Go RVing Match Play Championship

Barnes....Williams...it's the PBA on ESPN (cue the John Tesh music). Wait, what? That was the NBA on NBC? Sorry, folks.


12:55 PM: Quick cutaway from Baseball Tonight to Chris Barnes throwing a practice shot. Looked like he struck, he fist pumped. Nothing like a practice shot and a fist pump.

12:57: Old School PBA clip with Tommy Jones in his Buddy Holly glasses...and he must have stopped at Denny's before the video shoot. Damn, Thomas.

1:00: Dicky V!!! It's Awesome baby...with a capital A!

1:01: Rob Stone giving us the rundown and then Randy Pedersen chimes in with his observation: he feels like Barnes has a huge advantage with the multiple patterns and the fact that he has rolled to 4 straight Extreme Swing telecasts. Quick cut to last night's action between Williams and Chris Loschetter then Barnes and Mike Wolfe. The exhibition those two put on last night was amazing. Barnes shot 824 for 3 games on two different patterns.

1:04: WRW has got a lime green MoRich shirt with what appears to be polka-dots, Barnes is in his usual Lance Armstrong biker shirt. Stone misspeaks by saying that this is the 4th time these two have bowled for a title. This is actually only the second time they have bowled on TV for a title and the 4th time, period.

1:08: I always feel like...somebody's WATCHIN MEEEEE! Geico: so easy, a wad of money and googly eyes can do it.

1:09: The chess match on the lanes...the Chameleon on the left, Cheetah on the right. Both players plan to play up the rail. Walter does just that: RED BALL UP 5!!!

1:11: Barnes with a can opener strike to start, then dribbles, shoots, and scores on the left lane.

1:12: Hey, look. Barnes pulled a shot...what a shocker that was. Big 4 and the first open of the match.

1:14: Walter Ray....HAMBONE. Or an opening 4 bagger (well said, Rob Stone). Then he packs another strike for 5 in a row.

1:16: Barnes strikes on the left lane with the Resurgence. Amazing how many miles that ball still has on it. Arguably the ball that saved Columbia 300. My girlfriend and I are discussing the bowling ball, saying how that ball tore up oil patterns in college (and still does as she bowls for Vanderbilt, as most of you know), but how she never could get a good feel for it.

1:20: Walter Ray with a humbling career review in comparison to Earl Anthony saying that was Earl did was much more impressive as he now has 7 in a row.

1:21: Barnes spares then strikes and flat out cannot hang with Williams if the outside is playing that well. As Williams trips the 4 pin for 8 in a row. Crowd isn't even jacked up.

1:22: Now 9 in a row...you almost had a feeling something like this might happen today with these two and the friction zone to the right.

1:24: Barnes is Noble sign...very creative. Barnes changes balls again, really trying to max out his look on the lanes. Shoots 241. Now it is Walter...with a 7 pin...ouch. Suddenly, we have a match. Just like that. AND HE MISSED A SINGLE PIN SPARE!!! Incredible. The entire match changed. Barnes is only down 26 after one game when it looked like he'd be dead.

1:29: Nice section on youth bowling. One of the major criticisms of bowling in the last 5-10 years has been the death of junior bowling and how it has killed the adult leagues now. Tons of scholarships??? Don't think so...

1:31 Randy talks to Barnes and WRW in between games. A nice evaluation...brain fart says Williams on the whiffed 7 pin.

1:35: Lumber Liquidators...title sponsor of the PBA. Yep, I'm sold.

1:37: Barnes to start Game 2 and strikes. Barnes saw the light and is looking to explode through it. Walter on Cheetah makes a ball change and goes 2-8...something doesn't look right with him.

1:39: uh oh...uh oh...Barnes has found both lanes it would seem. He looks absolutely locked in.

1:40: Ball change for Deadeye...4-9. Misses both pins and then goes big 4 on the Chameleon. This is a fold worthy of the New York Mets bullpen...can't you just see K-Rod blowing out a vocal chord due to his excessive celebrating and being out for two months? But I digress...

