Video: Steve Cook Career Retrospective

Practicing Next to Leanne Hulsenberg

Yesterday I had the privilege of practicing next to Leanne Barrette-Huslenberg, who is gearing up for the USBC Queens tournament next month and to defend her U.S. Women's Open title in June. She told me that the televised finals of this year's Open will be held outdoors on a main street in Reno.

As I've mentioned before, Leanne, who's a 27-time national titlist and USBC Hall of Famer, is one of my favorite bowlers of all time, and I'm delighted that she and her husband Gary own a pro shop in my home house, Fireside Lanes, near Sacramento, CA. and also bowl in the venerable Steve Cook Classic scratch league there along with PBA Hall of Famer Steve Cook, P.J. Haggerty, and a host of other outstanding local bowlers.

I also have the privilege of bowling in a senior scratch league at Fireside that numbers PBA Hall of Famer Larry Laub and his USBC Hall of Fame and former U.S. Women's Open champion wife Betty Morris-Laub among its members. I really feel blessed to bowl in a house with so many great bowlers of the past and present and to even compete against some of them.

For those of you who missed the historic and exciting U.S. Women's Open last year or would like to see it again, you can read my blogpost about it and watch the embedded videos of the entire televised finals here.

Mark Baker Compares the Great Bowlers of the 80's With Those of Today

Mark Baker bowled on the PBA Tour in the 1980's and is now one of the most respected coaches in the game. He recently wrote a column on pba.com, Comparing the Greats of My Era to Today. He begins by writing:

"The most common question I’m asked when I’m out among bowling fans is to compare the players of my era (1982-1990) to today’s players. So I thought with the next two blogs (this week’s will be Part 1 and the next Part 2) I’d give it a shot. "

He says that there were many more tour stops in the 80's than there are today and more players to beat out in each tournament, but that:

"the best players of today would have had absolutely no problem competing in the '80’s. Conversely, the superstars of my group would have been just fine today…actually, a few of them (Walter, Voss, Duke and Pete) were able to succeed in both eras."

He goes on to say that today's players have to and do know a lot more about equipment and other technical aspects of bowling than players used to. To highlight this point, he writes that more new balls probably come out each year now than came out in ten years in the 80's, that most of today's players utilize many more ball layouts than they used to and carry many more balls around with them, and that they have a more specialized bowling vocabulary and a far more sophisticated understanding of bowling.

Finally, Baker writes that one of the biggest differences between today's players and those of the 80's is that today's players are much more businesslike or even "robotic" in their approach to the game than players used to be. Players in the 80's used to be much more demonstrative when they bowled well or poorly, running out strikes even in qualifying and berating themselves and physically reacting much more strongly than they do today. One example he cites of running out strikes involves the great Steve Cook:

"When Steve Cook got it going (which was a lot) and you were within three pairs to his left (his favorite run-out zone) and you bowled before he was done, you literally took your life in your own hands! Cook was a seriously large human being who took striking and winning very seriously. Just ask Norm Duke. One time at the U.S. Open, I was bowling Norm and he was on the approach three lanes over from Cook. Steve ran one out, slapped his hands (which sounded like one of Zeus’ thunderbolts hitting the Acropolis), then pirouetted in front of Duke (probably sparing Norm’s life), picked him up by the side of his arms and set him back down in the settee. Norm looked at me and sheepishly asked, “Can I bowl now?”"

I look forward to reading Baker's second installment of his series comparing and contrasting the players of the 80's with those of today.

Bowling Against a Legend

I bowl league at Fireside Lanes near Sacramento, CA. Yesterday afternoon, I subbed for a team in an excellent senior scratch league there. These are three-person teams, and each person is matched against his or her opposite member. My opponent yesterday was Betty Morris-Laub.

If you've followed bowling for a long time, the names Betty Morris and Laub should sound familiar. A certain Betty Morris was female Bowler of the Decade for the 1970's, three time female bowler of the year, and a holder of 17 women's professional national titles and numerous other bowling awards. In other words, she's one of the most accomplished female bowlers ever. And PBA Hall of Famer Larry Laub was voted the 37th greatest bowler in PBA history.

Well, it just so happens that Betty Morris married Larry Laub, and that same Betty Morris was my opponent yesterday in the Fireside Senior Classic. With her husband Larry looking on, she put on a veritable bowling clinic, shooting over 900 for four games and winning three out of five match points against me.

