Rec and Sports

Pool Cue Origins: From Predator Bones To Predator Cues

Wikipedia traces the origin of billiards to the 15th century. The first indoor billiard table belonged to King Louis XI (1461-1483). Here is the unofficial, wildly speculative, and highly theoretical beginning of the game, as told to me by my great-grandfather, Thor.

Dateline: 8 Million Years B.C. (before cues)..Two cavemen roast and eat a tyrannosaur drumstick, tossing the huge bones aside. Their pet wolf polishes offf the sinew and gristle that’s left, leaving a gleaming 5 foot femur, thick on one end, and narrow on the other. The two twin 8 year old boys fight over the bone, wrestling on the ground, and the stronger of the two grabs it away viscously. The end of the bone strikes a small round rock, which rolls into a rodent hole. The boys watch this in amazement. The first  Predator Cue is accidentally invented,  and the game of pool is born.

After a few weeks of playing their new game, the twins are heartbroken when the rock-striking end of the bone cracks. Their father, Thor, ponders the predicament, and gets to work on the cure. After breaking off the tip of a wooly mammoth tusk, he hollows it out to fit over the end of the fragile bone to make it stronger. The first ivory ferrule had now been invented.

The boys’ mother,  meanwhile, grows tired of the constant racket from bone striking rock, and racks her brain for an answer. She notices a small, round scrap of mammoth hide  as she is making winter parkas, and trims it up and glues it on the end of the bone. The first leather tip, a ‘Mammoth’ 75.75mm in diameter, was invented.

The hunter-gatherer clan moves with the seasons, hunting game for food. They meet other clans along their journeys, who are fascinated watching the boys play their new game. Soon requests for replica ‘bones’ enabled the family to trade their ’sticks for food and clothes. The ‘Predator’ group comes into existence.

OK, OK….The timeline might be fantasy. Maybe the first pool cue wasn’t made of bone, maybe it was a tree limb. If the first tip wasn’t made of mammoth, it was at least mammoth in size….but if you’ve ever read Mark Twain, you’ll never let facts get in the way of a good story. And the original “Predator Group?” The family tree disappeared (or was made into another cue), but there is a living, active Predator Group, and they are widely responsible for the present day evolution of the high-technology pool cue.

In the early 1990’s Predator introduced their 314 shaft, made of 10 pie-shaped pieces of hard rock maple spliced together, with a small hollow space near the tip, and a shorter ferrule. The drastic weight reduction in the end of the shaft reduced cue ball deflection by such a substantial amount that it significantly increased accuracy when applying side spin, or ‘english’, on the cue ball. Using ‘english’…striking the cue ball left or right of the vertical axis in the center of the cue ball….is what causes the cue ball to deflect, or ’squirt’, from its intended path. Striking the cue ball to the right of center causes the cue ball to deflect to the left of its intended path, and vice versa. To hit the contact point on the object ball correctly when using english requires compensating for this squirt effect, and takes years to master using a traditional shaft. Pro players switched to the new Predator shafts and cues since less deflection meant fewer missed shots and more money in the bank.

The passing years have seen refinements in the shaft in the form of the second generation 314² shaft, and eventually the Z²  shaft, which has an even shorter ferrule than the 314², and also a reduction in tip diameter from 12.75mm on the 314² to 11.75mm on the Z² shaft. These changes further reduced weight at shafts end, causing an even greater reduction in deflection. Independent testing show the Predator Z² shaft and the 314²  shaft as the top two shafts in the world in least amount of deflection incurred when striking the cue ball left or right of the vertical axis, which means a player has much less deflection to compensate for when using ‘english’ on the cue ball, with a resulting increase in accuracy.

It can take many years to learn how to compensate for cue ball deflection using a standard shaft. Since the invention of the high-tech, low-deflection shaft, the learning curve is greatly shortened, allowing beginner and intermediate players to become better players much quicker. There are very good pool players who don’t use ‘english’ on the cue ball, simply mastering speed and angles, but to master the game, on must master spin to get position in certain situations. If you can master spin, you will increase your ability to play shape for your next shot in many situations, and mastering spin is much easier with a low-deflection shaft. Predator shafts also put more spin on the cue ball with much less effort, meaning a softer stroke for the same results. I recently purchased a Predator 5K3 with the Z²shaft, and the improvement in my game was remarkable. The second generation Predator shaft, the 314² , is the best option for beginning players. The 12.75mm tip is much more forgiving than the 11.75mm tip on the Z², which requires much more precise placement when striking the cue ball.

The long, impressive list of professional pool players who use Predator cues and shafts can be found on the Predatorcues.com web site. Over 50% of the top 40 pro men, 3 of the top 5 women, and over 30,000 other players worldwide use Predator cues and/or shafts. They are not paid to play with a Predator, they use Predator Cues and Predator Shafts for another reason…their accuracy is what puts food on the table.