1:42: And Barnes is playing the Phillies...shoot me now. Now Barnes has 5 in a row, he looks absolutely locked in. Did I already say that? Sorry, that was a "Memento" moment, except I did not need to tattoo myself with notes.

1:43: Walter Ray with the Flomax weekly update...and again goes high during the quick segment. He is having weak stream issues right now.

1:45: ESPN commerical for fantasy baseball with Alyssa Milano: the only child star that did not have a true falling out in her career in the last 25 years. Think about it very carefully and see if you can't figure out one more who accomplished that goal.

1:48: We return to Barnes now leading in the match suddenly...wow, just opened up the rack for 6 in a row. He is remarkable when he's right, now he has 7 in a row. One is thinking Barnes has started to run away and its only the middle of the match.

1:51: Now Barnes has 9 in a row...sensational. Walter Ray finally doubles in the match. I hate to say this about Williams but he has to try and alter Barnes' look instead of trying to run after him. Could he maybe move left and stay ahead of him?

1:52: Barnes takes a re-rack. Foolish of him but we'll see if it works. And yes, an SPLIT! WE still have a match! Barnes gives away roughly 30 pins back and it is now a 48 pin match after two games. That is easily doable for Deadeye to recover from.

1:56: Michelle: "I want to say this has lived up to the hype...but not entirely in a good way."
Me: "It is the beauty and the curse of these two."
Michelle: "It is."

What we mean by that is that we expect these two players to give us a thrill in good ways but they keep handing each other chances instead of just outbowling each other.

1:59: Walter Ray with Randy: he sounds boring and uncomfortable with what is going on. Barnes with Randy: he sounds relaxed and certain of his next move but yet also doesn't give you this sense of I am going to destroy Walter Ray...he stands no chance, don't miss old guy or you will lose.

2:04: They are going commerical free for the last match. Barnes has a healthy lead but we have seen him gag away healthier leads with fewer frames. Williams promptly starts with a strike. Barnes moves laterally and goes 4 pin. Back to Chameleon...bird dogs the 10 pin! OUCH!!!

2:08: Walter gets over amped and barely leaves the 10 pin. That can be his only miss of the match. Then Barnes on Cheetah goes plack 10. Now what is the move for CB on what is easily the tougher of the two lanes, amazingly, the Cheetah?

2:10: Williams makes a ball change...and strikes. WOW. Then nails on the Chameleon and strikes...look out Chris.

2:13: Barnes hasn't missed on Chameleon all day by the way. The lane he is finishing on. Williams goes 4 pin on the left lane. Where Barnes has created right, he has erased Walter's left.

2:15: Barnes' first non strike on the left lane. Now it is a 39 pin lead for Barnes. Williams still can't strike on the left lane. Barnes starts worrying about his carry. I ask you why that even came up in his mind, but that would make too much sense. It was the Chris Norry moment.

2:17: Barnes again makes a tight shot (spinchter tightening...). Leaves the 2-4-5 and makes it. Still leading...one more mark...BIRD DOGS IT FOR THE WINNA!

2:18: Barnes wins and for the first time in his career wins back-to-back events, capping off one of the greatest runs in bowling history. As for Walter Ray, he fought hard but that missed 7 pin truly was the downfall of his day. He actually won two of the three games but lost total wood by 29. 722-693, a 29 pin win for Barnes and his 12th title.

2:23: Randy and Walter Ray again after the match. Gracious as a champion, he said that Chris bowled better than he did. But his interview was telling: his game is predicated around playing straight and being accurate but the power players really force him to slow his ball speed down and rely on carry as much as his ability to throw it firm and make the pins dance.

2:28: Barnes and Pedersen interview after the last commercial break. You can tell how great his mind is when he just bowls and lets his talent take over. He gambled right on the lanes and he took away WRW's hold left. He is still alive to repeat as Player of the Year but he will need to cap off this amazing run of bowling.

"Bowling Blind"-The Exteme Swing

At long last, this is a title match...

PBA Tour

"It's About Damn Time"

Well...we have finally arrived to this moment...

