Billiard balls: a wide variety of balls to match the variety of games
Billiard balls are considered as simple accessories that one needs to be able to play any pool game. They are often overlooked, but the fact is that they are absolutely essential. There are so many different pool games out there now, and they all have specialized ball sets to use; one can even have personalized pool balls based on interests, passions, etc.
carom billiards
Carom billiards regroups the games that are played on a table without pockets; straight rail, tri rail, balkline, etc. The game consists of three billiard balls: a red one as an object ball, a white ball, and a second white ball with a point for the second player to use. The latter is sometimes yellow. These balls are quite a bit larger than most people are used to – their dimensions are usually 2 7/8″ in diameter.
International Billiards
Those are the best known; the usual game of pool balls that almost everyone knows and is used to play common 8 balls, 9 balls, straight billiards, one pocket billiards and more. The set consists of a cue ball and 15 object balls with a diameter of 2 ¼”. The object balls are numbered and colored so that they are separated into two distinct groups. Numbers 1 through 7 are solid in color and range from as follows: yellow, blue, red, purple (sometimes pink), orange, purple, and brown (burgundy) Balls 9 through 15 have a color stripe on a white ball and follow the same color order. 8 remaining the ball is solid black but is considered neutral and must be pocketed last in the 8-ball game.
black ball
Those pool balls are simply separated into two sets of different colors; typically red and yellow and a cue ball with which each player has to pocket all his colored balls before his opponent. Those balls, to compensate for the fact that there is no specific order in which to pocket them, are smaller (typically 2 to 2 1/8″ in diameter). And the cue ball is even smaller, at 1 7/ 8″. .
Snooker
The snooker pool ball set contains more balls than most games use with their 22. It consists of fifteen solid red balls, six colored balls, and one cue ball. All colored balls represent a specific number of points: yellow (2), green (3), brown (4), blue (5), pink (6), and black (7). Standard diameter for billiard balls is 2 1/15″.
Basepool can be played with international pool balls as it uses the same number of balls. However, no distinction is made between solid and striped, so only the color matters. There are 7 pairs of colored balls, one black ball and one white ball. The colored balls are paired like this: yellow and blue (singles), red and purple (doubles), orange and green (triples), and brown (part of the home run). Various shots with those object balls allow players to walk, bunt, steal, hit and run, sacrifice fly balls, take strikes, strikeouts, and just about any other situation that occurs in the course of a baseball game. Its diameter is 2 ¼”.
To learn more about the history of billiard balls, visit the Billiards Village blog where you will find this and much more information about the game of billiards in general.