[Travis Covington]

Originally Posted by GeeTwo

As I said earlier, you're on a different level of play; birds vs mammals. The key item between pocketing as practiced by top level teams like 254 and most rookie teams is that 254 (please correct me if I'm wrong on this) planned the pocketing from the get-go and knew how much strength would remain, whereas rookie teams pocket out of desperation, without a good understanding of what is acceptable vice what is excessive. For us mid-level teams, it makes much more sense to select the proper strength members than to engineer them by buying over and pocketing down.

Selecting without knowing the engineering trade-offs and objective differences is simply guessing. Thinner material is also not the same as thicker material with pocketing/lightening/trussing/whatever you want to call it. Maintaining a larger cross-sectional area is extremely important, and pocketing can let you do some cool things to make parts stronger (in directions you care about) while also lighter than their thinner alternatives.