastimes for amateurs, even young children. Think soccer, tennis, basketball. Snooker declines to lend itself so readily to the amusement of dilettantes. The cultural status of the game stems therefore not from mass participation but from mass viewership. Bad snooker would be painful to watch; mediocre snooker is notoriously boring; but great snooker is sublime. from Angles of Approach by Sally Rooney (NYRB; ungated)
Huge snooker fan here - been to the World Championships the year Shaun Murphy won.
A "maximum" or 147 is when a player pots (sinks) a red (1 point), then black (it's the highest value at 7), then red, then black etc, then after that 15 times, the "colours" are played in order of points: yellow=2, green=3, brown=4, blue=5, pink=6, black=7. This all sums up to 147.
Here's the GOAT Ronnie O'Sullivan making the fastest 147 - a little over 5 minutes of excellence:
Ronnie's maximum.
He makes it look easy - it's an extraordinarily hard sport.
posted by whatevernot at 2:59 AM on March 25 [17 favorites]
A "maximum" or 147 is when a player pots (sinks) a red (1 point), then black (it's the highest value at 7), then red, then black etc, then after that 15 times, the "colours" are played in order of points: yellow=2, green=3, brown=4, blue=5, pink=6, black=7. This all sums up to 147.
Here's the GOAT Ronnie O'Sullivan making the fastest 147 - a little over 5 minutes of excellence:
Ronnie's maximum.
He makes it look easy - it's an extraordinarily hard sport.
posted by whatevernot at 2:59 AM on March 25 [17 favorites]
Nation-state capitalism—itself a relatively new political formation—may just be doomed to cyclically recreate the conditions for fascism to thrive. And of course, it also seems doomed to overheat the planet and kill us all. . . So we should probably do something about that
🎱
posted by HearHere at 3:36 AM on March 25 [1 favorite]
🎱
posted by HearHere at 3:36 AM on March 25 [1 favorite]
The sport of Kings.
Here's the 2014 Welsh Open final frame Rooney mentions.
posted by Klipspringer at 5:06 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
Here's the 2014 Welsh Open final frame Rooney mentions.
posted by Klipspringer at 5:06 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
Snooker started being covered on the BBC in 1969. Ted Lowe will be long remembered for the legendarily helpful comment "Steve is going for the pink ball - and for those of you who are watching in black and white, the pink is next to the green."
posted by epo at 5:14 AM on March 25 [14 favorites]
posted by epo at 5:14 AM on March 25 [14 favorites]
Snooker is the best spectator game. Relaxing to watch, impossibly difficult to play.
posted by plonkee at 5:19 AM on March 25 [4 favorites]
posted by plonkee at 5:19 AM on March 25 [4 favorites]
People who think they're hot shit for making a few runs of 8 ball on a home table have no clue thinking snooker is something they could just pick up. A snooker table is 12 fucking feet long. The pockets are smaller, the balls are smaller, and you have to hit them in order. It's like going from a playskool basketball set to the real thing.
Bad snooker is appalling but championship snooker is the performance of the demi-gods of physics and hand-eye coordination.
posted by seanmpuckett at 5:27 AM on March 25 [6 favorites]
Bad snooker is appalling but championship snooker is the performance of the demi-gods of physics and hand-eye coordination.
posted by seanmpuckett at 5:27 AM on March 25 [6 favorites]
Bad snooker would be painful to watch; mediocre snooker is notoriously boring; but great snooker is sublime
I was a dedicated pool player back in the day and pretty much lived in bad/mediocre playing. Playing against people who were very good wasn’t always a great experience but I was lucky enough to regularly play a guy who could clear a table on the first turn. Watching him was indeed a sublime experience.
Billiards is the next level of pool and I’m always in awe of talent on display.
posted by ashbury at 5:31 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
I was a dedicated pool player back in the day and pretty much lived in bad/mediocre playing. Playing against people who were very good wasn’t always a great experience but I was lucky enough to regularly play a guy who could clear a table on the first turn. Watching him was indeed a sublime experience.
