Why No One Remembers Allie Brandt
We all tend to think of technology as a good thing and it almost always is. But there are exceptions and I believe that bowling is one of them. It is the advancing technology of bowling and bowling equipment that has caused people to forget who Allie Brandt was.
My father started my career in bowling when I was only four years old. I had to roll the ball with both hands and if I was lucky enough to hit the pins twice a game, I considered myself fortunate. Of course, this was long before one of the good technological advances of bowling, today's "bumpers" that allow kids of small size and age to bowl without ball after ball going into the gutter. But as my career advanced into junior and ultimately adult competition, I was there as the technology advanced as well.
When I returned from a tour of duty in South Korea in the mid 1980s, I was greeted by the first revolution, the urethane bowling ball. Prior to that, bowling balls were made of rubber or plastic. Urethane, a new age material, was better. It hit the pins harder, grabbed lanes better and made for higher scoring. It was soon followed by something called reactive resin, and then a change in the pattern of oiling the bowling lanes known as "short oil" and nowadays the bowling scores are out of sight.
To verify this one only need take a quick look at the record book maintained by the American Bowling Congress (ABC). The four highest season averages for league competition were all set after the development of reactive resin and short oil, and are averages of 261, 256, 251 and 250. Those are season averages for a game in which a perfect score is 300.
That same record book shows that six men are tied for the record high game series of 900, three consecutive perfect games. All six were accomplished after 1997, long after reactive resin and short oil hit the scene. There are other recorded examples of the 900 series being accomplished, but the ABC refused to sanction those scores. To Mr. Glenn Allison, wherever you may be, you deserved to have your achievement of 900 acknowledged. You were robbed sir, and the ABC should right this wrong.
Another example of the astronomical scoring that technology has created can be found in the record books having taken place on April 1, 2004 at New Castle, Delaware. A team called Limo Exchange with 5 players on it shot 3,934 for three games. Let's do the math. That's 1,311.3333 per team game, divided by five players equals 262.2666 per game per player. Now this may be a team with five really good bowlers on it. Hell, it may have five members of the Professional Bowlers Tour on it. But I submit that without the technological advances like reactive resin and short oil, scores like that just would not happen.
I was a pretty good bowler back in the late 1970s and early 1980s, before technology changed the game. My friends and family wonder why I won't bowl anymore. The answer is simple. Technology has ruined the game. It has taken the skill element out of it. Anyone can buy a great ball, learn to take advantage of the easy, high scoring conditions that lane owners are putting out there and learn to average 200. I averaged 200 and over before short oil, before reactive resin and before urethane. I see no point in continuing and scoring higher using this new technology. The challenge and therefore the fun are gone.
As to the legacy of Allie Brandt, back in 1939, he did something amazing. He bowled a three game series of 886, games of 297, 289 and 300, setting a record that would stand for more than 50 years. It was an incredible accomplishment and it is a shame that technology has caused his fine achievement to be overshadowed by these artificial records.
Around two years ago, AMF Bowling Centers went into Chapter 11 Bankruptcy. At the time, people were saying that bowling was dying. Now they are out of bankruptcy and have recently sold off their centers in the United Kingdom to focus on their core operations in the United States. Maybe bowling is dying and maybe it isn't. I don't know for sure. All I know is that for me, it isn't what it was and never will be again.
RIP Allie Brandt. RIP Bowling.
My father started my career in bowling when I was only four years old. I had to roll the ball with both hands and if I was lucky enough to hit the pins twice a game, I considered myself fortunate. Of course, this was long before one of the good technological advances of bowling, today's "bumpers" that allow kids of small size and age to bowl without ball after ball going into the gutter. But as my career advanced into junior and ultimately adult competition, I was there as the technology advanced as well.
When I returned from a tour of duty in South Korea in the mid 1980s, I was greeted by the first revolution, the urethane bowling ball. Prior to that, bowling balls were made of rubber or plastic. Urethane, a new age material, was better. It hit the pins harder, grabbed lanes better and made for higher scoring. It was soon followed by something called reactive resin, and then a change in the pattern of oiling the bowling lanes known as "short oil" and nowadays the bowling scores are out of sight.
