This installment of The One Board originally appeared in Bowlers Journal International, August, 2020
In June, we saw the return of the PBA on FOX with two events that not only appealed to the usual bowling audience but also enthralled casual sports fans—those who will watch any sport even if they aren’t necessarily fans of that sport. Now, perhaps, many of them are becoming bowling fans.
For existing bowling fans, the shows were fun because they were different from what we usually see and we got to watch the players showcase their talents in new ways. Plus, we hadn’t seen any live bowling in three months, so we would’ve gladly watched anything with a sanding pad.
For casual sports fans—regular people who don’t yet know the delicate intricacies of changing axis tilt to generate a slightly different ball motion—these events showcased exactly what the general public assumes pro bowlers do all day: strike constantly. A casual sports fan can’t relate to a grind-it-out, clean 190 game, but he can relate to strikes.
In the Strike Derby, competitors were each given two minutes in which to roll as many strikes as possible. Because it’s bowling, of course we had to sit through a qualifying round, but once that was over, interest picked up as the players were seeded into a bracket. Again, given two minutes each, the player with the most strikes advanced.
With no time for pre-shot routines, thumb-tape adjustments or incessant balking, the bowlers—who, one hopes, were still able to trust the process among the rapidity—were thrust into a fast-paced strikefest that was as compelling to the fans as it was exhausting to the players. Two minutes is much longer than an average NHL shift, tennis rally or football play, and most of the players hadn’t been able to bowl at all in months. Also, consider a bowling ball weighs about three times as much as a hockey stick, hockey puck, tennis racket, tennis ball and non-Patriots football combined. This was strenuous.
With the oil getting pushed around with every shot, the lanes got considerably more difficult as the players grew more fatigued. Perhaps it’s important to note the oil pattern was not arduous, but it’s also important to note only moderate-to-high-level bowlers understand the game to that extent. Casual sports fans didn’t care about the oil moving around or whether the conditions were tough; they cared about seeing who would strike the most.
In the Summer Clash, each player bowled a 10th frame in the first round and the lowest score was eliminated. From there, the remaining field rolled one shot each, low score eliminated, until we were down to one. It wasn’t quite as brisk as the Strike Derby but it was just as immediately understandable to new viewers.
In the Strike Derby, casual sports fans saw exactly what they see in every other sport: a result every few seconds (each attempted strike), every two minutes (a player’s final score) and every four minutes (the winner of the match). In the Clash, every shot from the second round on determined if someone was in or out.
Even better: viewers could comprehend on their own what needed to happen for a player to win. That’s right, the score was decipherable. If the first guy rolled 12 strikes in the Strike Derby, the next guy needed 13 to win. If the low score in the Summer Clash was 8, the rest of the bowlers needed 9 or better to advance. This is a bit more intuitive than a novice trying to figure out what’s going on by looking at a scoreboard full of slashes and exes that claims one guy trails by 8 but has a max score 12 pins higher than his opponent.
When sports fans are given fast-paced action, frequent results and a score they can figure out without straining themselves, sports fans are engrossed.
A first-time viewer didn’t know he was supposed to assume one of the no-thumb bowlers would win the Strike Derby, but that viewer had a lot of fun watching full-thumbed and not-slow-but-certainly-not-fast Kris Prather hoist the trophy. The same viewer had no clue Sean Rash wasn’t winning his 16th career PBA Tour title in the Summer Clash, but the image of a happy person clutching a trophy is how sporting events end.
Bowling fans got a fun reintroduction to their favorite sport. Sports fans got an approachable, comprehensible inducement into becoming bowling fans. Soon enough, they’ll be clamoring for clean 190s, too.