A ball is a round object that is used most often in sports and games. Balls are usually hollow and spherical but can be other shapes, such as ovoid (only in a few special cases) or solid (as in billiards) and flat (as in ice hockey). In most games using balls, the play of the game follows the state of the ball as it is hit, kicked, or thrown by players. Balls are often used in ball dropping functions such as in the famous Times Square New Year's Eve ceremony.
Balls were used in ancient times by the early Egyptians, the ancient Greeks and Romans, and t ...
The umpire signals a no ball by holding one arm out horizontally. If the call is for illegal placement of the bowler's feet, the umpire will also shout "No ball!", giving the batsman some warning that the ball is a no ball. A batsman with quick enough reflexes can take advantage of this by playing an otherwise overly aggressive shot at the ball.
A batsman may not be ruled out bowled, leg before wicket, caught, stumped, or hit wicket off a no ball. (In some types of short form cricket the batsman may not be out by these methods on the ...
In the US, Billiard balls are balls used to play the game of US billiards. The balls are numbered and colored as follows:
yellow
blue
red
purple
orange
green
brown
black
yellow and white
blue and white
red and white
purple and white
orange and white
green and white
brown and white
Cue ball white
Note that balls 1-7 are o ...
In the US, Billiard balls are balls used to play the game of US billiards. The balls are numbered and colored as follows:
yellow
blue
red
purple
orange
green
brown
black
yellow and white
blue and white
red and white
purple and white
orange and white
green and white
brown and white
< ...
A ball game is a sport played with a ball.
There are many popular games or sports involving some type of ball or similar object. These games can be grouped by the general objective of the game, sometimes indicating a common origin either of a game itself or of its basic idea:
Bat-and-ball games, such as cricket and baseball.
Two-goal games, such as basketball and all forms of football and hockey.
VŰolleying games, such as volleyball and tennis.
"Target" ...
A ball pit (less commonly known as a ball pool) is a pit, usually rectangular and padded, filled with small (generally no larger than a baseball) colorful hollow plastic balls. It is typically employed as a recreation and exercise for small children. Some ball pits are fairly shallow, suitable only for "wading", while others are much deeper, and may be used for "swimming".
Ball pits are often found at nurseries, carnivals, amusement parks, and large video arcades such as Chuck E. Cheese's and the (now defunct) Discovery ...
Buck and ball was a common load for muzzle-loading muskets, and was very commonly used in the early days of the U.S. Civil War. The load consisted of a full caliber round lead ball combined with three buckshot pellets.
Buck and ball was issued in paper cartridges that combined the projectiles with the black powder propellant charge to facilitate rapid loading of the weapon.
The intent of the buck and ball load was to combine the devastating impact of the full-size (normally .69 caliber) ball with the spreading pattern of a shotgun, and served to greatly improve the hit probability of ...
A cricket ball is a hard, solid ball used to play cricket.
Cricket ball - Manufacture.
Cricket balls are made from a core of cork, which is layered with tightly wound string, and covered by a leather case with a slightly raised sewn seam. The covering is constructed of four pieces of leather shaped similar to the peel of a quartered orange, but one hemisphere is rotated by 90 degrees with respect to the other. The "equator" of the ball is stitched with string to form the seam, with a total of six rows of st ...
The cups and balls trick is an old magic effect that has spawned a variety of adaptations. The effect know as acetabula et calculi was performed by Roman conjurors as far back as two thousand years ago. One popularly circulated painting of a man holding two inverted cups over two small round objects has been taken as evidence to erroneously suggest that the effect dates back as far as Ancient Egypt.
The most widely performed version of this effect uses three wide-mouthed cups and three small balls. The magician makes the balls ...
In billiard games, the cue ball is usually the ball that a player must hit with the cue. It is usually white in color, although in certain games where more than one cue ball is used, a second yellow cue ball may be employed. See three cushion billiards. Ideally, the cue ball should be the same size and mass as the other balls, but in certain kinds of coin operated pool tables, it may be slightly bigger and heavier.
Cue balls have been made from wood, ivory, and various synthetic materials. ...
