Anyone Blundering into a certain billiard room in Hamburg, Germany, in the year 1800 might have heard the owner of the joint make an apparently preposterous claim. He said he could pocket a ball by jumping it from one table to another. Betting against him, of course, was folly, for he had mastered one of the first recorded trick shots. Yet you can be sure that someone always took him up on his proposition, if only to see him do it. Because then, as now, people just love to watch a gifted pool player perform the apparently impossible.
We asked a few of America's top professional pool players to name their favorite trick shots, and we invited top pool player Pete Margo to our Chicago studio to execute them for our camera. If you're a shark, or just a weekend shooter, you'll want to try these out yourself. Some look tougher than they are, mainly depending on precise spotting of the balls and an accurately stroked cue ball. Others are so difficult that to make them with any degree of regularity requires the dexterity of a violinist, the nerves of a surgeon and the coordination, eyesight and training of--well, of a professional pool player. Good luck, hot-shot.
