"Bowling Blind"

PBA Tour

'Choog'in Along

For roughly 24 hours, I was searching for ways to describe what I saw this past Sunday on the Big Wood PBA Tour when suddenly it me: no, not an idea but a flat tire on the Long Island Expressway while driving my sister and her friends to the teen center. My sister had already driven me nuts by oversleeping in the morning and missing the bus for school along with her friend who was staying over for the week at our house (aptly nicknamed "Ashton's Palace"). Then I do the big brother thing and pick her up from school after my bowling instruction lesson and there she comes waiting for her friend...and another friend that I had not known was joining them this afternoon. Perhaps the extra baggage in the vehicle was too much for the Silver Bullet (my '01 Sentra) to handle as the left front took a bump and went limp on me quicker than a sailboat on a calm, sunny day.

This past Sunday's Chameleon Championship was much like this afternoon for me in that I got more than i bargained for and most I did not like and wish did not happen, although in the end you felt as if the outcome you anticipated all day long was going to happen. That outcome Sunday was the official coming out party for Billy O'Neill winning his first career title. After coming within one shot of taking down the great Walter Ray Williams Jr. (Hall of Famer and bowling ambassador as you all well know), this was going to be the week where O'Neill would take his spot among the elite and become a PBA champion. Usually tournament leaders in the stepladder format do not fail at sealing the deal unless circumstances of an extreme nature take place and one of the major factors I always consider is can the guy at the bottom of the ladder complete all the steps and get so much momentum that he is unstoppable? In the case of Mike Machuga, I was proven right. Machuga was seeded 5th in what was supposed to be a 4 man stepladder final only extreme circumstances necessitated such a change.

On Friday night, a scoring malfunction had Sean Rash (Sunday's #4 seed) bowling in the position round against the wrong player. It was nothing of Rash's doing at all nor was it of Machuga's doing-merely an honest mistake made by the PBA. However, honest mistakes are one thing...not giving both players the opportunity to bowl would have been another thing. Rash was supposed to bowl where he was supposed to bowl, same with Machuga but mistakes happen and Rash after seeing the mishap and knowing full well what he needed to bowl to advance to the show did enough to knock Machuga out of the final 4 (and by one pin no less). The PBA made thr right call and Machuga took care of the rest going through Rash, then Brain Kretzer, then Wes Malott, and then finally past O'Neill to win his second career title.

As for Bill O'Neill, he has now had 3 runner-up finishes in his career and in the last two weeks has had the tournament in his own hands both times, only to make a late game error and lose the match. While last week, losing to Walter Ray is no shame he had a chance to put a player who has never been a great closer in Williams on the hot seat to try and win (yeah, I forgot to mention that in my Walter Ray Haterade blog of last week-if you can keep up with WRW for 8 frames, he will get fast with a shot and go plack 10 and you can sneak in the backdoor and win) and O'Neill went 2-4-8-10. A week later, title in his grasp late spot in the 8th frame...2-8-10. Amazingly, O'Neill still had a chance to win his first title outright with a double in the 10th frame and failed to do so. Machuga stepped up and showed you how winners win: clutch double in the 10th for the money.

This show turned out to be the flat tire on the expressway for O'Neill in that no matter what the expectations were, something happened along the way to change the result which leads me into one of the major thoughts of this blog: for all of Billy O'Neill's great amateur and collegiate accomplishments before coming out on tour, where has the major breakthrough come for him? In 4 remarkable seasons at Saginaw Valley State, O'Neill never won a national championship and only came sniffing near one once in his senior year where Rhino Page and Kansas got in his way. In 4 years on tour, still no wins and two mini meltdowns when he had a chance at the title. Look, this is not a blast on O'Neill or me being harsh on him not winning but eventually, the label begins to be etched on your forehead, "yes he throws it great, but...".

The label grew on Chris Barnes and his failure to win a major and still hangs over his head to this day despite winning a pair of majors. When the great college players make headway on the PBA Tour, much is expected of them from the start because bowling fans want to get get behind a player from the start and root for him. The only way that anyone will root for a player is if they can win and prove to fans that they are on that winning level. Rash has won, Page has won, even Machuga is from the great stable of college players of this generation has won twice, O'Neill has not yet. Here is hoping that he does because when you watch him bowl, he can get crazy hot and run through people unlike most in this sport. I do root for him but until you change the flat tire, it will stay flat.

