In regards to saving the PBA / growing the PBA I really don't know if there is much that can actually be done. I know a few ideas were brought up, but I just don't know if this will actually work out...
Youth Bowling: While I agree that there needs to be more of a focus on younger bowlers I just don't see how it can actually be done. In regards to elementary age kids there are a few issues; First, with this age group you are essentially competing with youth basketball, football, little league, swimming, and a wide variety of other activities for two days worth of time. Week days are not set up to have any of these activities for kids with their school schedules and parent's work schedules. The other issue with week days is that a lot of these other activities do not require transportation to participate; basketball, baseball, and even football can be played right at the school while bowling would require transportation to be set up. In middle and high schools you have a high volume of places, such as Arizona where I'm from, where there isn't bowling teams at school and I don't see money being spent to start these programs when districts are looking to cut spending.
Television: I believe that the PBA is very fortunate to still be on ESPN and it is so far away from getting to ABC/NBC/CBS/FOX that I don't think that should be the discussion. Also with the networks you have the following things to compete with; ABC - NBA and College Football, NBC - Sunday Night Football, NHL Contract and Notre Dame, FOX - MLB Contract and NFL Contract, CBS - PGA Tour and NFL Contract. Week nights are not an option because these networks would want to focus on their series. Bowling is too far of a repitition program to move the needle for the common television watcher. Also, with the March Madness format, if you assume each match to take 15 minutes of television time you are looking at over 45 - 22 minute programs (when you factor in commercials) or 10 - 2 hour programs for a single tournament to show the results (this adds to the endorsement risk I explain below because the people being endorsed have more of a chance to not get exposure). I don't know if people are going to follow this program for the "stories", reality television is dime a dozen and plenty of programs fail each year; also what happens when this idea fails and ESPN finds out that there is more of a market for another sport.
Tour: I don't think you can get rid of the tour for a more widespread tournament set-up. I agree that you may want to add an additional USBC Masters type tournament but not to replace the PBA tour. The modification of having centers choose two bowlers will also kill your premium leagues due to good bowlers spreading around to get in this tournament; Two years ago one of our premium leagues had Andrew Cain (USBC President), Josh Blanchard (PBA Pro), Brett Wolfe (Former Masters Champion), and Chris Klerk all on the same team - this does not include Michael Haugen Jr. (PBA Pro), Ben Laughlin (Made telecast this year), and other Regional champions...these elite leagues would be more difficult to create under this system.
Endorsements: With the larger tournament you will not get better endorsements, you may create a system of many smaller endorsements that will actually squeeze out your top pros. Companies will be much less likely to pay significant money to pros with the risk of a Tom Daugherty shooting 100 and not making it past the first round - wasting a fair chunk of change.
The Top Heavy Tournament: The 100,000 player format for a top heavy tournament is anything but free. You may only look at an entry fee being free, but if you have multiple days/weeks of bowling you must factor in travel, hotel, food, wages missed out on, etc. This format would be far from free and could actually be a huge risk for the person who bubbles in this tournament.
A side note: Let's not bash on Jason Belmonte's style as being an inferior form of bowling...to be that accurate while throwing two handed is amazing. If you don't think he is accurate just look at this spare shooting.
Sorry for the long post and I hope Aslan doesn't think I was attacking his post, it was a good structure so I used it.
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