Howard was talking to one of the head guys at the PBA.
Howard questioned why the Professional Bowling Association would make the lanes difficult to bowl on by varying the oil content from one area of the lane to the other.
The guy asked if Howard would rather see all the Pros bowl 300 almost every game or would he like to see a more competitive game?
Did the Pros on the Tour really become that good?
Here’s a ten-year-old article from the New York Times that ascribes the increase in 300 scores even among amateurs to “NASA-like advances in bowling-ball technology and the more liberal application of lubricants upon lane surfaces.”
The pros have always been that good. Now, however, the bowling balls are so much better (in terms of reliable hooking and impact on the pins), the lanes are so much better (in terms of repeatable/reliable action), and modern automatic pin spotters have become so much more accurate (they’ll always put that 3-pin down riiiight there) that much of the randomness is gone and something has to be done to make things more difficult for those really good folks.
For 150-average bowlers like me, though, the game’s still plenty tough even with the easier oil patterns that the alleys typically put down for us.
They need to implement a five drink minimum. You know, like recreational bowling.
Even though this was a legitimate General Question, The Game Room is probably a better place. So, moved. Great info, guys.
samclem Moderator, GQ
I hadn’t been bowling in about 15 years, until a month ago. On the very first game, I beat my old high score by 17 pins (158 to 175). I don’t know how much credit goes to the equipment, though; I used a house ball and roll it dead straight.
I’ve been a couple times since, and rolled a 173 last week. I’d kinda like to learn to throw a hook.
I have a 75 average. Bowling is hard.
Palooka, my game gets better as I drink.
There’s your problem. You need your own ball with a “reactive” surface. For not a whole lotta dough, you can get a ball that will hook like crazy - today’s balls will hook even if you drop it down a kiddie ramp.*
Then, once you’re good with that, you’ll probably want a non-reactive “straight-shooter” for picking up spares. Or, if you get really good, skip that as you’ll be rolling 300s.
I poked around on the web a little, and a bowling ball certainly wouldn’t break the bank. (Even found a particular one I liked.) It’s hard to justify spending anything on a game I didn’t play for fifteen years, though, and the options of drilling patterns and such made my head spin.
Now see, that’s the issue. The lanes are consistent, the pins are consistent, the balls are consistent. I’m not. I roll the ball straight and it still doesn’t go over the same spot twice. (I must be better than I once was, though.)
Obviously, for a hook there must be some side spin when you release the ball, but that straight-rolling motion feels very natural to me. I watched a video during my surfing; a how-to on throwing a hook. He showed how to change your grip, and that was it. There’s got to be more to throwing a hook than that.
Most bowling balls have a weight block in them that makes the weight uneven throughout the ball. When the holes are drilled in the right place and the ball is thrown properly, the ball will hook. If you look at a bowling ball (not usually found on kids 6 or 8 lb. balls), you’ll see a little round dot somewhere on the ball. That’s where the center of gravity is closest to the surface. The pro-shop uses that mark to determine where to drill the holes. A ball can be drilled to hook to its maximum potential or to not hook at all (useful for picking up 10-pins and on really dry lanes).
I don’t notice any of this but I primarily bowl on the Wii.
I was in your position two years ago, and the only thing that worked for me (as someone with virtually no hand-eye coordination) was using a suitcase grip.
Basically you hold the bowling ball like you’d hold a suitcase, with your thumb pointed at your body instead of at the pins. When you release the ball your thumb tends to come out first and your fingers second, promoting a (for right-handers) counter-clockwise spin on the ball. To get more counter-clockwise spin, try starting the downswing with your hand cupped slightly and then moving your fingers away from your body (and your thumb towards the floor) slightly during the release.
The suitcase grip is supposed to lessen your natural hook, but for those of us that don’t have a natural hook it seems to generate one.
My son, not a pro, has 14 “300” games. They are all at the same place, and 11 of them are on the same lane. His average in other places is around 210, but at this place it is 265. He says it is because all other places vary the oil to a greater degree and he has to learn the lanes every time.
