New best series tonight

[boatman37]

Game 3 I was still hitting the pocket but kept leaving corner pins, including a pocket 7-10. I did pick up quite a bit of speed in game 3 to try to combat. I was in around the 10-12 board by then. Probably should have dropped down to my Igniter or moved in more

EDIT: Started trying to pay attention to my ball as it exits the deck and it was later in the night but noticed it was dropping at about the 8 pin. Looking at the videos I'm wondering if my ball isn't getting into the roll phase? If that is the case do you think a 2000 surface might have been better? I had a fresh 3000 matte on it last night (wet on the spinner)

[boatman37]

Back to last nights results. I said our opponent had the highest handicap game for the night...well we probably had 4th highest cause 3rd highest was 1195 and we had 1193 in the first game. So even having that good of a game we had it the same game our opponents had the 2nd highest handicap games of the night and later they beat that and had the highest of the night...ugh

[boomer]

I feel your pain - honestly, it feels like that all the time (not now. . . Cali is still closed for bowling)

I think a lot of it is my father-in-law - he is 87, still carries 170-180 avg and TALKS and TALKS and TALKS. If you are good, he'll talk smack. If you aren't good, he'll help. If you're right in the middle, he'll tell dirty jokes. Everyone says they love bowling against us - and I think it's true both because they enjoy him (and I'll admit, I tend to join in . . . ) but I guess we elevate the competition.

It does get old, though.

[boatman37]

Well I was consistent. Not great. Bowled my average the whole night. Not happy with that because the last month or so I'm averaging about 15 pins higher than my current average so if you look at it from that perspective I struggled. Overall I wasn't happy with my night. I struggled to find that miss room and seemed like I had to be right on to strike. My speed ranged from 13.5 at the pins to 17.5. Started the night slower but as the lanes dried I started throwing 9's and the increased speed helped stay in the pocket and with the carry. Missed some easy spares too.

Now, we bowled the first place team that had only lost 1 game this 3rd, We are in last place by quite a bit. This team is stacked and I think they have like 4 of the top 7 or 8 average bowlers on this team and the top 2 in our league are on this team. Those top 2 didn't bowl tonight. One of the other top ones pre-bowled and was slightly below his average every game. The first game we won by 14 pins. Only the 2nd game they have lost this 3rd. Game 2 they won by 11. I opened in the 10 or we would have won that one. 3rd game we got stomped. They won by 167. We were slightly below our average 3rd game but they were about 100 over theirs. Given all of that I'm happy with the way it went tonight. Just wish I would have bowled a little better. I used the Uppercut all night

[boatman37]

Another frustrating night. Wife is miserable bowling and is at the point she hates it. We all beat our averages tonight individually and we beat our team averages all 3 games but got smoked in 2 of them with the other team crushing their averages. Game 1 we beat our average by 18 but they beat theirs by 76 (we lost by 113). Game 2 we beat our average by 60 and they missed their average by 2 (we won that game by 85). Game 3 we beat our average by 32 and they beat theirs by 96 (we lost by 98). One of their guys rolled a 290 with a 193 average. We are in last by a mile. Tonight I beat my average by 14, teammate beat his by 36, another beat theirs by 6, another beat theirs by 25 and my wife beat hers by 29. So even though none of us had great games we were still over our average every game and still couldn't win.

So for me. I couldn't hit the broadside of a barn tonight. The lanes were a little dry from the start. Even inside there wasn't much oil. In warmups I had a nice line up the 10 board but then struggled to hit it once we started and had no miss room at all. I got some good carry in game 1 and ended with a 221 but then game 2 lost the pin action. Tried moving in with no luck then changed to the Igniter early in game 2. I'm not very confident in the Igniter. I can't pinpoint it but it doesn't feel quite the same and I don't get the rotation I do on the Uppercut and don't get the carry. Teammate even commented on that tonight. Early in game3 I switched back to the Uppercut and moved in a little more. At the end I made a small adjustment to come in slightly higher and struck out in the 10th. Another anomaly...a few weeks ago I left a pocket 7-10. I rarely ever leave a 7-10. I have left 7 of them in 466 games since I returned to bowling in early 2018. Well I left another tonight. Slightly light as the 5 pin almost stayed up too but fell at the last second. So now I have left 2 of them in the last 3 weeks. I may leave the Igniter home next week and maybe put the Squatch in it's place. The Squatch is a little more aggressive then the Igniter but it feels good and maybe I will take some surface off it and see how that goes. I have been tracking games on each ball and averages with each and my average is exactly 10 pins lower with the Igniter. I do understand that when I use the Igniter it is after the lanes are a little burned so have to take that into consideration but just the fact that the Igniter just feels different and I can't get near as much rotation on it bothers me.

My average is up to 194 and at this point I'm just trying to get my average to 200 before the end of the season. I averaging 208 the last 8 games on the Uppercut so I can get there. If I can fix my spare shooting it would be much easier.