A ball bearing is a common type of rolling-element bearing, a kind of bearing.
The term ball bearing sometimes means a bearing assembly which uses spherical bearings as the rolling elements. It also means an individual ball for a bearing assembly. The remainder of this entry uses the term ball for the individual component and ball bearing or just 'bearing' for the assembly.
Ball bearings typically support both axial and radial loads and can tolerate some misalignment of the inner and outer races. Also, ball ...
This page is about the fortune-telling object. For the album Crystal Ball by Prince, see Crystal Ball (Prince). For the Styx album, see Crystal Ball (album). For the probability distribution function used in physics, see Crystal Ball function.
A crystal ball is a crystal or glass ball believed to aid clairvoyance. It is sometimes known as a shew stone.
Crystal ball - History.
Celtic tribes, known to exist in Britain as early as 2,000 B.C., were unified by a priesthood know ...
Chinese Eight Ball is a two-player pocket billiards game which combines the play of Eight Ball with the shooting style of carom games.
Play
Set the balls up as you would for eight ball. The first player breaks by shooting the cue ball into the rack as you normally would. A ball must be pocketed, or two must strike cushions, for the break to be legal. If a ball is pocketed, the breaking player goes again.
The break is the only time pla ...
The dead-ball era is a baseball term generally used to describe the period between 1900 (though some date it to the beginning of baseball) and the emergence of Babe Ruth as a power hitter in 1920.
Dead-ball era - Origins of the term.
Specifically defined, the dead-ball era refers to an era in baseball characterized by extreme low scoring games, in fact, it was the lowest scoring period in major league baseball history. Using major league statistics, the dead ball started in about 1903, and continued to 1918 ...
The Ball Python (Python regius), also known as the Royal Python, is a ground dwelling snake native to the savannahs and rain forests in western Africa. Its name derives from its tendency to curl into a tight "ball" to protect its head on the inside when threatened. They are usually brown and black in color, and there are several "morphs" in color that breeders have obtained (see link below). As adults will they can range from 3 to 6 feet (90 to 180 centimeters) in length. They reach sexual maturity at 3 to 5 years, and live more than 20 years. The oldest recorded ...
Ben Wa balls (also known as Burmese bells) are small, marble-sized metal balls, usually hollow and containing a small weight that rolls around — used for massage and meditation purposes as well as female masturbation. Some may also be solid, or contain clappers or chimes within; other larger versions made of plastic encasing lesser balls are called Duotone balls. There is also a pair consisting of one containing a drop of mercury and the other, a tiny vibrating metal tongue, giving a uniquely erotic sensat ...
In mathematics, a ball is the inside of a sphere; both concepts apply not only in the three-dimensional space but also for lower and higher dimensions, and for metric spaces in general.
Ball mathematics - Metric spaces.
Let M be a metric space. The (open) ball of radius r > 0 centred at a point p in M is defined as
where d is the distance function or metric. If the less-than symbol (<) is replaced by a less-than-or-equal-to (≤), t ...
A ball is a formal dance. Attendees wear evening attire, which is specified on the invitation as black tie or white tie (the most formal). Social dance forms a large part of the evening; actual ballroom dancing may or may not occur.
Strictly speaking, a party may only be called a ball if it is a charity event. Otherwise, no matter how grand or formal the gather ...
Nine ball is a contemporary variation of pocket billiards, with historical beginnings rooted in the United States and traceable to the 1920s. The game may be played in social and recreational settings by any number of players (generally one-on-one) and subject to whatever rules are agreed upon beforehand, or in league and tournament settings in which the number of players and the rules are set by the sponsors. During much of its history, nine ball has been known as a "money" game, in both professional and recreational settings, but today in major to ...
A ball-peen hammer is a type of peening hammer used in metalworking. It is distinguished from a point-peen hammer or chisel-peen hammer by having a hemispherical peening head. Though the process of peening has become rarer in metal fabrication, the ball-peen hammer remains useful for many tasks.
The original function of the hammer was to "peen" riveted or welded material so that it will exhibit the same elastic behavior as the surrounding material. Specifically, striking the metal imparts a stress at the point of ...
