The Calmer Way to Better Bowling

Did any of you watch Alex Aguiar take it to Chris Barnes in Saturday's "Chris Barnes Challenge"? I did, and it wasn't pretty. Aguiar shot 626. Barnes shot 524.

But it wasn't only what Chris shot that made the contest so ugly, it was the WAY he shot it. He smirked and grimaced and juggled balls all the way through it and finally just figuratively if not literally threw up his hands in resignation.

That was what disappointed me the most about Barnes' performance. I think maybe he's been so good for so long that he expects to do well all the time and hasn't learned to handle struggle and defeat with exemplary professionalism and grace.

Can you imagine Earl Anthony carrying on like that? Or do you think he would have continued calmly trying to figure out the lanes, correct his mistakes, and stay in the hunt until the end? And do you think he, even in this modern age of bowling ball mania, would have kept going back and forth between all those balls, or would he have taken a couple at most and tried his best with line, speed, and release adjustments to make them work?

I realize that we're all different. We have different temperaments and styles and ways of doing things, and what works best for some may work worst for others. But I wonder if there isn't an optimal way to approach bowling psychologically and strategically that works best for virtually everyone.

During the Chris Barnes Challenge Saturday night, Del Ballard noted how upset Barnes seemed to be and said it was good to get angry because this focuses you on your game more intensely and makes you bear down, try harder, and do better. But it didn't seem to be helping Chris.

I personally don't see the value in getting upset at yourself or the lanes or your opponent or whatever. It seems to me that you aren't consciously trying to make mistakes. You're trying to do the best you can, and when things aren't going well, there are reasons or causes for why they aren't. So, rather than get all bent out of shape, why not keep your cool and try to figure out what's amiss and correct it and keep on trying to make the best shots you can?

I guess there's such a thing as being too cool and not caring enough about what you're doing up there on the lanes to do your very best. But surely there's an optimal middle ground between that and what we see from a lot of bowlers on TV, in our own bowling leagues and tournaments, and maybe even in ourselves too much of the time.

Maybe there's a better way, and maybe we can find and discuss it here together.

Will Chris Barnes Get Revenge Tonight?

Chris Barnes will have the opportunity to get revenge against the player who unceremoniously knocked him out of the tournament in the first round this week when he takes on Alex Aguiar in the fourth "Chris Barnes Challenge" tonight at 8:30 PM EDT. The match will be a 3-game total pins match contested on tomorrow's television pair employing the same dual pattern that challenged the bowlers all week, and it will be carried live and viewable afterward on PBA Xtra Frame.

A lot is made of revenge matches. We're constantly hearing sports announcers say things like: "He's going to want to get even after so and so beat him previously, so look out!" But I don't know if this is just hype or if there's something more to it. That is, even if Chris Barnes IS upset about his defeat the other day and extremely determined to return the disfavor tonight, I'm not sure if that will make him bowl better. It could conceivably make him tense up, try too hard, and bowl worse.

What's more, I don't know that Barnes carries a big grudge against Aguiar over being defeated by him Thursday. Everybody out there is just trying their best to win and earn a paycheck to put food on the table. Aguiar just came into that match warmed up, tuned up, and readier to rumble than Barnes was at the time and was skillful and fortunate enough at that moment in time to shoot some big games and put Barnes away early.

However, I'm thinking that, revenge-minded or not, Barnes will be better prepared than he was Thursday and that tonight's match, for which each has put up $1500 of his own money, could be the best "Chris Barnes Challenge" yet. I'm looking forward to it.

Ignore Bowling Predictions

"This might not be the boldest of predictions, but my choice to make it all the way is Chris Barnes."
--Donnie Layman, from pba.com article Go RVing Match Play Championship: The Long & Short of It

It just goes to show that you need to take bowling predictions with more than just the proverbial grain of salt, but with a whole bucketful of it. Many predicted, yours truly included, that Chris Barnes would handily win his first best-of-seven, single-elimination match of the Go RVing Match Play Championship and continue right on into the televised final where he'd overcome his bad luck on TV and win the title.

After all, he's widely thought of as the best bowler in the world and a preeminent match play bowler. What's more, he's bowling on pairs with a very different pattern--Cheetah on the right and Shark on the left--on each lane, and this makes him doubly likely to win because of his legendary ability to adjust to differing lane conditions. Finally, his first opponent was an amateur, albeit a successful one in high-stakes tournaments, by the name of Alex Aguiar (see embedded video below) who entered the tournament as the 61st seed by finishing fifth in the TQR. On paper, it looked as though All-World Chris Barnes had a virtual lock on victory.

So much for paper. When the rubber met the road or, in this case, the reactive resin met the oil coated synthetic material, Alex Aguiar destroyed Chris Barnes four games to one, shooting a blistering 801 series for his last three. Chris Barnes wasn't even close.

And the multitudes who predicted that #1 seed Walter Ray would readily defeat #64 seed J. Warhol fared no better. Warhol crushed Williams four games to one. In fact, most of the higher seeded players in the first round lost to their lower seeded opponents.

The moral of the story is to not take bowling predictions seriously. Actually, there are two morals of the story so far as I'm concerned. The second is that single elimination matches from the get-go are a travesty and should be banned immediately and permanently from PBA tournaments. They can eliminate the best bowlers in the tournament before they even have a chance to warm up and show why they're the best bowlers in the tournament.