http://news.pba.com/post/2013/3/12/PBA-CBS-Sports-Network-Sign-Multi-Year-Television-Agreement3b-Debut-Set-for-GEICO-PBA-Summer-Swing-in-Milwaukee-in-June.aspx

Could be some great news!

Better time slot as well. Should be great! If this were to continue into the winter, it could mean, NO BUTTING HEADS WITH NFL!!!!! It was the dumbest thing in the world anyways. Dont care if the telecast was recorded, just dont have it butting against the #1 sport in the US.

It looks like a great deal for the PBA.  One unfortunate thing, at least for me with UVerse, I have to pay extra to get that channel.  One good thing about ESPN is almost everyone gets it since it is included in most basic cable packages.  CBS Sports is in a lot fewer homes, thus reducing the exposure of the sport to the casual fan. 

True diehards will go out of their way to watch it, but the PBA may lose some of the casual fans.

I have to agree here. The problem that will come up for this is viewership, since most of this will be happening in the offseason, and that is generally the slow season for us.. so it all depends on what happens here.

Announcers will definitely stay the same, if not Randy. Most CBS events has had Barnes giving the play-by-play; case in point: Intercollegiate finals.

Better time slot as well. Should be great! If this were to continue into the winter, it could mean, NO BUTTING HEADS WITH NFL!!!!! It was the dumbest thing in the world anyways. Dont care if the telecast was recorded, just dont have it butting against the #1 sport in the US.

All due respect, but you may want to read the article again. This deal currently applies only to the Summer Swing, so this won't be conflicting with any other sport except baseball.

Besides, everyone knows that the #1 most exciting sport in the world is Australian Rules Football.

BL.

Righty,
    Your post makes it seem like you think the PBA chose to be on against the NFL....if that's the case, you couldn't be more incorrect. ESPN chooses the timeslot for the PBA. ESPN chose to put it on against the NFL. ESPN thinks that the bowling gets a better rating against the NFL than anything else it can put there and thusly has kept it there for it's tenure on the network. While I understand the sentiment of your post, and agree I would like to see the PBA on at a different time, it isn't the PBA's call and ESPN has no incentive to move it. Anything else it would put there would get worse ratings than the PBA does.

And this is a very good point.

Let's look back at where the PBA was before.

Saturdays, 1 or 1:30pm Central time, on ABC. I don't know about where you live, but when I was growing up in Nebraska, that was right at kickoff for every Nebraska football game, home, away, or otherwise. Bowling was on against that, which was the least of people's concerns. As more access to it would come up, the tour became the option to get pushed out of its slot; one it had had since the late 1960s/early 1970s.

Then late 80s/early 90s. Again, where I lived, the PBA, LPBT, and PWBA tours came on ESPN2 every Thursday or Wednesday night - right in the middle of basketball season, when Jordan was dominating. Again, basketball grabbed more viewership, so the tours get kicked out of that slot.

Where I am at now on the west coast, ESPN's Sunday morning slot is actually better than what it had in the 80s and 90s. All that it goes up against are pregame shows, or paid advertisements. And by the time it is done, the football games are about to start. So for now, Sundays are not that bad. Saturdays would interfere with the kids' toons and college sports. During the week is a crapshoot thanks to college and pro basketball. So Bowling has the best slot it can get at this point.

BL.

Yea, I have Uverse also.  Looks like I will have to fork up another $10 buck a month during the summer to watch.  Since the PBA now has an alternative station to bradcast its events, maybe ESPN will see the light and give them better times and prices.

Righty,
    I am not 100% that is accurate. I know the announcers have very little respect for bowling. If I had a dollar for every time Berman made a joke about bowling coming up next after the Sunday Countdown I could be close to retiring soon. But I think ESPN does respect bowling a little. As I said, it's not putting bowling on against the NFL because it has anything against it. It has be proven that bowling delivers better ratings in that time slot than anything else they have put there. In the grand scheme of things, the ratings are not great, something like a 1.1 share. But when bowling doesn't air, the programming in that slot gets like a 0.6 or 0.7 share, so bowling is almost double what anything else gets (I am trying to remember the figures, these may not be 100% accurate, but the point is). So that is why it leaves it there. Plus, when they do show it at other times, the ratings bump isn't that significant for bowling (I don't remember the figures for this one). So as long as ESPN is broadcasting it, bowling will be on Sundays against the NFL. It is the best timeslot for the network, even if it isn't the best for some viewers.