Topic: Pull Shot: Do you use different firing strokes?

[foozkillah]

So here's a question for all you working on your pull shot.... Is your firing stroke to shoot a straight exactly the same stroke as for your middle or 3/4 or long? In other words... when you hit that straight.. is everything the same as when you actually pull to go 1/4 or longer.. same power, same sound in the goal?  Heck do you even have a "straight" (non pitty-pat) to begin with?
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Why?  I was lucky enough to have observed Horton, Loffredo, Rue, Gumby TMac et al (over 2 decades) ... even Kev Walker recently ...
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Their straight is often exactly the same stroke, power and finish as their middles or longs (deadbar or not).. there might be some minor differences.. but they use the same firing /release stroke.  Ever wondered why?

[SilentSam]

I shoot a pull as a secondary, and no my stroke isn't the same. I'm not sure I understand how it ever could be? The square off motion I use for my middles and long would cause me to hit post every time. Then again, my pull isn't as fast as any of those gents you listed, so people tend to face my middle & longs.  More often than not I off-pace my straight about 50% to account for this, and I do tend to score a lot of straights this way. I also aim for 3/4 a lot, and split very tight race Ds this way too.

My finish for the 50% is actually a feint for the long, so I pull the bar almost all the way during & after the stroke. My fast straight looks a little more like my middle & long, but still has no recoil. My recoil isn't even that heavy for middle & long either.

[foozkillah]

Sounds good to me... and to clarify, what I meant by "firing stroke" was the complete forward motion on the ball.... I've seen so many reliable and consistent deadbar and longer hitters that do NOT recoil or do an exagerated return motion with their hand... hardly any wrist contortion and the only return motion is from the forearm going back to neutral.  Of course that wouldn't work with a "tuck" where you zip it around and go back to wherever the defending 2bar is...
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And I wouldn't worry about speed as much as the smoothness of the stroke..  the best I've seen and defended against... it seemed sometimes that the table surface moved towards you on the pull, instead of the middle 3 pulling the ball.. that's about as smooth as I can describe it.  The clue there?  there was no immediate wrist or hand/finger curl as as they shot a 1/4 all the way to extreme or "7" deadbar...  the firing stroke seemed the same, although, even for a long, the start of the firing motion was never past the big or middle dot.  You can figure out that the smoothest pulls (and some of these have been done on tour for over 30 years by these same guys!.. No tennis elbow, no extreme strain on the wrist, forearm, elbow or shoulder .... ) seem akin to having a pistol and having a consistently smooth lateral motion to fire the same shot.

[jerrydiday]

I have been shooting a pull shot for over 40 years.  I can pretty much shoot the ball into the goal any way I want.  When a person decides to shoot all their pulls into the goal exactly the same way it is mainly just the joy of shooting a pull shot.  Its a dopamine thing.  At some point they decided to do this thing then make it happen.  There is an argument that their shots will be so similar that the defender will not be able to tell which shot they are taking.  But this is like performing a magic trick. There is a thrill to it.  It might help intimidate the defender if they see that all the pull shots seem to go in the same way.  But any way a shot goes in is a point.  Make enough points you win a game.  Being able to intimidate the defender is a win-like achievement and could help win the game.   

I would caution you, though, about paying too much attention to the details of your wrist and hand motions.  If you try to replicate these motions for consistency, you will strain your wrist and hand.  A good pull shot shooter can vary the motions in his shot to ease tension in the wrist and hand.  The final motion of the shot is variable, but you can still decide to do all of these shots the same way, even when that final motion will vary from game to game.

[jerrydiday]

When a person decides to shoot all their pulls into the goal exactly the same way it is mainly just the joy of shooting a pull shot.  Its a dopamine thing.

After some thought there is a good reason to make the finishing moves of your pull shots similar.  This similarity keeps your shot selection simple.  When you have to shoot at a quickly changing defense, it is much easier if all of your shots are similar.  If you have to choose between different openings and different finishing moves it can get confusing.  Pull shots are very physical. Confusion when shooting a pull shot can make a person ignore the physical side of the shot.  This confusion can cause easy shots to miss.