House bowler here. Averaged roughly 210 when I bowled competitively (haven’t for awhile but plan on picking it up again soon). During high school, I traveled to a variety of different lanes. They were house conditions, but I have also bowled on many sport patterns. Sport bowling (what pros/amateur/tournaments do) is MUCH harder. This cannot be said enough. House patterns are dumbed down for a number of reasons, but competitive bowling introduces much harder conditions that are designed to cause havoc for the competitors.
My average while bowling on sport patterns was probably closer to 180ish. Bowling is not getting too easy. What has become more popular, though, is power bowling. Much like tennis and other sports, it has been decided that faster/harder/more revolutions will always win out. Common sense from a physics perspective, but it has only become popular in the past few decades. This is, of course, not universally true. Some of the all-time greats (among those, active bowlers) still practice a slow, methodical approach. The beauty is that neither is any less effective. Power bowling offers many advantages and more forgiveness, but it’s not without drawbacks.
The main difference is that the new equipment has given a much larger edge to house/league bowlers. I bet if you did some research, you would find that the average average (haha!) has gone WAY up for league bowling. Exponentially, I’d wager.
have they ever thought about increasing the length of the lanes? i mean in golf 30 years ago a 400 yard par 4 was driver 7 iron. now it would be driver and flip wedge. so golf just said ok, lets make par 4s 470 yards or so. i mean it is still driver 7 iron but the distances exacerbate any off line shot.
why couldn’t bowling do something like that? make the lane 10 feet longer (or some such number) for the pros. have different “tee boxes” based on your relative skill.
I’ve seen people do that accidentally, or quite possibly, while slightly swizzled. They picked up a ball from the rack behind the scoring table and rolled from there. Fortunately nobody was in front of them. :eek:
You’d need dedicated lanes of different lengths, or need to devise a movable pinsetter. If you tried to change the length at the approach, you’d either have people getting into the oil and smashing their heads open, or the pros are rolling through a few feet of dry and dirty floor before the ball gets to the lane.
Ultimately, IMHO, the bowling industry is trying to save itself by making bowling more fun. One way to do this is to make it easier for the Average Joe to score higher and get closer to that ultimate mark of perfection - a 300. People have fun bowling and they think “Hey, this is fun. Let’s come back next week!”
Just make 'em play candlepin bowling. No one’s ever gotten a perfect game in official play.
When the different oil patterns are in use is it announced somehow or is it up to the individual bowlers to discover what pattern was put down?
In a regular bowling alley it’s never announced because any particular alley always uses the same “house” pattern. If you want to know the specifics of a particular alley’s house oil pattern, just ask at the front desk. (I’ve never asked.)
For a PBA event (and, I assume, any lesser events) it’s always announced. If you watch one of these events on TV, the bowlers and announcers are always aware of and often discuss on-air what particular bowlers think of the pattern they’re using that day.
PBA member here. Senior events, mostly, with a couple of regular tournaments sprinkled in if they’re near my home.
While we are informed in advance of the particular pattern in use for the tournament, and the specifics of the patterns are well known to us, every house plays differently. In addition, the PBA varies the amount of oil laid on the “heads” (the front part of the lane) week to week. Therefore, the “cheetah” pattern in a house in Michigan one week can be vastly different from the same pattern the next week in Indiana.
As far as league bowling goes, yes, the combination of bowling ball technology and the house patterns has made big scores much more common. Even at the USBC Nationals, one of the toughest patterns around, scores have increased dramatically in recent years due to advances in ball technology. But I still believe that, ultimately, you can’t buy skill. There’s a lot more to our sport than just hook; lanes change as the competition progresses, and you have to be able to adjust to those changes. Yes, you can shoot 300, but if you can’t adjust, you’ll probably follow it up with a 180. And no ball, no matter how advanced or expensive, will help you with that.