Tonight in league we start the night in 1st place, one game out in front of the 2nd place team.  Our anchor is struggling, but we win the 1st game by 9 pins.  The team just below us also wins their 1st game.

During the 2nd game, one of my teammates starts coaching the opposing teams leadoff bowler.  Not only is she telling her how to pick up specific spares, but what adjustments to strike.  I found this really unusual, as our bowler has always been a highly competitive type bowler.  I asked another member of the team why she was coaching the other team and was told who knows.

While it bothered me, especially when we lost the 2nd game by 19 pins and the team below us won again, I decided to just ignore it.  We went on to lose the 3rd game and total pins to drop to 3rd in the league.  The bowler being coached was 12 pins over average each of the 2 games she was coached and my teammate was 7 and 9 pins under each of the games.

Would you coach some one on the team you are bowling against?  Maybe it is just me, but I have never been coached by anyone I am bowling against and would never expect to be.  I have had my coach talk to me after the match was finished and advise me on what I was doing wrong or could have done better, but never during the competition.

Is it just me, or would it bother you to have your teammate coaching the competition?
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Age is only a state of mind.  Since I lost mine years ago, I must be really young

Edited on 7/8/2004 4:15 PM

TP,

 To answer the first question: I have been "coached" by an opposing team member during competition but he didn't do it for my benefit. It was more an attempt to mess with my game than to help me out. Usually if someone tells me to do something different with my speed, approach or whatever I tend to ask myself why they are doing so and then ignore them. As to the second question, " would I coach an opposing team member during competition". I have done so in the past but only during my Sport League. The reason for this is that Sport is more about you vs the lanes than you vs someone else and sometimes I might see something minor in someone elses game that can be fixed just by bringing it up to them.
 Having said that I will also say that during a normal league night when I am trying to stomp the opposing team I would never consider helping them beat me. That is somewhat Sadomasochistic don't you think??

 You should consider trying to find out what the reasoning was for your teammate to do her helping during competition.

 Just a thought...

 Gallandro

I wouldn't want a teammate giving advice to another person on another team.  That's weird.  Shouldn't your teammate possibly be giving YOU advice if you're bowling under average instead?
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White Dot
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Thanks for the replies.  I am still having mixed feelings about the situation.  One thing that made it worse was that at the start of the night the bowler coaching was approached by the other team to leave our team and join them in the winter.  Her reply, after talking to me and the rest of the team is she would stay with us.  At the end of the night she decides she is going to leave us and join them.  That leaves us hanging without a bowler.  I thought we were friends, but maybe I was wrong

Anyhow, it is a fun league where it doesn't matter where you finish, everyone gets the same thing.   I joined it 2 years ago and have usually been on a team close to the bottom, it would have been nice to stay in first.  There are still several weeks left, so we are not out of it.  She joined the league, supposedly, so we could bowl together.  Yes, I brought her, her mom and daughter into the league.

How was the rest of the team bowling, all of us were over average except our anchor.   He was off his game all night.

Bottom line is I was surprised to see her coaching the competition due to the fact she has always been a very competitive bowler.  But life goes on and people change.  Too bad she wasn't coaching our anchor.  We could have used him to be plus 12 or 13 pins per game
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Age is only a state of mind.  Since I lost mine years ago, I must be really young