League Night - NSAC - Victory Lanes - Kankakee, Illinois
They say, "fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me." Well, if that's the case, shame is my middle name! My execution was shoddy at best, but that's not where the disappointment comes in. The disappointment stems from the fact that, for the second time this season, I completely misread how the lanes transitioned while bowling against a particular team. That misread lead to poor decisions in regard to where and how to play the lanes, which resulted in very lackluster scoring.
Game 1
8/ X 7/ X X 9- 72 X X X9/ - 205
For whatever reason, lately, I just can't seem to get myself going early in regard to quality shot-making. To put it nicely, I threw the ball like garbage this game. My feel in the ball was off - possibly due to the warmer weather and higher humidity in the center - and my delivery was terrible. I had zero balance at the foul line, and my release was terribly inconsistent. I missed the head pin all together in the first and third, but I managed to strike in the second, fourth, and fifth to get off to a decent start scorewise. Sadly, a flat 10-pin (which I missed; I made the dumb decision not to remove a piece of tape, which caused me to hang in the ball and throw a duck right into the ditch. Dumb!) derailed me in the sixth, and then I lost the ball at the bottom in the seventh, resulting in a miss left and a 4-6-7 split. I recovered with strikes on the next three balls before a wiggly two-pin ended my run and left me with a modest 205.
Game 2
X X 9/ 9/ X X 7/ 9/ X 9/7 - 211
Feeling like I was starting to execute a bit better, I decided to stick with the Mastermind Genius in Game 2. I opened with a double before coming a pinch high for a 4-pin in the third and leaving a half 10 in the fourth (At least I made that one!). I got back on track with a double in the fifth and sixth, but the ball jumped on me in the 7th, resulting in a 4-7-10. On the bright side, I threw a really nice shot and converted it. That conversion should've gotten my going; instead, it was the start of my complete brain death in regard to transition. I left a stunner 5-pin in the 8th, struck in the ninth, and went flat 10 (make), 2-4-5 for 211.
Game 3
X 9- 9/ 9/ 8/ 9/ 6/ 9/ X X52 - 181
Remembering the look I had during Game 3 the week before, I started this game by switching to my Mastermind Intellect and moving about 5 boards deeper with my feet and 3 with my eyes. I struck on the first shot, but the 10-pin didn't go out with much authority, which should've told me that my move was wrong. Sadly, it didn't, so I proceeded to stick with it for the next three shots only to go flat-10, miss (no excuses on this one; I just made a very poor attempt and missed it right), ripped 9-pin, half-10. At that point, I realized that the Intellect wasn't the ball, so I tried the Strike King. My plan was to try to jump way back right and use the track the way the lower-rev guys on the other team were doing. Unfortunately, I moved too far right on the first pitch, resulting in a high 3-6. I moved back left a bit further with the next one, but I pulled it into the oil, which resulted in the flattest flat 10 of the night (I'm lucky the 5 and 8 didn't stand with it! lol). Feeling like the Strike King wasn't the choice either, I pulled out the Melee Jab and moved back in deep. I liked the first shot off of my hand, but I hated it down the lane as I washed out for the 1-2-4-10, which I made (two split/washout conversions in one night? It almost makes up for the two missed 10-pins...wait, no, it doesn't!). I came in light again on the next shot, resulting in an 8-pin. I split the difference on the lane and played just inside the track and smashed the next two before the ball leaked right early and left the Greek Church on the second ball in the 10th. I actually thought my conversion attempt looked pretty good, but it somehow managed to gake 6-10 off without anything else. In the end, the grind ended in a 181 for the game and 597 for the night.
Although I'm never pleased with a sub-600 three-game effort, the score isn't really what bothered me about this performance. What bothered me was my complete lack of recognition. We bowled this team earlier in the year, and I had similar problems. They have a lot of slower speed guys who burn up the track area. Because of that, as the night progresses, anything that gets to the track immediately sees the friction. As such, I needed to stay left of the track and play tight lines to the pocket from inside of them. Instead, I kept wheeling the ball through the burn area, which resulted in tons of bled-off energy and terrible movement/hit at the other end. Had my head been on straight, I would've gone deeper with my feet and mark with the Intellect or Jab and just made sure not to get the ball into the track area. From there, I would've been fine on anything but dead pulls or shots missed way to the right. Sadly, yet again, I didn't recognize it until it was way too late. If I'm ever going to be the player that I truly want to be, I can't keep making the same mistakes over and over again. Execution errors are one thing; my physical game isn't perfect, so I'll have to live with bad pitches once in a while; however, I have been doing this long enough that I should at least know enough to be playing the lanes the correct way. Sadly, what's done is done, so there is nothing to do now but try to actually learn from it (this time) and be ready to go next week.
As always, thanks for reading!