It took us roughly nine long seasons to achieve this matchup for a PBA title. The bowler of the 90's, Walter Ray Williams, Jr. and the bowler of the 2000's, Chris Barnes will meet for the GoRVing Match Play Championship tomorrow afternoon in Norwich, CT. For Walter Ray, it is another notch on his legendary Hall of Fame resume to add a mixed pattern championship after the devastating, heart-stomping loss to Patrick Allen to start the second half of the season in Reno. For Chris Barnes, this is the 4th consecutive finals appearance he has made and in the fourth consecutive Extreme Swing format tournament, he has a shot at winning in what can only be described as truly the best 4 week stretch of bowling we have seen from any player in, quite possibly, the history of the sport.

Barnes in the last 4 events has thrown plastic balls, bowled on 6 different patterns in 5 days, navigated through an eliminator mega-bucks style format, and now through an all match play format. The last two he has bowled on have had the mixed patterns and in case anyone forgot, Barnes has made two other shows this half on the first mixed pattern event and then the Dick Weber Open and its difficult lane pattern. To review, Barnes has made 6 shows the second half of the season on fourteen patterns. Are you kidding me??? In the annals of PBA history, we may never know how good this run by Barnes is only because...we have nothing to base this performance on.

The PBA has never attempted to showcase its best players in tournaments that have truly tested their overall game. For years, the game had been the same: 42 games, 18 in qualifying, 24 round-robin matches, stepladder for the final 5 in a 90 minute telecast. Admittedly, it got kinda boring to watch and this a bowling fan talking, wondering how those in charge of the PBA didn't feel like changing things up every now and then to see if maybe a novelty could become standard. Things changed in the 2001-02 season with single elimination match play. Best of 5 and best of 7 matches in head-to-head competition with the finalists bowling on the show. Fans were able to make believe for a moment and see possible rivalries develop and get emotionally invested. Supporting their favorite player of players compete against guys that they didn't like or hated in some cases to develop an emotional investment in the product so that they would camp their behinds on their sofa and watch the telecast on Sunday, or buy tickets to the local event, or possibly go bowl with their favorite players in a pro-am or two during the week to establish a following with bowling.

There was hope...but hope sometimes can dangle on a string like slow spinning redemption and in the case of the PBA, it could never get a true desired rivalry for its fans to get behind.

Walter Ray vs. Pete Weber, you say???

Fans forget that a rivalry must have both sides that can win and must both be presented as winners. While Walter Ray beat Weber from pillar to post every time they bowled, Weber became more and more less over with the fans as the man. If you can't beat the great Williams at any point on television, then are you worth the hype? The answer is no way.

Ryan Shafer vs. Norm Duke???

Not even worth mentioning as a rivalry. Duke has embarrassed Shafer in his career on TV so much so to where Shafer has basically had a Hall of Fame career denied thanks to one man alone.

Barnes vs. Tommy Jones???

Really....? Guys, Jones has whacked Barnes like the Wall Street Journal does to a housefly.

The only rivalry that came out of the match play format was Patrick Allen and Mika Koivuniemi, much of it due to Mika's audacity calling himself "Left Hander's Wurst Nightmare" and PA beating him in that classic US Open match where they went to a sudden-death roll-off to where Allen yelled out to the Jersey crowd that it was a new season and a different outcome. Other than that, they haven't had enough head-to-head matches to truly have anything long lasting on TV.

What about Barnes vs. Williams???

Ah, the rivalry that never was. If you do your homework, these two players have only met for a title once and it was a major, the 2004 ABC Masters. It was fun to watch as a fan. Barnes was still throwing Brunswick and wearing shirts with the American flag and eagle on it. Walter Ray still has his full beard and only had 38 titles at the time. It was great to watch arguably the two finest players in the world go strike for strike on the shortest pattern in tour history at 34 feet. The only poor shot thrown was by Barnes late in the title match as Walter Ray was charging close to a perfect game in a major tournament. It showed two things to me: 1) Walter Ray was still a factor in bowling and in the big events where Barnes was making common occurrences and 2) we would get to see this a few more times in the coming years. Five years later...