Billiards is the next level of pool and I’m always in awe of talent on display.
posted by ashbury at 5:31 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
Chavenet, I just finished reading the article. It was well-written, fascinating and did a great job of bringing O’Sullivan to life. Thanks for the post!
posted by ashbury at 6:24 AM on March 25 [1 favorite]
posted by ashbury at 6:24 AM on March 25 [1 favorite]
I'm not a great snooker fan, though I can appreciate how skilled a good player is. And that's extremely skilled. Decades ago, when I lived in Sheffield, I went to the Crucible for a couple of matches of the World Championship just out of curiosity (I'll go watch most sports at least once). I was shocked at how large the tables were, and the utter precision demonstrated by the players, often doing shots which seemed outrageous flukes as just their normal play.
Ronnie is something else. How he can so quickly figure out and execute shot after succesful shot is, frankly, impossible and inhuman. But he does. Somehow.
There's a school of argument that Ronnie is the most skilled sportsman since Don Bradman. While it's difficult to compare across sports, and Ali, Pele, Phelps, Bolt et al have their advocates, a strong case is certainly made for Ronnie O'Sullivan.
posted by Wordshore at 7:08 AM on March 25 [3 favorites]
Ronnie is something else. How he can so quickly figure out and execute shot after succesful shot is, frankly, impossible and inhuman. But he does. Somehow.
There's a school of argument that Ronnie is the most skilled sportsman since Don Bradman. While it's difficult to compare across sports, and Ali, Pele, Phelps, Bolt et al have their advocates, a strong case is certainly made for Ronnie O'Sullivan.
posted by Wordshore at 7:08 AM on March 25 [3 favorites]
I enjoyed this read, and also the video of O'Sullivan's maximum. I don't know if I just never paid enough attention to pool to see it when I've watched that, but watching snooker I'm fascinated by the calculations that have to go on to not only sink the target ball but to put the cue ball right where you want it for the next shot. That maximum looks weirdly easy because most of the shots seem like such straight shots, which is, of course, because that's how O'Sullivan wants them to be.
posted by Well I never at 8:54 AM on March 25 [4 favorites]
posted by Well I never at 8:54 AM on March 25 [4 favorites]
I watched a 20-year-old Ronnie in 1996 World Championships at The Crucible, when at Sheffield University.
He played Alain Robidoux. He demolished him. It was a long time ago, so my memory might have embellished certain parts over time, but I remember he cleared most of the colours left-handed, and potted the black without his rest hand at all . Just balanced the cue on the cushion, and BANG.
After the match, Alain was not a happy chappy. Ronnie didn't care. "I didn't give him any respect because he didn't deserve any. I'm good left-handed, I've made 90 breaks playing that way. In fact, I'm better left-handed than he is right-handed.". Here's a very British YouTube report here.
To call Ronnie complex is an under-statement; he has had a love-hate relationship with snooker, with his fellow professionals & the industry, and seemingly with himself, for decades. But no-one has ever doubted his genius on the snooker table.
posted by moonface at 9:02 AM on March 25 [4 favorites]
He played Alain Robidoux. He demolished him. It was a long time ago, so my memory might have embellished certain parts over time, but I remember he cleared most of the colours left-handed, and potted the black without his rest hand at all . Just balanced the cue on the cushion, and BANG.
After the match, Alain was not a happy chappy. Ronnie didn't care. "I didn't give him any respect because he didn't deserve any. I'm good left-handed, I've made 90 breaks playing that way. In fact, I'm better left-handed than he is right-handed.". Here's a very British YouTube report here.
To call Ronnie complex is an under-statement; he has had a love-hate relationship with snooker, with his fellow professionals & the industry, and seemingly with himself, for decades. But no-one has ever doubted his genius on the snooker table.
posted by moonface at 9:02 AM on March 25 [4 favorites]
>most of the shots seem like such straight shots, which is, of course, because that's how O'Sullivan wants them to be.
