Ebonite man

I had the luck of the draw tonight getting 27-28 as the pair to finish the first half. The team we were bowling against had only 2 bowlers show up out of 4, so it was looking good for the team. Practice went fairly well, but did show signs of carrydown (already?!). The oil pattern also did not resemble a typical house shot as the outside bump area was not there. It played alot more like the PBA Viper pattern with a bit more length. Having said that, this was probably the worst night of carry I have had all season. I didn't miss the pocket until the 1st frame of the 3rd game and you sure wouldn't have guessed that by the scoring pace. Left a ringing 10 on the first ball of the night and of course, I whiffed it. Didn't miss another one the rest of the night, though. Left a 4-9 and pocket 4-10??? to finish with only a 194. The second game was looking better, but a potential 9 bagger was broken up by a ripping 7 and a couple of solid 10s. After the team lost the first game by a close margin, I had a chance to win it with the first two strikes in the tenth. I was sitting on a 168 in the 7th with a double working. Made what I thought was one of the best shots of the night only to leave a ripping 7-10. Myself and a couple of guys on the league like to refer to this split as the "Chris Barnes". The reason for this is that it seems like the worst possible break happens to him at the most critical time causing him to lose the match as was the case for my team after this shot. The result was a 224 and a team loss by 24 pins. The start of the third game showed the heads drying up. I had been throwing the Mutant Cell up to that point and switched to the Virtual Energy. Carry did not improve resulting in a 215 and the team being swept. This was a real disappointing night considering the team hadn't been swept all half and the ball reaction/pin carry was so poor. Not to mention getting beat by a team that had only 2 bowlers!! Ended with a 633 series and a final 216 first half average. I also noticed that the pairs on either side of mine had very low scoring paces. A lot more splits were being left, especially the guys that threw the big hooks were leaving a lot of 2-4-10s and 2-8-10s. Washouts were also quite common. Maybe the house decided to change their shot and lower the ratio. We'll see next week as 25-26 is on deck. This pair is probably the toughest, so this will be a huge test.