Here we stand today and we have been waiting a long time for this moment to come around. Walter Ray vs. Barnes. The two players that have come to define the beauty of bowling and its curse in the last 20 years. The smartest player to ever bowl against the most talented and dedicated bowler ever. Also the greatest rivalry that never was in bowling history. The possible passing of the torch that never came around. They have three games tomorrow to show us their smarts and their talents by themselves and for a title.

Gentlemen...make us proud.

"Bowling Blind"-The Exteme Swing

Etonic Marathon Open

For all fellow readers who were waiting for my predictions on the Etonic Marathon Open last week, I apologize for my computer's strange tendency not to upload this page and thus providing anything relevant rather well...irrelevant. So without further ado, I give you a little subtitled list I like to call "26.2 Reasons to Love the EMO":

1: Welcome back David Ryan!!! Even if it was for one week, Ryan's return to the sport that helped catapult his career to such accomplishments as Little League Baseball, D-3 football, and some strange version of Japanese military training was a great sight for the bowling fans in need of a Rob Stone Vacation. For the record, Mr. Stone now has four children and he looks like he is about 28...either he ages well or he's got some powerful pelvic muscles, but I digress.

2: Woodland Bowl: easily one of the top 5 bowling centers in the country, without a shadow of a doubt. Think about the last 10 days of bowling contested at the Woody: the Hoosier Classic with close to 80 collegiate teams and a waiting list to boot last weekend, followed by 54 games over 5 days of professional bowling this past week.

3: The city of Indy itself is a fantastic city to visit (just not in the middle of a Nor'Easter) with some great history with race car driving and bowling.

4: Those odd looking lime green tinted sunglasses Pete Weber was donning on Sunday in his latest defeat to a young player that he more or less helped cultivate from a style standpoint.

5: Five players on the "plus" side of power revolutions making the show in Bill O'Neill, Chris Barnes, Ronnie Russell, Weber, and Wes Malott (yes, we'll get into alllll of them shortly).

6: Barnes' opening 6 bagger while rolling 3 10 pin messenger strikes. His opponent, O'Neill just threw his towel in disgust over his head almost feigning defeat.

7: O'Neill's answering 6 bagger to end that match and force Chris Barnes to strike on the first shot in the 10th (which I would bet dollars to pesos that 7 out of every 10 people watching the show knew he wasn't going to strike on that first ball andohbytheway...he didn't).

8: BLUE!!! The Colts mascot in attendance. Thank God he got away from Peyton Manning, who is still waiting for that possession in overtime against the Chargers.

9: Nine games times 6 patterns equals 54 games of bowling with no match play at all. PBA execs: embrace this format except add a tweak to it next time for the fans. Get the final four bowlers on TV and have them bowl 3 matches each and find out who actually should have won this. Of course, if you asked Malott, he probably should have won it and did anyway.

10: The pesky 10 pin for Pete Weber cost him the match. Wrong ball choice to say the very least in contrast to what happened last week where Weber only had two balls to choose from and was going....plack 10 of all things last week.

11: Eleven titles was in the front row in Hall of Famer David Ozio, the master of the gutter shot and now the GM of Etonic Worldwide. Etonic could not have found a better figurehead than a true pro, a self made HOF'er and one of the great action bowlers ever. Did I say action??? I meant late night practice...not action, no no no....

12: Ronnie Russell's climb to the Big Wood Tour this season. Missed the first 7 events of the season and is in the cut line with 4 tournament left. Chances are he is going to survive another year and he has bowled one third less tournaments than most other exempt pros.

13: Patrick Healey's strange story. Russell got back on the tour due to Healey's inactivity this season and anyone that I trust in bowling circles has absolutely no idea what is wrong with Healey or what he has been up to in the last two years.

14: Xtra Frame's free 7 day trial...but you must put down a credit card to apply to the free trial. Warning: if anyone elects to get the free trial you must cancel subscription immediately or you will be billed for it after the 7 day trial. Caveat Emptor.

15: "Whoa...Nellie!" Dave Ryan's call for O'Neill's washout in the 7th frame of the second match against Russell.

