Independant Merchants – 2013-2014 – Wk. 5

• (2)(4)(164) Mr. Pink-*181-168-130=479 (159) -5
• (-)(6)(114) Lenny-*146-*141-142=429 (143) +29
• (1)(5)(159) Ruben-155-128-190=473 (157) -2
• (6)(8)(181) Tod-*215-158-*192=565 (188) +7
• (4)(6)(205) James-167-*228-190=585 (195) -10

As a team we took only 11 points. Another less that satisfactory outcome for point totals. Having said that it was nice to have the whole team together and even more special to see Mr. Pink throwing his ball at Mach-3.

My brother Lenny (Linus) crushed last night at +29 per game. This is encouraging to see as he had not bowled outside the occasional fun bowling excursion in maybe 10 years. He is throwing a hook ball and getting used to the idea of not throwing the ball at the pins and letting the ball hook into them.

Another positive note is Tod continues his crawling towards his goal of hitting a 200 average this year with +7 pins per game. He is already 3 pins higher now than he ended last year with. Nice bowling Tod!

Mr. Pink did well for the first 2 games and then back-slid a bit for the last game that took a way a little from his overall +/- for the night but I think the real take away is that he did bowl his average 2 games and had no ill effects other than a little soreness from bumping his head and knee on various pointy bits around the bowling alley.

Ruben struggled a little bit last night for the first 2 games, especially the second one but then was able to pull things back together for the last game where he bowled 31 pins above average. Nice way to finish the night off.

I still struggle to figure out which ball is working on the lanes consistently from week to week and even game to game. During practice I rolled 3 or 4 strikes in a row and felt like I had things zeroed in and then after 2 frames the shot changed for me and had to adjust. This is no big deal since as a bowler you have to make those changes as needed. However after a struggled for 7 frames I grabbed my other, more aggressive, ball and started to throw that in the 10th frame of the 1st game in the hopes that I might get something to work a bit better. I rolled 228 and felt like I was on track but then, once again the lane conditions changed and I was not able to carry single pins like I should have and ended with a 190 (-15).

In other news, Karl, whom I have an ongoing wager with on who ends the league with a higher average, CRUSHED the pins all night and shot 255-253-255 for a whopping 763. 755 (I believe) which will take his average back to 223 (now maybe 224). I on the other hand dropped a couple pins down to 203 which, if math is what is used to be, means Karl is a comfortable 20+ pins ahead of me.

Onward and upward. This bowling slump cannot continue…can it?

More t come.