Straight shots in snooker are usually seen as a bad thing. In my experience, "good pot" is actually a back-handed compliment for a pot with poor positioning, while "good shot" implies both a good potting of the ball, and good position for the next one. You can hear the groans on TV when someone leaves a shot too straight.
I would guess that positioning the cue ball is perhaps 30% of the task in bad snooker (if you can't pot a ball, positioning is actually a bad thing, as you give the next player a good position) but probably 80%+ of the task in elite snooker.
Ronnie plays so quickly, and has such good positioning, that I've seen him get down for his next shot while the ball is still moving, and stops magically right in front of his cue.
posted by moonface at 9:14 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
Straight shots in snooker are usually seen as a bad thing. In my experience, "good pot" is actually a back-handed compliment for a pot with poor positioning, while "good shot" implies both a good potting of the ball, and good position for the next one. You can hear the groans on TV when someone leaves a shot too straight.
I would guess that positioning the cue ball is perhaps 30% of the task in bad snooker (if you can't pot a ball, positioning is actually a bad thing, as you give the next player a good position) but probably 80%+ of the task in elite snooker.
Ronnie plays so quickly, and has such good positioning, that I've seen him get down for his next shot while the ball is still moving, and stops magically right in front of his cue.
posted by moonface at 9:14 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
. . . fun and accessible pastimes for amateurs, even young children. Think soccer, tennis, basketball. Snooker declines to . . .
I guess I disagree. When people ask if I play sportX, I reply "I have played it" because I had the chance to play a wide variety of field and table games before I got to vote. Some games are hard to get to knock-about level: you have to get the ball over the net in tennis but not in squash, for example. I used to play billiards at the same level as my chess - I was pretty good for making the current move but my competence didn't allow me to plot 2 or 3 (or 17 in the case of Ronnie O'Sullivan or Magnus Carlsen) moves ahead. But billiards was fun at my level, and as with anything I got better as the hours clocked up.
And billiards isn't hard because the field is large but the holes are small - by that criterion golf is hardest.
posted by BobTheScientist at 9:26 AM on March 25 [1 favorite]
I guess I disagree. When people ask if I play sportX, I reply "I have played it" because I had the chance to play a wide variety of field and table games before I got to vote. Some games are hard to get to knock-about level: you have to get the ball over the net in tennis but not in squash, for example. I used to play billiards at the same level as my chess - I was pretty good for making the current move but my competence didn't allow me to plot 2 or 3 (or 17 in the case of Ronnie O'Sullivan or Magnus Carlsen) moves ahead. But billiards was fun at my level, and as with anything I got better as the hours clocked up.
And billiards isn't hard because the field is large but the holes are small - by that criterion golf is hardest.
posted by BobTheScientist at 9:26 AM on March 25 [1 favorite]
Here's the 2014 Welsh Open final frame Rooney mentions.
Why in that one did they spot the black to the center of the table first time?
posted by solotoro at 10:00 AM on March 25 [1 favorite]
Why in that one did they spot the black to the center of the table first time?
posted by solotoro at 10:00 AM on March 25 [1 favorite]
>Why in that one did they spot the black to the center of the table first time?
There was a red covering the spot for the black, and the pink was still on its spot. So it went on the blue spot instead. If no spots are available, it goes as close as it can above its own spot, not touching any other balls.
posted by moonface at 10:16 AM on March 25 [1 favorite]
There was a red covering the spot for the black, and the pink was still on its spot. So it went on the blue spot instead. If no spots are available, it goes as close as it can above its own spot, not touching any other balls.
posted by moonface at 10:16 AM on March 25 [1 favorite]
Solotoro if a color ball's spot is covered by another ball the referee puts it on the next available color spot, in this case the blue. If all the color spots are covered it's placed as close as possible below its own spot. You can hear the announcer foresee the possibility at around 2:07.
