A league outing that would be good to forget..........

[Hammer]

League day was a disaster for two of my teammates. Their averages are 129 and 135. Mine is a 161. I bowled a 176, 162 and a 208. That last game of mine was shot with a little bit of anger. My two teammates had more opens then marks. The team that we were bowling we were spotting them 83 pins. Now we all know that when you spot a team that many pins then everyone better bowl their average at least. If you don't and the team with 83 pins given to them from the start bowls good then you are in trouble.

Well my two teammates kept telling me that they were sorry that they couldn't help me. I told them to not worry about it. I was just trying to bowl the best I could so maybe we could win at least one game. Well we won the last game only because we all marked in the tenth frame. My one partner had a spare and a 9 count on his last ball and the other finally got two strikes and a 8 count on his last ball. I had a good game going with one open and a spare in the ninth and then two strikes and an eight count on my last ball. If that didn't happen in the 10th frame then we would have lost that game also.

Both of my teammates were really down on themselves. They kept apologizing to me for not helping me. I just told them to not worry about it. I was just glad that I was bowling decently. Actually we should have won the three games and the series but my two teammates were not even getting close to their averages. We lost the series by 17 pins. That means that if just one of us had and extra spare with a 9 count after that spare we would have taken the series plus the last game that we did win. Those 83 pins extra we gave to the other team hurt us this day. I was glad that all three games that I had were over my average. Well better luck next time for us. Let's sweep this time out under the rug more or less.

[Ryster]

83 pins isn't that bad. It has been a while since I bowled handicap leagues, but it wasn't unusual for our team at the time to spot other teams anywhere from 150-300 pins per game. Spotting the other team the equivalent of an additional bowler rolling a perfect game was frustrating at times. The team getting pins would then complain all night that they should be getting more handicap. And for some reason, the other team would always have their season high games and series when bowling against us.

Interestingly enough, there was always a proposal at the beginning of the season to change the handicap percentage from 90% to 100%. It was always struck down. One year, a bowler proposed going to 80% and that also got struck down. The high average bowlers argued that 100% handicap wasn't fair for them, and the casual bowlers argued that 80% wasn't fair for them. So 90% was always the "happy medium". I have been bowling scratch for a while now and cringe at the thought of going back to handicap leagues. However, word on the street is that our scratch league will not be returning next season because our Bowlero doesn't want to give us our usual day and time anymore [we are taking lanes away from the potential for them to earn more from open bowlers.] We are the only scratch league in the center these days. That means I may have to find a spot on a handicap league on some other night next season.