The effect and benefits of getting "a line to yourself" during league play.

[Aslan]

I've always been rather skeptical when people talk about other people "chewing up their line" or "defensive bowling". It seems like the small area where a ball makes contact with the lane…and the rather "dense" material of a bowling ball…you can't really do THAT much damage.

Well, I bowled my best league series Friday and one thing I noticed post-game is…I sort of had a line to myself…which probably helped keep my shots rather repeatable.

2 Teams: 5 players per team

Team 1 (my team): 3 right-handed/2 left-handed.

I am the only stroker of the two righties and tend to play the 8-board. The 2nd righty is a "big hook" kinda player…almost thumbless…so his ball only crosses my line 2 times briefly. The 3rd righty is a girl and she plays a straight shot with a Columbia WD…so more up the 15-board.

Team 2: 3 lefties/2 righties

Their 2 righties, both women, play a straight line approach similar to the 3rd right on our team…right up the 10-17 boards.

So with HALF the 10 players playing the LEFT side of the alley…and 3 of the righties playing boards 10-17…that gave me and the other righty on our team "lines to ourselves". He played a big inside to outside arc….that crossed my line in 2 places…but didn't burn it up much.

Lets just say he and I, who are #2 and #3 in average respectively (of the 10 players)….we had the best 2 series. We both finished right around 550 for the night. We both were about 10 pins under our average in game #1, but he finished with a 190 and 200 effort and I finished with a 213 and 182 effort to end the night.

Meanwhile…THEIR top player (a lefty with a 173 average…5 pins above our best and 10 pins above me) started out with a 215 effort (best score in game #1)….but then struggled in games 2 and 3.

So even though thats a "microcosm" and by no means a statistically significant sampling; it's a rather simple example that someone could use to show how other bowlers bowling on your line can often lead to worse and worse scores as the night progresses. In this example, the best bowler (in terms of average) bowled only 3rd best as he had 2 other players from his own team playing his line…and 2 of our players playing "close" to his line. It was undoubtedly frustrating for a lefty to have so many lefties bowling with/against you.

[RobLV1]

Having your own line is less important that where that line is in relation to the other bowlers. The higher the other bowler's averages are, the more important it becomes. Last week during the doubles league that I bowl with my wife, she commented that the better bowler on the other team was playing my life. I told her that I, in fact, had chosen my line based on where I saw him playing during the 10 minutes of practice. On a house shot, the most important thing is finding some oil on each part of the lane. Finding friction on a house shot is the easy part; it's to your right on the outside part of the lane. As long as you can keep oil to your left and friction to your right, you'll be successful. It's when the condition provides friction on your right, and someone else's line creates friction on your left, that you are going to struggle, for the simple reason that now you have to be perfect. Make sense?

Rob Mautner

[Mudpuppy]

I pretty much have the lane to myself every week being left handed. Occasionally I run into left handers as well - my Tuesday league has a few. But I generally do not notice any difference either way. I think people (mostly right handers) put too much emphasis on people playing their line or whatever and it becomes a mental distraction more than anything - or an excuse (and trust me everyone is looking for any and all excuses in this world of zero accountability) for why they missed a shot or are bowling bad. Just throw the ball and shut the pie hole. That works more often than not.