Here in Chattanooga we have an oil embargo. Medium ball is all you need for fresh here. But yet I see hook monster on the lanes and by game 2, they are struggling with transition more so than the rest of us.

Maybe I will do some sort of reasonable video review. On Sundays we have an AYCB for $6.50 for 3 hrs Sunday morning. Normally one guy at the end of the house has a PBA pattern out for practice. So maybe I compare a few shots on THS here vs PBA with a ball or two.

I have to say Tamer's reviews are one of the good ones

I have to say Tamer's reviews are one of the good ones

agreed.

I always found staffer reviews to be more informative, you just have to pay closer attention to what they say.  Nobody is going to say a ball is something it isn't, because if you then go buy one and find out it's not what they said, you're going to be pissed and never listen to them again.  That's not good PR.  Now they're more than likely to only talk about the best attributes of the ball, but when have you ever gone to your pro shop and said, "Yeah, I'd like a ball that's not good on oil and not good on dry either."  No, you're going to go tell them you want a ball that's good for medium oil, so they will pick you out a ball that's great for medium oil and tell you WHY it's great for medium oil, they aren't going to break down why it's bad on oil or on dry, that makes no sense.  That's like going to buy workboots and getting mad that they don't tell you how well they perform for jogging or playing golf, I want to know how good a boot it is. 

If you're buying a Crux and are concerned about how it reacts on dry, it's time to go back to basics. 

I believe that every ball is right for someone and is a piece of crap for someone else.  Pay attention to the person giving the review.  If you are a 12mph, 150 rev bowler, then the ball that works for an 18mph 500rev player probably won't work for you.  Look for a review from someone who is close to your stats and is testing on the same lane conditions you throw on.  As a friend use to say, a Ferrari is a great car, but where do I load the refrigerator?

+1 ....

Exactly, but that's the group who is causing the problem that this post is whining about.  What are they looking for out of reviews or videos?  Bad balls don't get released, companies aren't going to make a ball that sucks.  Review videos aren't going to show misses, that's idiotic, you want to see how the ball reacts when a good shot is thrown.  When someone misses, it's not the ball's fault, and it's hard to get a real read on a ball when someone doesn't throw it right.  And besides, people tear videos like that up anyway, "Well on the second one he dumped it outside, the next one he yanked, this guy is just a hack."  Maybe that hack was trying to show how the ball reacts when he misses and has just gotten sick of the heckling, so let's just edit down to all the perfect shots, must be what people really want. 

Everyone here made some pretty good points (yes, even the guy with the 160 avg ), but one thing I keep thinking about is at the end of the day, what majority is really being targeted by the bowling industry?  Is it the tournament/sport shot bowler (which seems to be a lot of you guys here), or the average league bowler?  Like Milorafferty said, a lot of it is marketing.  There are people out there who get a ball that doesn't come close to matching up with the lanes, we've all seen it.  Getting someone to buy a Crux when all that's needed was a Lights Out is the name of the game.  I don't like reading the cookie cutter reviews either, I think they're useless.  But, I also know that I'm not really part of the demographic the industry, staffers included, are targeting.  They're really targeting individuals who think that the next big thing will somehow allow them to suddenly stop sucking and their average will go from 160 to 210 overnight.  They don't want to know any better and some don't want to.

Most ball reviews videos are like car commercials, you show it at it's best and tell everyone they want one. You don't show it having a head on collision with a semi or what it looks like after you run into a telephone pole

And you don't pick a driver off the street and have them drive that car on that closed course track the pro driver did.


As for the written reviews the thing with staffer reviews is, while there are are some that try to do a "honest" reviews. It's the rest that are just copy/pasting the marketing materials.

While they may be required to use a ball before writing a review, are they required to use it for 10, 20 30 games before writing that review.

How many just go out and throw 1,2 or 3 games and say okay I tried it and then write a review by just copy/pasting with all the marketing buzz words.

The one I always thought was fun was "this ball has more continuation than the last one." at the rate the balls were getting more continuation than the last one. They should have been continuing right out the back of the building.


This makes me think of a story I heard at Kegel years back.

Norm Duke was there working on his game, he had set a new ball on the rack. They asked him what it was and he said it was a ball the company asked him to test (I don't remember which company).

The ball set there all day and as he was getting done, someone said what about testing that ball.

He said oh yeah, he picked it up got on the approach and made one shot. The ball came back, he picked it up and walked over to the garbage can and dropped it in.

"Okay, I tested it."