She bowls only once a week yet still averages well over 200 and retains the famous form and smooth execution of yesteryear. And although I haven't seen Larry bowl recently, I understand that he's still got game too, except that he now projects the ball a lot further down the lane than he famously used to.

As I've written previously, I feel blessed to bowl in a center that has one of the finest junior programs and junior coaches (Debbie Haggerty) in the nation, features the Steve Cook Classic and other fine leagues, has a pro shop owned by Gary Hulsenberg and Leanne Barrette- Hulsenberg, and in which I've been able to compete against the likes of bowling legends Steve Cook, Leanne Barrette, and Betty Morris, and even be coached by Bill O'Neill, P.J. Haggerty, and bowling psychologist Dean Hinitz. Every bowler should be so fortunate.

Just don't expect to be able to beat the "old legends" there. Like I said, they've "still got game."

Would You Rather Bowl on a Sport or House Condition?

I blogged recently about bowling last weekend in a tournament employing the Shark pattern. I wrote that even though I struggled like mad to make my ball hook, hit the pocket, and carry and averaged under 180 for six games, I wanted to bowl only in sport pattern tournaments and leagues if I could, because I thought that if I upped my game some, I could actually be more competitive on a sport condition than I could on a house shot against young crankers.

I have also reached the point of being bored with booking relatively high averages and shooting high games and series on house patterns where I have area of five boards or more to get the ball to the pocket and strike despite glaring mistakes. When I score well or average 200 on a sport condition, I feel so much more gratified, because I feel like I earned what I got. I love the challenge of bowling on conditions at least remotely similar to what the pros face instead of striking on the adult equivalent of bumper lanes. And if I average only 176, the way I did last weekend, that's okay with me. It just motivates me to get better.

Now if I didn't know better, I'd think that virtually every bowler at or above my level of proficiency would feel the same way. Yet, clearly they don't, as two people really made clear to me this week.

I was practicing with one of the top bowlers in the Steve Cook Classic league last Sunday. The Steve Cook Classic is one of the best, if not the best, leagues in the Sacramento area. Featuring such luminaries as Steve Cook and Leanne Barrette Hulsenberg (yes, THAT Steve Cook and THAT Leanne Barrette), it makes up in talent and skill for what it lacks in size.

You'd think that the bowlers in that league would want to bowl only on sport conditions, but the guy I practiced with said that while he and some of the others would like that, most wouldn't like it and would probably quit the league if it became a sport league. When I asked why, he said that most don't have the time to practice as much as they think they'd need to in order to score decently on sport patterns, and so they want to bowl on an easier house shot where they can score well.

Later, I bowled with a young woman who seems quite serious about the sport. She bowls in a scratch league and participates in many tournaments where she's enjoyed considerable success over the past few years. But when I urged her to bowl in the PBA Experience league this summer, she declined. She said she doesn't have the right equipment for it. I remember thinking that her reactive resin equipment was plenty good enough and, besides, strategy and execution mattered a lot more than equipment anyway. It seemed to me that she may have been worried about bowling lower scores than she was accustomed to and of being emotionally deflated by this. If so, I think this is unfortunate.

What about you? Would you rather bowl in a sport or house shot league or tournament?

Bowling Video of the Day--Steve Cook Yesterday and Today

I patronize a wonderful old bowling center near Sacramento that features one of the finest scratch leagues in the area--the Steve Cook Classic. Yes, the name refers to THE Steve Cook who was a formidable force on the PBA Tour during the early to mid 1980's and was voted the 25th greatest bowler in PBA history. And, yes, he bowls in the league. So does Leanne Barrette-Hulsenberg. She won 26 national titles in the PWBA and is one of the greatest female bowlers ever. And, even though the league is relatively small, it features some of the other finest scratch bowlers in the area.

It's a draft league in which those who carried the top averages from the preceding season are designated team captains who choose or draft from the remaining pool of players to fill their teams. I'm planning to submit my name for next season's draft whether or not I have a snowball's chance in Hades of being drafted. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Below are a video (top) of action in the Steve Cook Classic from 2007 and of Steve Cook in his heyday winning the Firestone Tournament of Champions in 1981.