16: The wide, wide, WIDE pocket Russell had for 2 games and then it went adios in the title match.

17: The open format this week got some unknown names close to the show in Edward VanDaniker Jr. and the ever growing push for Jason Belmonte who finished 11th. Clearly the multiple lane conditions and longer formats have helped certain bowlers and you are starting to see a trend with certain players in these super long formats. Guys like Walter Ray and PA are always close. O'Neill and Malott have thrived in these formats but Richie Allen always keeps sneaking up in these big formats as well. Take a much closer look at the THB's finishes in these formats exceeding 45 games and you'll be surprised.

18: "Sixty feet...to success!!!"
YES!!! Thank you Dave.

19: No Hambones this week. As I said, it was nice to have a week off from that yet the Stone machine has taken off. Even with him telling fans in Indy he would not be there this week, fans still littered the TV audience with Hambone signs. Rob Stone continues to get over with fans.

20: So do these funk Gemini Shirts. Ronnie Russell wore a bubble shirt for all I could guess on the show. Coupled with the Billy Johnson shoes (his nickname was "White Shoes" for all teenagers who have no idea who I was talking about), he was one strange looking leprechaun.

21: What does PDW stand for? Peter David Weber...I never knew. His theme song for the shows while he is striking is Motorhead's "Time to Play the Game". Yes folks, only on "Bowling Blind" can you get a cross between Lemmy, PDW, and Triple H and make it work smoothly.

22: How generous is this Scorpion pattern to pros? Its length of 42 feet coupled with the PTA (Predominant Track Area) made the lanes play more like your ordinary house shot only with slower ball speed. Think about how many shots Sunday did not hit the pocket and you might be able to count it on one hand.

23: How good are Weber and Barnes in these last 4 weeks? They have both made three out of the last four shows, and the same event, and with totally different formats behind it. They go from reactive to plastic then back to reactive. If you couple Pete Weber's top 10 at the Masters, Weber in the last 4 weeks has bowled 46, 40, 35, and 55 games and he is 46 years old bowling on two flatter patterns, a modified Cheetah with plastic balls and then bowling through 6 different patterns.

24: Why not the same dap for Barnes? Lemme think....oh yes, because no matter how much you want to root for Chris Barnes, he constantly lets you down when the pressure is on. Barnes had a 48 pin lead through six frames and somehow ended up losing by 19 pins...a 67 pin turnaround. He constantly frustrates fans that come to see him run over players at this level because most fans and most pros readily agree that no one in this game has more tools or trick than Barnes yet he continues to let something plague him when Sunday comes. Dean Hintz can't help him, Lynda Barnes can't help him, not even his kids can help him. Chris Barnes can only help Chris Barnes just as much as the only thing stopping Chris Barnes is Chris Barnes.

25: The winner: Wes Malott. Glad to see his "week of rest" was good for him.

26: Oh, I'm not done. I congratulate Malott on his win.

"Yeah, But..."

He changed his story. Two weeks ago, he basically dismissed the tournament as not being fair in saying that you should not take the technology out of the players hands. Then he proceeds to win the tournament rather comfortably and during the process was calling out PTI's Mike Wilbon about his comments about him hiding from it because he didn't think he could win. Malott's response was that he needed a week off on the show...we like to call that in the media as Covering Your Own Ass.

Personally, Malott's mouth has done more for me to dislike him this year more than anything else. He did not accept the first mixed championship pattern on TV, and then he railroads the tour for electing to take technology out of the players hands. It seemed like Malott got sensitive toward the issue and elected to tell "his side of the story" just a week too late.


And oh, the .2: The Don Johson Buckeye State Eliminator might be the most intriguing show of the season because for the first time in PBA history, bowlers will be bowling with each other in 4 4-man pods basing winners and survivors on total pinfall. The show will condense it to one game for the final pod until there is a winner. This might be the most politically charged tournament ever because bowlers will have to trust their other group members (or at least one) to advance to the finals and then the finals would be no different. Expect this to be Survivor: Columbus. Just no live scorpions to digest.


Leftyism's email is Senordoscien527@aol.com for further questioning.