So, after Mushtare and anyone else who has bowled unopposed and achieved perfection we now have the USBC in their infinite wisdom allowing a team to request to bowl unopposed in Team event and they run away with the title. When will these brilliant leaders of ours get their heads out of their rumps and stop this practice?

Edited on 8/14/2007 2:35 PM

I just read the article covering this in Bowlers Journal.  No rules were broken, true, but Bryon Smith sounded a little ridiculous in his defense of it.  He takes two teams every year, bowls one on the 2:30 squad, and one on the 8 pm squad, this is supposedly so the people going with him don't wind up getting each other in brackets, ok, fine.  Then he sees the "2:30 team" not doing well, because the other team on their pair was "playing the lanes wrong", so he doesn't want that happening to his late team, so he asks if they can be moved to a pair with nobody else on it if one is available.  USBC agrees and they are moved.  Now he says he just asked an innocent question, not knowing the rule on it, and they really just went there to have fun, and play some golf, never actually expecting to win it.  
Let me get this straight......a former touring pro takes two teams, puts them on separate squads so they don't face each other in brackets, is frustrated that the other team on the early squad played the lanes wrong, asks to be moved to another pair, so they'll have the pattern all to themselves, and all they wanted to do was have fun, and play some golf? I don't think I'm buying that, it's a little rich for me.  Just say that what he did was within the rules, and he saw an opportunity and took advantage of it, the BS defense comes off as a little sappy.

Granted, the article did not say that Smith put the teams together, and if I implied that in my response I apologize for that.  He was the captain and the one who asked the question of USBC to see if there were lanes available that did not have teams bowling on them.  I also do not blame Smith or team Lava Lanes for the problem, they took advantage of a rule that was not in place that should have been.  This is clearly USBC not having all of their bases covered, and allowing a really bad situation to take place.  I wonder if I had made this same request if it would have been granted......probably not, Bryon Smith....sure no problem Mr. Smith.  Sad governing body we have.