*Based on entries
After eight years and 96 editions, plus the 97th edition currently in print, The One Board moves to its new home: the internet. We’ll continue to revere the sport while highlighting and having fun with its absurdities but, like a dying network’s TV show revived on Netflix, the lighting might be slightly different and one of the actors may be having trouble recapturing his sultry performance voice.
We begin with the eighth annual year-start countup, eschewing year-end countdowns and embracing ludicrous prognostications for the year ahead.
- The PBA Player of the Year discussion will start on day one of qualifying in the PBA Players Championship January 10.
- That discussion won’t end until December.
- The winner of the Players Championship will be jokingly asked, “How does it feel to be the frontrunner in the Player of the Year race?”
- No one will laugh.
- The player will be respectful to the asker but blow off the question due to it being so early in the season.
- There’s a lot of bowling to go.
- Jason Belmonte, who has not gone back-to-back years without winning the PBA Player of the Year Award since his first POY season in 2013, once again will be extra motivated to prevent a two-year gap.
- EJ Tackett, one of just three players (and the only one to do it twice) who aren’t Belmonte to win Player of the Year since 2013, likewise has additional incentive to claim his second consecutive year-end honor.
- Anthony Simonsen, who is admirable for his lack of desire to talk about Player of the Year despite frequently being asked about it, and who finished in the top 10 in every single event in 2023, may take it from everyone.
- Simonsen will win at least one major and become the youngest player to win six.
- We’ll see three players win their first PBA Tour titles and one, who isn’t necessarily part of that group of three, win his first major.
- Increased PBA Elite League competition adds intrigue not just to the League but also to every event on the schedule.
- With PBA Elite League matches taking place on practice day in every town, fans have yet another reason to believe practice day is more compelling than qualifying.
- Come for the practice, stay for the Baker team bowling.
- Come back the next day for qualifying.
- Or go to work the next day. You can turn on BowlTV at your desk in an effort to keep track of the qualifying.
- BowlTV’s small price increase is reinvested directly toward funding the creation of a Dr. Joyce Brothers hologram, finally adding that essential seventh simultaneous commentator to the booth.
- Bowling fans are divided on whether or not they like the hologram. Some think it’s a nice change of pace to hear that fake voice while others think that seventh chair should’ve gone to a bowler.
- Any bowler. But not that bowler.
- Similar to the Stanley Cup, the Elias Cup is to be traveled around the world, one day per player on the championship team, but plans are canceled when no one can agree on the format for the tournament that would’ve determined who gets to wear the white gloves and escort the Cup.
- Six months after the season ends, the PBA Player of the Year is announced. It goes to a “PTQ Guy” who comes out of nowhere, every “week,” to dominate.
- “Week,” in bowling, continues to mean “absolutely any length of time.”
- The One Board continues its reign as the most highly read satirical bowling column, bolstered by being at the forefront of a burgeoning movement called digital publication.
- To enhance authenticity and integrity, readers will only be able to click on this site using a mouse or trackpad that was manufactured at a minimum hardness of 78HD.
Happy new year, bowling fans.