Are bowling leagues promoting sandbagging and dumping ?

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Found an interesting bowling topic that we all deal with and know is going on all the time. Its so sad to admit it. - Why Do Bowling Leagues Promote SandBagging and Dumping ?
I bet we all have seen leagues do nothing at all about dumping even when they see it.

[J Anderson]

Found an interesting bowling topic that we all deal with and know is going on all the time. Its so sad to admit it. - Why Do Bowling Leagues Promote SandBagging and Dumping ?
I bet we all have seen leagues do nothing at all about dumping even when they see it.

I don't think that leagues promote sandbagging, at least not on purpose.

One part of the problem is that even the casual leagues that are more social than competitive have become money leagues. The leagues where your reward was a trophy are becoming a thing of the past. When money is on the line, the temptation to cheat becomes greater.

Another part is that usually secretary and treasurer are often the only officers who know what their job entails. The others don't have a clue as to what they could be doing to cut down on sandbaggers.

Thirdly, its very difficult to prove that someone is deliberately bowling less than their true ability.

[e-tank]

^^

agreed. My league is a fun league but we do a sweeper for money and sure enough the biggest sandbagger in our league won the pot last time

[billf]

Well in the year between your posts this topic was discussed extensively. Your idea to help stop this atrocity?

[swingset]

As long as I've lived I've never understood handicaps in the game of bowling....or in any sport for that matter. The score is the score, deal with it. Don't like losing? Get better.

I can't imagine my experiences with football, or wrestling, or baseball if my skill had been put on a curve and points were given automatically to people with lower scores.

I can't change the tradition, but I've always been in favor of abandoning that silly point system for scratch scoring. Unfortunately, because bowling for so many is considered a quasi-gambling recreation, it's here to stay.

And, with it comes sandbagging and other manipulations. I guess actions have consequences.

[Greenday]

Scratch bowling is the only way to avoid sandbagging. Now that I've gotten my average above 200, it kills me to bowl against a two man team and give up nearly 100 pins to handicap. Then when one of those 150 average bowlers bowls a 230, the game is over no matter what my partner and I do. What incentive does someone in my position have to not sandbag? I'm not good enough to win a scratch league but handicaps can be a huge unfair advantage for the lower average players.

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with bowling being just a math game, its easy for these dumpers to take advantage and even abuse the system to make money. I have seen them say they will re-rate a bowlers average if they believe his average is fake. I have never seen it happen yet in all the years i am bowling. I my vacation league they let a lady come in with a summer average, which that is never allowed. The average she sad she had was 81. She goes on to shot 630 scratch and her team ends up going undefeated for the like 8 weeks. That is pretty hard to overcome.

[billf]

^^^that is some BS right there and shouldn't have happened. Those league officers should be ashamed of themselves! Now I understand your frustration.
I rolled an 800 two weeks ago and we still lost. My team had a lot more scratch pins but not total w/hdcp

[Gunny]

It's part of the game now, some people do it, and some don't. If you want to compete in a hdcp league, your gonna have to play the game accordingly. Otherwise bowl in scratch leagues. What some of our league has done to minimize it, was to implement a 10 pin drop rule. Throughout the course of a season your avg will never drop below your highest book avg. that you entered with. Keeps the baggers in check.

[billf]

Here's a funny one for you.
A guy in my scratch league openly says he sandbags because State uses handicap. Carries a 198 avg into State and gets into 20 brackets saying how he was going to clean up. I knocked him out of five brackets the first game, Derrick got him out of two the second game and in game three I knocked him out of another six. He did win one bracket. Money for 20 brackets= $100 money won $20 serves him right!