I have been playing my flintstones a lot lately, and the pops seem pretty good there. They help you score the dig rollovers, which is important for a number of reasons, and then it can feed your upper flipper or squeak out the other side and cause you all sorts of problems if you aren't paying attention.

My one complaint about them is that they are needed to complete bedrock derby, and that's the time the ball will always fall through the pops without hitting anything. It never fails. I'll get great action in the pops the whole rest of the game, and the that stupid derby mode tarts and it seems like I can never get them to fire.

Also the bronto crane is designed to dump the ball out past the pops, but more often tan not the ball bounces back in. Except during bedrock derby, lol.