My new ones were tight.

Should the shank in the ball of a ball joint be tight or free in the ball?

A new ball joint is tight and should be hard to move by hand.
As thes joint is used, it becomes looser but should have some resistance and no 'free play'.
Totally worn units will have lots of of slop (free play) and can wear to the point where the ball can pop out of it's socket.
DD

You indicated that you did not want to end up in a ditch. I take it you therefore are concerned with safety.
Remember there is NO DOLLAR SIGN IN SAFETY.....
Cheaper (mostly foriegn made) Ball Joints have thinner cup/body walls at the crimp point where they are closed up retaining the ball and bearing/bushing. They also may have ABS plastic wear cups under the ball. They will wear out quicker.
There had been some changes to MOOG replacement ball joints in the past 10 years where they started using a NYLON lower wear cup under the ball or the ball was incased in the Nylon, instead of sintered iron metal or brass/bronze. Very different in price.
Then they listed the Metal Cup/bushing/bearing units as Heavy Duty or Race versions.
NOTE: Nylon is NOT a bad alternative as more and more light duty truck beam axle replacement king pin sets now come with Nylon bushings instead of metal. Nylon does NOT need to be reemed to size. Nylon does not have the memory like metal and can bounce back to it's original configuration after a hard hit. Metal can be peened and deformed and retail this loose mis-shape. Grease can only fill some of the gap.
Terry