Cowboy pool (or simply cowboy) is a hybrid pool game combining elements of English billiards through an intermediary game, with more standard pocket billiards characteristics. The game employs four balls, the cue ball and three others, numbered one, three, and five. A game of Cowboy pool is contested as a to 101 points, with those points being awarded for a host of different shot types. Dating back to 1908, the game is a strictly amateur pastime.
History
The parent game of cowboy pool is English billiards, which is itself a hybrid of three predecessor
billiards games – the winning game, the losing game and the carambole game (an early form of
straight rail) – and dates to approximately 1800 in
England.
There are a number of pocket billiard games directly descended from English billiards, including
bull dog,
scratch pool,
thirty-one pool and
thirty-eight. Thirty-eight is the intermediary game from which cowboy is directly derived.
This precursor game was first reported on in the
Democrat and Chronicle on 18 January 1885: "there is a new billiards game called 'thirty-eight'. It appears to have met with special favor among the many devotees of pool".
Cowboy is very similar to thirty-eight, with the major difference being that thirty-eight requires the use of two cue balls.
Rules
Conventional cowboy pool uses only four balls: the
cue ball and object balls numbered one, three, and five.
The balls have a set opening placement: the one-ball is placed on the ; the three-ball on the ; and the five-ball on the . As in the game of
snooker, balls that are pocketed are immediately respotted to their starting position. Beginning with from the – the area behind a pool table's head string – the incoming player must contact the three-ball first. If the player fails to do so, the opponent may either force the player to repeat the , or elect to break themself.
To win the match, a player needs to score 101 points. For the first 90, points are scored in three ways:
-
one point for performing a on the cue ball into any two object balls;
-
two points for caroming into all three ;
-
and the face value of any ball pocketed.
The maximum score possible on any single shot is 11 points, achieved by caroming off and pocketing all three balls. The failure to score in one of the delineated manners on any shot ends the player's at the table.
All shots result in the player losing all points scored during the inning (not just those on the fouled stroke), and the opposing player comes to the table with the cue ball in position – except in the case of a , which results in ball-in-hand from the kitchen.
The 90th point in cowboy pool must be reached exactly, and the failure to do so is a foul resulting in a loss of turn.
The final point necessary to reach 101 and the win must be made by a – an intentional scratch made by caroming the cue ball off of the one ball, scratching off either other ball is a foul.
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