[boatman37]

Rough night. Lanes were jacked. Both teams struggled. Left lane the headpin was slightly off to the left and right lane rack kept dropping pins. Not sure if that led to bad racks but strikes were very hard to come by tonight on both teams. I played from the 5 board to the 20 board and hit the pocket with no strikes. Tried 3 balls. Best luck I had was near the end of the night using my old Hammer Black Widow Gold on the 5 board with a bunch of speed. BTW-the Igniter felt and looked better with the 3000 on it.

[boatman37]

Ran into another buzzsaw. Story of our season. A 194 average kid rolled a 740 and they had another 175 average bowler roll a 630 or so. We lost all 3 by a ton

My night started good. Actually hit the pocket most of the night but left 5 7 pins, which is alot for me. I can't complain about my game as my shots looked very good. Left a few 9 pins too. Ball would brush them and they wobbled but wouldn't fall. Game 2 was a real struggle. Hit the pocket but no strikes. I tried moving in but if I missed by a little I left bad leaves.

[boatman37]

So Tuesday night is position round for the end of our 2nd 3rd. We are in last place in an 11 team league so have a 'bye' and we are far enough back that we can't move up no matter what happens.

I used to only target the 7ish board and when I tried to move in I got pretty erratic with my aim. Now I am good at the 10-12 board but anything inside of that and I get uncomfortable so my plan is to throw all 3 games inside the 12-13 board and even in tighter too. Like I said, scores won't matter because even if we win all 7 points and the 10th place team loses all 7 we will still be pretty far back. Good time for a practice session

[Ryster]

So Tuesday night is position round for the end of our 2nd 3rd. We are in last place in an 11 team league so have a 'bye' and we are far enough back that we can't move up no matter what happens.

I used to only target the 7ish board and when I tried to move in I got pretty erratic with my aim. Now I am good at the 10-12 board but anything inside of that and I get uncomfortable so my plan is to throw all 3 games inside the 12-13 board and even in tighter too. Like I said, scores won't matter because even if we win all 7 points and the 10th place team loses all 7 we will still be pretty far back. Good time for a practice session

Scores matter for average, and winning games is still important for point money at the end of the season. During sanctioned league, a bowler should always bowl to the best of their ability.

Our team already won one of the four quarters on our league earlier this season, so we are ineligible to win another quarter (a team can only win one quarter...this is how they make sure there are four teams in the finals at the end of the season). However, we still work hard to make sure we win as many games as possible for point money. After a very slow start to the third quarter we have worked our way up to the point where we are only 5 games out of first with 3 weeks left in the 3rd quarter. We started the season just trying to win a quarter. Now, it is all about point money until the finals on the last night of the league!

[boatman37]

Scores matter for average, and winning games is still important for point money at the end of the season. During sanctioned league, a bowler should always bowl to the best of their ability.

Our team already won one of the four quarters on our league earlier this season, so we are ineligible to win another quarter (a team can only win one quarter...this is how they make sure there are four teams in the finals at the end of the season). However, we still work hard to make sure we win as many games as possible for point money. After a very slow start to the third quarter we have worked our way up to the point where we are only 5 games out of first with 3 weeks left in the 3rd quarter. We started the season just trying to win a quarter. Now, it is all about point money until the finals on the last night of the league!

Oh I'm competitive and want to get my average to 200 but we have no chance of making it out of last place. I think if we even doubled our points we'd still be in last. And I'm not purposely tanking to raise my handicap. I'm still hoping for a 600 minimum but this would be a good chance to work on my weak areas.

We finished the 1st 3rd 1 point above last place and this 3rd we are so far down I don't think there is any way we could not be in last when we total up the whole season.

For this 3rd here is what we have:
1st - 64-6
2nd - 49-21
3rd - 45-25
4th - 40-30
5th - 40-30
6th - 37-33
7th - 32-38
8th - 31-39
9th - 30-40
10th - 26-44
us - 13-57

We can get 7 points/night. 2 points per game and 1 point for total score. Oddly, in the past 3 seasons my team was always around top 3 or 4 and we had 16 teams then. I have never been on a team that has been beat up this bad. Granted we lost some good bowlers due to COVID and threw some new teammates in there and my wife (106 average) so we weren't expecting to be that good.

But yeah, definitely not sandbagging, just 'practicing'. I had a mental thing about playing way outside and was erratic anywhere inside the 7 or 8 board. Worked on the 10 board and am now comfortable and consistent there but still struggle inside of there. I need to spend a night targeting the 15-20 board to get comfortable with it. I 'try' it at points through the night but throw a good one then the next misses my mark by 3 or 4 boards and we are desperate for wins so I revert back to my comfort zone. So I'm going to work on getting comfortable there and figuring that out.