Author Topic: bowling and golf (Read 2084 times)

Mike L · « **on:** June 21, 2010, 03:33:50 AM »

Heres a question, how come bowlers can understand when a golfer goes out and struggles but yet bowling they don''t?

For example here at my center I overheard a few guys talking last night about man they are struggling, imagine what we would do on that course?

However, when they see a pba guy struggle, the same people say well hell I can bowl better than that or talk about how bad those guys are.

What is the difference? Tough courses make for higher scores, and tougher lanes make for lower scores, its the samething to me.

This is why its a dying sport! (Not brackets like alot of people say)
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"Typical House Bowler"

Edited on 6/21/2010 11:40 AM

LuckyLefty · « **Reply #16 on:** June 22, 2010, 09:21:53 AM »

Walter Ray shot 160 and I can do that!

It's true....if he is a straight ball thrower and good at spares he can probably average just the same on a sport shot!

This is NOT the case on a tough course in golf!

Problem with the sport shot. Doesn't affect the mediocre in fact if a guy can't hook it he might do better on sport shot.

REgards,

Luckylefty

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It takes Courage to have Faith, and Faith to have Courage.

James M. McCurley, New Orleans, Louisiana

Hornetajc · « **Reply #17 on:** June 22, 2010, 10:53:53 AM »

Love this topic!

1) It is still very difficult to shoot scratch in golf. Credit goes to USGA and PGA for keeping their sport challenging by regulating technology. Now, let's add a very difficult golf course with ankle high thick rough and greens that are like putting on a tilted felt poker table, and people can visually see how hard it is.

2) We all know the local league bowler who proclaims they could beat the pros. We also know those are the same bowlers who NEVER put the money where their mouth is. They never enter any regionals, Masters, US Open, and in some cases, never leave their own home center! Hell, I know some guys who make these claims but yet, won't enter $2 brackets!

Mike L · « **Reply #18 on:** June 22, 2010, 12:54:43 PM »

Love the replies and yes this was just an opinion/question topic, NO BASHING AT ANYONE!

I understand the point about seeing the course and seeing the hazards. I run a tough/sport league here and I put out a pretty plain explaination of the pattern, as well as a chart graph (not the kegel or any other companys graph, because hell bowling 20 years now, I can't read them) and people still seem to not grasp it.

My question is how come? What can actually be done about it to make it simplier for the average league bowler to understand it?
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"Typical House Bowler"

rotogrip_rick · « **Reply #19 on:** June 22, 2010, 02:29:15 PM »

Love the replies also Mike L. I put out that challenging shot I designed for the Don Kauffman Tournament last year and had almost 80 bowlers. The amazing part is that a TON of people came to and ask me to run the pattern again. So there is a true separation between league bowlers and tournament bowlers. I recently wrote an article for Roto Grip with almost the same questions. A tournament bowler will drive miles to try out different tournaments and if they don't bowl well, they just move onto the next tournament. A league bowler will complain that you changed something with the house shot and that you "screwed" with the pattern just to piss them off. League bowlers will never get it, unless we can convert them into tournament bowlers by applying a little harder shot each tournament and house conditions and "teach" them how to read ball motion and etc... For all those interested, on the stormbowling.com website under marketing is the RG/Storm forecast slide show.. Alot of great info about my balls react the way they do and information about coverstocks, Rg #'s and diff #'s, and more info on ball maintenance. Check it out.
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Rick Mitchell
Roto-Grip Staff Member

wabullets · « **Reply #20 on:** June 22, 2010, 02:38:43 PM »

Lucky,

Walter Ray shot a game of 160, did not average one sixty as the regular boweler did. In bowling, on any given condition and on any given day, a regular guy might beat a walter ray for a game during an event but by and large a Walter Ray will easily out average a regular guy for the course of the event. Same as in golf...a regular guy might beat a pro for a hole....but during the course of the round, the pro will win the round.

To me the biggest differnce in the 2 sports is a bowler completes his game on a single pair of lanes. Minor change will occur during that game but for the most part, his conditions will not differ greatly from frame one to frame 10. In golf though, every shot is a different shot from hole to hole. Any thing from the shape of the land where your next shot is played from, to the height of the grass, the softness of the sand, to the tilt of the green, to the direction of the wind blowing, to that tree that is now in your way. From shot to shot to shot the variance in golf and your ability to make a good shot is much greater to that than of bowling.

So after that long windedness....in my mind it is much easier for me to think that a regular joe to think he can do what a walter ray does more easily than he thinks he can do what a Tiger Woods does.

Mike L · « **Reply #21 on:** June 22, 2010, 04:04:37 PM »

See I think its going in the opposite direction. Its getting too technical. Most average bowlers do not understand rg, pap, val, and so on, but yet say in golf, tennis, and baseball, its still the same factors. Now don't get me wrong, yes of course in all those sports they are many different adjustments that you make, but not quite as many as in bowling.

How many bowlers really want to carry 8-16 balls around to tournaments? I know I sure don't and when I know its a house condition, I don't have to, maybe 6 at the most. 10-15 years ago, most were always on house conditions and they had 3-4 times as many people bowling, now 30 is alot.

Im sure Walton and Baker would agree its dropped drastically in the last few years.

