I see on CBS sports network pba has a tour finals event round 1.  Is that live.  If not when did they do the matches.

That's my point.  10 years on tour with multiple titles and he probably didn't make 300K during that time.  The other tough thing is that, unlike golf, there is no real way to make a decent livelihood in the game after a successful tour run. 

Nobody is forced to bowl on Tour.  It's an alternative for the guys allergic to work.

If someone spends 10 years bowling and doesn't figure out what they are going to do when they get done then they are just not very smart.  And if they spend 10 years and aren't at least making some get a head in life money they spent 7 years to long doing it. 

Heck probably in 5 years a person will be able to make more money playing some bowling e-sport (fapping motion) video game than the real thing sadly.  Bless those Millennial hearts.

That's already the case. Maybe not with bowling just yet, but probably.


https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/gaming/2017/06/21/professional-esports-becoming-more-lucrative/413662001/

The $50k mark isn't even close.  Try 75 or 80 to compare it to earning $40k at regular job.

Expenses.  Entry fees, hotel, food, rental car, flights, gas, drilling fees, transport fees.  Back when there was 30-35 events a year guys would average about $1000 a week in expenses.  And that is on the cheap side.  There were guys that definitely spent more.

Except all the money stats for recent years include the WBT, regionals, sr and sr regionals.  The PBA does everything it can to make the numbers look better than they really are.   

Ask somebody like Mike Devaney how PBA life as a two time champion was when he didn't even have enough money to get to Detroit for a guaranteed check.

Expenses.  Entry fees, hotel, food, rental car, flights, gas, drilling fees, transport fees.  Back when there was 30-35 events a year guys would average about $1000 a week in expenses.  And that is on the cheap side.  There were guys that definitely spent more.

 
Exactly. More for fun than anything else, I do the PBA50 swing in Las Vegas every year. It's turning into more of a "Hall of Fame" swing for the guys who camped out on PBA telecasts in the late 90's.
 
There is no real money in these events. What you can make at the Sr. US Open and the Sr. US Masters was a monthly paycheck at my day job before I retired. I wonder if most of these guys have been reduced to scraping a living in proshops and giving lessons is all that they have left.
 
It's not a fairytale ending.....