Some other observations about yesterday:

1) The Rash Aura is weakening: for the second consecutive time on television, Rash looked tight, he looked nervous, and looked uncertain in his approach to bowling. It showed on the scoreboard in losing to Machuga in the first match in which Rash rolled 3 suspect strikes and balked again. Say what you will about Rash and whether fans like him or not, he is a great mark for bowling: polarizing. Fans like him or hate him, there is very little grey area with Rash. But one part of being good on TV is swagger. Tommy Jones has the swagger on TV that you wish most young players had to where they ran through people. Rash appeared to be heading that way but has looked very tight the last few times out and with that, looks to be beatable as opposed to when he just running through people on TV.

2) Malott-a advertising: my buddy and Monday night teammate, Mike Boble noticed Wes Malott's nice racing shirt Sunday. Big Wes is well a big guy, to which he had Office Space type 'flare' all over the shirt. He has his Roto Grip shirt with the big Roto star right in the middle, the new Cell Pearl bowling ball, Vise grip patches on his right chest and left arm, on his right arm was the PBA Tour patch, the 50th Anniversary patch, and had his shoe sponsor, Etonic on both arms and on the back of his shirt. I was almost expecting Malott to hop out of a race car with his pit crew. I jokingly talk about that but did you happen to see the oversized check Jimmie Johnson was carrying around winning his 3rd straight NASCAR championship? Johnson made over 7 million dollars this year driving in left circles...yes, seven million bucks. I can't help but be dumbfounded by it but this is where you can start seeing the paralles between Walter Ray and bowling as opposed to Dale Earnhardt in car racing. What Earnhardt did for the sport of racing by selling his name and promoting himself to polarizing levels (he was hated by many in the sport), he became a far greater name than anyone in the sport and the future generation has followed suit and are now making millions a year with sponsors all over everything on their car and fire suits as well as their signature on anything that cannot be bolted down. On the bright side, Walter Ray sells RV's...

3) Machuga Maturation: the Chameleon pattern lended itself to playing the inside line all week long and Mike Machuga went into TV Sunday with a plan: play from out, carve it from out, work a shot from out and stick with it. It was a performance worthy of his bowling buddies Norm Duke and Brian Voss in that he gutted out a victory when it appeared that he was going to lose. Back to back opens early in the championship match to O' Neill while Billy O started out with 3 out of 4 strikes could have ended Machuga's day. However, all those late night talks with Duke and some Marlboro Reds in the hotel room (and other things perhaps...) paid off for Machuga in the title match. Playing the gutter shot, he carved out a performance worthy of Duke or David Ozio when he was the master of the gutter shot. It appeared that Machuga was going to have to move away from the gutter yet he did not and prevailed by getting the big time double that he needed to win.

4) Ladies...: Just two events in, the Women's Series has kinda been rather unexciting so far. Michelle Feldman has made both shows and won Sunday over a rather unimpressive Jody Woessner, after Feldman came up short against Stefanie Nation two weeks ago. Feldman has found her groove bowling with the men in the midst of the Women's Series. Her power game has become very transparent bowling alongside with the men so far and she has been able to run away from her fellow females when the lanes require an inside line. Feldman can be very exciting if she is on striking and ripping racks and taking women's bowling to another level but so far, she has been off in her TV appearances. Yes, she did win but in the process missed two single pin spares making what should have been a runaway a match to where she needed to make marks late in the match to hold off Woessner. If the Women's Series is to take off into new heights and make women's bowling seem relevant again (past college), it will need Feldman to be a monster on the lanes as well as its other top stars in Carolyn Dorin-Ballard, Nation, Diandra Asbaty, and Joy Esterson to make splashes on television in ways they did last year. So far, the heat is not there yet but with five events left, you hope that a storyline comes out of the Women's Series instead of women just bowling for no good reason.

College

Next Week: No PBA blog on high scores (the Ultimate Scoring Championship), but it is time to bring the college game back into the forefront next week with the Lady Hawk Classic November 21-23, held at Millsboro Lanes in Millsboro, Deleware. Bring the kiddies to this wonderul shore resort town...in the middle of fall, right before Thanksgiving where lakes turn into ice rinks and the sun sets around 4:30 in the afternoon...better yet, watch some bowling then go watch some Ohio State football ass-whuppin on That Team Up North.

About the Editor: Tommy Scherrer (that's me) is one of the night managers-a far more fancier term for 'Shift Leader'-at AMF Syosset Lanes. A former student at William Paterson in Wayne, NJ as well as a former member of the Pioneer bowling team for 4 years, he is a regular contributor to the pockets of many great players and on occasion, will actually make his money back generally in marathon tournaments.