You say people don't understand the difference in patterns, so why make them? The same core of guys are always going to bowl, hard or easy. Why cater to 20% of the people and lose 80%?

Rick you said make them a little tougher and tougher, but you know what happens? They go 15 mins to the other center and bowl there because they are easier. In the 9 years that I have been here at the center, we have less than 50 honors scores and I have about a third of those so I do make them a little tougher, but people don't want to struggle.

Why not just make them easy all the time everywhere? And trust me I would much rather bowl on tougher conditions, but id rather have 50-60 people than 20-30.

And don't say its the economy either, because the northern area of md and pa still gets people and plenty of brackets. People still wanna bowl just not struggle.

Bakers doubles tournament was easier than anticipated and there was plenty of whining going on, but guess what there were more brackets the 2nd block than the 1st one, because they were easy!

Question for you guys, would you rather bowl WRW or PDW on your house shot or the US Open pattern? I'd say most would say house, but maybe im wrong. Now would you rather play Tiger or Phil on your home course or the US Open course?

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"Typical House Bowler"

CBass1724 · « **Reply #22 on:** June 23, 2010, 12:05:57 PM »

quote:

You say people don't understand the difference in patterns, so why make them? The same core of guys are always going to bowl, hard or easy. Why cater to 20% of the people and lose 80%?

Rick you said make them a little tougher and tougher, but you know what happens? They go 15 mins to the other center and bowl there because they are easier. In the 9 years that I have been here at the center, we have less than 50 honors scores and I have about a third of those so I do make them a little tougher, but people don't want to struggle.

Why not just make them easy all the time everywhere? And trust me I would much rather bowl on tougher conditions, but id rather have 50-60 people than 20-30.

And don't say its the economy either, because the northern area of md and pa still gets people and plenty of brackets. People still wanna bowl just not struggle.

I really wish tournament directors would read the first paragraph quoted above over and over and over again!!! Some of you all just don't get it.

If you wanna make them hard, that is totally cool. I get it and I understand it's the way the game should be played, for the integrity of the sport, blah blah blah. But just don't b!tch and moan about not getting entries because you are getting plenty of feedback on what is NOT working about your tournaments and why people don't show up.

The same group of people show up regardless of the pattern and they should not be catered to because they are in the minority. Why on earth would you market a tournament towards a specific group of bowlers who are going to be there no matter what?! You need to market it and sell the tournament to the folks who are not there each week and figure out how you get those bowlers to your tournaments. If you're content with low entries and tough shots, then none of this applies to you.

Bowling has turned into a game that is all about "matching up". I think it's safe to say all/most of us feel more comfortable and match up better on a house shot compared to other patterns like the PBA or Kegel Patterns. Bowlers are more inclined to show up when they know in their mind that they have a chance to strike often.

To answer Mike's question, I'd take a house shot vs WRW/PDW/whomever. I can shoot honor scores on house shots. With golf, I'm losing either way whether it's easy or hard so I choose Pebble Beach because I haven't played there lol. Not really the same type of comparison because most recreational golfers will never shoot below 80 in the easiest of conditions.

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C.J. Batten

walt8398 · « **Reply #23 on:** June 23, 2010, 01:54:11 PM »

Oh my, this was too good to pass up! LOL

I will add my $.02... All I have to say is ABC/USBC..... Our governing body has ruined the game.

I remember a time when "blocking" a lane was highly frowned upon. Now, if you don''t "block" the lanes you lose league bowlers and revenue. USBC has allowed the centers to give the bowlers 10 boards of friction to the left/right and a "BP OIL SPILL" in the middle of the lane... Couple that with the high tech balls you can get from any pro shop and now you have the unrealistic scoring environment of today. There is no way that a bowler who puts his ball away for the summer should come back and average 220+ for a league season. I haven''t played golf in 8 years (I''m not that good anyway....lol) should I expect to shoot under 70?

CJ - We have talked about this before. I completely understand where you are coming from but some of us "old school" TDs have to try and keep the bowlers in touch with reality in regards to scoring! LOL

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Tony Walton
VMSBT Tournament Director
http://www.vmsbt.com

Edited on 6/23/2010 1:55 PM

CBass1724 · « **Reply #24 on:** June 23, 2010, 02:28:38 PM »

quote:

CJ - We have talked about this before. I completely understand where you are coming from but some of us "old school" TDs have to try and keep the bowlers in touch with reality in regards to scoring! LOL
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Tony Walton

As much as I'd like old school bowling to come back, it's just a different game nowadays. At least you put out tougher shots knowing you won't get max entries. Some of the TD's these days put out the hard stuff and complain when nobody shows up!

Or like certain Bowl America directors have done...they have 60-90 entries on a house shot and listen to the 10% (or less) of the bowlers that don't like the scoring pace...so the shot changes and the tournament entries go down the drain, lol.
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C.J. Batten

Author Topic: bowling and golf (Read 2084 times)

Mike L

bowling and golf

LuckyLefty

Re: bowling and golf

Hornetajc

Re: bowling and golf

Mike L

Re: bowling and golf

rotogrip_rick

Re: bowling and golf

wabullets

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Mike L

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CBass1724

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walt8398

Re: bowling and golf

CBass1724

Re: bowling and golf