I have been impressed with Fox coverage of tour, and think Bowlero ownership will prove to be more positive than some believe.  However I was watching the golf pre game show, and they were talking about Tiger making 10 million official money on his best year.

Bowling needs prize funds to get to where a dominant player can make 1 million, and the top 50 can be in the 100k territory.  The PBA blew so many opportunities to stay closer to golf in terms of prize funds in the 70s.  Probably not in the cards, but it would sure be nice for the game

Some people still remember Walter.  I used to have a boss that moonlighted at Denny's, and when I told her I like bowling she mentioned him right away because he was part of their advertising back in the day.

Bowling's perception is the real problem here. It's not considered as high class as golf nor is it as fun to watch as Football, Basketball, Baseball or Hockey. It has a regular season, so it's not infrequent enough to be a "must see" event like Olympic sports.

Let's face facts here, Bowling is not much different than throwing darts, shuffle board or bocce ball. It's more of something to do while drinking and hanging out with your friends than a sport.

If advertising during televised bowling gave a decent ROI, then there would be plenty of money. It's been proven to not be that effective. Denny's tried it, so did Motel 6. Neither seem to any longer.  Barbasol still does, but not as a prime tour sponsor anymore.

I love bowling, especially league and tournaments. But I find watching the current televised bowling a chore.

The money needs to be invested at the lower level to generate participation and growth. Set up a high school scholarship fund and give kids an incentive to play. Set up a post high school semi pro circuit and put some money in to increase involvement.

Or, keep doing what they have been doing and what the sport continue to die.

The money needs to be invested at the lower level to generate participation and growth. Set up a high school scholarship fund and give kids an incentive to play. Set up a post high school semi pro circuit and put some money in to increase involvement.

Or, keep doing what they have been doing and what the sport continue to die.

Post high school semi pro circuit? You’ve had too much to drink.

Bowling got better ratings than golf in the 70s, but advertisers didnt like the demographics of the audience.   They thought we were all a bunch of beer bellied trailer trash with no money to spend

The problem with “saving” bowling is that everybody wants someone else to save it.

 People have decent ideas, but it always seems to depend on someone else to magically arrive on the scene with millions of dollars to throw in to fix things.

 WE, THE BOWLERS, CAN “SAVE” BOWLING.

 But, we have to be willing to foot the bill.

 Say, for instance, that about 1.5 million people were sanctioned bowlers.

 And, say they all bowled only one league a week, for about 30 weeks a year.

 And all those bowlers were to put in one extra dollar every week that went straight to the support of the professional bowlers tour. Or bowling in general?

 That’s about an extra forty-five MILLION dollars they could use to build and promote bowling, and have prize funds that would be big enough to draw both participants AND sponsors.

 I know, I know. Bowlers are cheap, and that’s part of the problem.

 How do we expect sponsors to voluntarily line up to pump millions of dollars into a sport that millions of potential customers wouldn’t even spend a dollar a week to watch? Or save?

A dollar a week.

And people will gripe about it, complain about it, and give a thousand reasons/EXCUSES why they shouldn’t/wouldn’t give a dollar a week to anybody to try anything to “save” it.

Basically, it’s because they don’t think they should have to save it, but they want magic rich people to just materialize out of thin air to save an activity that isn’t even worth a dollar a week to save?

 I’d give my dollar a week. Heck, I’d even pay my wife and sons dollar too.

 Anybody else in?

Yeah.  It is kind of funny how people will spend a few hundred dollars every year on new equipment and yet complain that the centers went up .25 cents towards lineage. 

Personally, I think it is a fantastic idea to have $1.00 go towards Team USA, Jr. Team USA, and PBA.  There are probably hundreds of bowlers out there that dont bowl the tour simply because of the financial side of things.  Pretty sure if we saw the winner of a tour stop getting $100,000 every week; you would see the number of bowlers increase significantly.  $25,000 is still a decent chunk of money.  But if that increased to closer to $100,000; more bowlers would figure out a way to make tour stops.