How do the not so good pros survive on tour.  The guys who never win.  Where does their money Come from for expenses and entry fees.  Do the top guys get a salary from the ball companies?  Does a percentage of what they win go to anyone?

I read that article a few years back and the thing that always sticks in my head is Jason couch winning the TOC three years in a row and turning around and giving it all back at the Mohegan sun gambling. PA is a right, a lot of these guys are bad with money.

I'm cheap as f*ck. I don't do pots, brackets etc the entry fee is enough, but I've liked bowling for bowling, not as an income stream. I can see why guys smash ball returns etc, they put their rent money up for brackets and pots and get RAMBO'D.

Quote from: northface28 on December 12, 2016, 02:20:10 PM

I read that article a few years back and the thing that always sticks in my head is Jason couch winning the TOC three years in a row and turning around and giving it all back at the Mohegan sun gambling. PA is a right, a lot of these guys are bad with money.

Well, like with many different careers, and including sports, while it is an (easy) way to make money, it doesn't teach you how to KEEP money. You have to have and learn the wealth thinking to be able to keep the money that you have, use it responsibly, and find that way to have that money make you money passively while you are also actively making more.

In short, you don't want to fall victim to the lottery syndrome: where someone wins big, and spends even bigger that they are worse off than where they were when they started.

BL.

For the Econ majors out there, lifestyle inflation, make more: spend more.

There's a tour?

I agree to a greater extent that bowlers are gamblers by nature. And it's true that at best most of us would be happy to say that we've broke even.

Back in my alley rat days, I remember the folks I went up against, including myself, would try parlaying whatever we did at the bowling alley the night before and be there at the racetrack the following afternoon for the daily double and pick six. If we were lucky enough, and I emphasize IF we were lucky enough, not to lose our shirts and asses at the track, we'd try recouping our piddly bankroll(s) back at the bowling alley later that evening.

Pot games? Humph, one place that I fondly remember whose property is now a freeway off ramp allowed pot games seven days a week. Of course, Friday night was the big night.

What was sobering was that a few of the guys who were world beaters from my two-bit pot games scene couldn't hit the broad side of the ocean once they tried going out on tour. I mean, these guys were so good among us all you had to do was announce that they're in the house and damn near half of the guys would pack up and go home. But these same guys couldn't bowl their way out of the PTQs.

Fast forwarding back to the 21st century, to say you've gone out on tour, whether national or regional, is an endeavor you simply have to say you've done it or you'll always question whether you were good enough (or not) to have competed. I think that's the nature of a truly competitive bowler.

What surprises me (and saddens me a little) are all of the remarkably talented guys and gals who have the talent but choose not to go out on Tour because there simply isn't enough money there to make it worth the risk. When I worked in Texas, I worked alongside guys like Derek Eoff and Bryan O'Keefe. These guys are insanely talented, yet neither of them have ever really made a go of the Tour on a full-time basis. I'm envious as all get out because if I had 1/2 of their talent, I'd love to give it a shot; however, they're wise enough to realize that it isn't worth it in the long run these days because the money just isn't there. It's a sad reality.

It goes more than just that. There was the time when there were all of these remarkably talented guys and gals who had the talent but chose not to go out on the Tour because there was more money to make in the amateur tournaments than there was on the tour. Guys like Patrick Allen, Pat Healey, Jr., Paul Renteria, and many others chose not to go out on the tour because in tournaments like the Hi-Roller, the Mini and International Eliminator tournaments, and the True Amateur Challenge, the top prize in some of those tournaments was the amount they advertised, in addition to the breakdown of the payouts when it got to match play.

It was when either those tournament organizers changed the rules that you saw those guys transition over to the PBA tour.. some of them then saw how it was starting to go downhill, then shifted their view overseas.

So when you see all these bowlers head to the Japan Cup, and you see the payout that is occurring there, it really makes you wonder, because while people here in the US think that bowling is a dying sport, it is thriving everywhere else in the world.

BL.

In any era, there has only been a small number in relation to all the bowlers out on tour who have made a decent living at it. These days, that number just happens to be even smaller along with the fewer opportunities that are available.