I love snooker so much. This past year I took a friend to see a day of the Masters in London and then this article inspired my dad and mom to come over and watch Judd-Higgins in the semis of the Player's Championship last weekend. If you are on the US east coast and have a good VPN and are willing to fib about having a TV license you can watch a lot on iPlayer and ITV. An hour of the late session of a tournament while making dinner is a particularly pleasant ritual in our house.
posted by sy at 10:17 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
I love snooker so much. This past year I took a friend to see a day of the Masters in London and then this article inspired my dad and mom to come over and watch Judd-Higgins in the semis of the Player's Championship last weekend. If you are on the US east coast and have a good VPN and are willing to fib about having a TV license you can watch a lot on iPlayer and ITV. An hour of the late session of a tournament while making dinner is a particularly pleasant ritual in our house.
posted by sy at 10:17 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
"above its own spot/below its own spot"--I believe Moonface's terminology is correct but we are describing the same direction, viz. toward the black spot side of the table.
posted by sy at 10:18 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
posted by sy at 10:18 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
Ha - I was about to say you were right and I was wrong!
It depends on what we both mean by 'above' and 'below'.
On TV, the cushion at the bottom of the screen is called the top cushion, and vice versa. Obviously.
posted by moonface at 10:22 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
It depends on what we both mean by 'above' and 'below'.
On TV, the cushion at the bottom of the screen is called the top cushion, and vice versa. Obviously.
posted by moonface at 10:22 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
I got passably good at snooker during a misspent youth, and then a few years ago Middle Son started playing with a few friends. He invited me to play a game, and was surprised when his old man wiped the floor with him and his mates.
Those were actually the best few games I've ever played, which shows that the brain doesn't really forget.
posted by 43rdAnd9th at 10:30 AM on March 25 [4 favorites]
Those were actually the best few games I've ever played, which shows that the brain doesn't really forget.
posted by 43rdAnd9th at 10:30 AM on March 25 [4 favorites]
I am a horrible pool player. I’ve never played snooker. I love to watch snooker at the top level. Their precision, control of the white, and imagination in inventing shots is amazing, and just plain fun to watch for me.
It seems to me more difficult than “standard” pool games of 8, 9, or 10 ball. Perhaps one pocket comes close in difficulty of strategy. But the snooker table is still 12 feet long! The longest standard pool tables are 9 feet long; a few 10 footers exist.
posted by Warren Terra at 10:37 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
It seems to me more difficult than “standard” pool games of 8, 9, or 10 ball. Perhaps one pocket comes close in difficulty of strategy. But the snooker table is still 12 feet long! The longest standard pool tables are 9 feet long; a few 10 footers exist.
posted by Warren Terra at 10:37 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
Stephen Hendry (who shares O’Sullivan’s record of seven world titles) has quite a a fun youtube channel, and he had an interview with Ronnie over a (very casual) frame of snooker.
posted by Bloxworth Snout at 10:38 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
posted by Bloxworth Snout at 10:38 AM on March 25 [2 favorites]
>But the snooker table is still 12 feet long!
Consider how many balls there are on a snooker table for the majority of the game (especially if you're as bad as me).
Then think how many of those balls are unreachable to, I dunno, a 5'9" man with a bit of a pot-belly.
Then Google "different types of snooker rest"
posted by moonface at 11:01 AM on March 25 [1 favorite]
Consider how many balls there are on a snooker table for the majority of the game (especially if you're as bad as me).
Then think how many of those balls are unreachable to, I dunno, a 5'9" man with a bit of a pot-belly.
Then Google "different types of snooker rest"
posted by moonface at 11:01 AM on March 25 [1 favorite]
"That's a bad miss"
posted by stevil at 5:14 PM on March 25 [1 favorite]
posted by stevil at 5:14 PM on March 25 [1 favorite]
"There's a school of argument that Ronnie is the most skilled sportsman since Don Bradman."
A better comparison might be Walter Lindrum, who was Bradman's equal, IMHO.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Lindrum
posted by Pouteria at 7:41 PM on March 25
A better comparison might be Walter Lindrum, who was Bradman's equal, IMHO.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Lindrum
posted by Pouteria at 7:41 PM on March 25
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