To verify this one only need take a quick look at the record book maintained by the American Bowling Congress (ABC). The four highest season averages for league competition were all set after the development of reactive resin and short oil, and are averages of 261, 256, 251 and 250. Those are season averages for a game in which a perfect score is 300.
That same record book shows that six men are tied for the record high game series of 900, three consecutive perfect games. All six were accomplished after 1997, long after reactive resin and short oil hit the scene. There are other recorded examples of the 900 series being accomplished, but the ABC refused to sanction those scores. To Mr. Glenn Allison, wherever you may be, you deserved to have your achievement of 900 acknowledged. You were robbed sir, and the ABC should right this wrong.
Another example of the astronomical scoring that technology has created can be found in the record books having taken place on April 1, 2004 at New Castle, Delaware. A team called Limo Exchange with 5 players on it shot 3,934 for three games. Let's do the math. That's 1,311.3333 per team game, divided by five players equals 262.2666 per game per player. Now this may be a team with five really good bowlers on it. Hell, it may have five members of the Professional Bowlers Tour on it. But I submit that without the technological advances like reactive resin and short oil, scores like that just would not happen.
I was a pretty good bowler back in the late 1970s and early 1980s, before technology changed the game. My friends and family wonder why I won't bowl anymore. The answer is simple. Technology has ruined the game. It has taken the skill element out of it. Anyone can buy a great ball, learn to take advantage of the easy, high scoring conditions that lane owners are putting out there and learn to average 200. I averaged 200 and over before short oil, before reactive resin and before urethane. I see no point in continuing and scoring higher using this new technology. The challenge and therefore the fun are gone.
As to the legacy of Allie Brandt, back in 1939, he did something amazing. He bowled a three game series of 886, games of 297, 289 and 300, setting a record that would stand for more than 50 years. It was an incredible accomplishment and it is a shame that technology has caused his fine achievement to be overshadowed by these artificial records.
Around two years ago, AMF Bowling Centers went into Chapter 11 Bankruptcy. At the time, people were saying that bowling was dying. Now they are out of bankruptcy and have recently sold off their centers in the United Kingdom to focus on their core operations in the United States. Maybe bowling is dying and maybe it isn't. I don't know for sure. All I know is that for me, it isn't what it was and never will be again.
RIP Allie Brandt. RIP Bowling.
posted by me at 4:39 PM
5 Comments:
I worked with a sanding crew summers for a number of years in the mid '70s for a great carpenter while I was in college. I know all too well the strictness in lane preparation.
There is "no way" to tip lane conditions in bowlers favor from this standpoint... the best that can be expected is serious leveling which makes equal conditions for all. Anytime a perfect game is bowled... an agent from the ABC will be there to qualify the sanction. If the lane is not in spec, the bowler and establishment fail... it's serious business...
It isn't so much the level of the lane that can be altered to artificially inflate scoring. It is how the lanes are "conditioned". The pattern of the "oil" as spread on the lane can be done in such a way as to make it much more likely that a shot will hit the "pocket", raising the likelihood of a strike.
having grown up in Lockport, NY. i had no choice but to become a bowler as a kid. one saturday morning, i rode my bike out to the Allie Brandt Lanes on Lincoln Ave. the man behind the counter gave me a lane near the counter. i was alone and just enjoying myself (i want to say you could bowl 3 games for $1 back then).
after a while, the man behind the counter came over and says, son, you're doing this all wrong. then proceeds to show me how i should be doing it.
of course, i had no idea who this man was, but when i went home, i told my dad. he then told me that the man was Allie Brandt, and that he was the world record holder for the highest 3 game set. it's something i've remembered all my life and a story i've told my kids while trying to teach them how to bowl.
Thing is: With all the newness of bowling these days, urethane, short oil, juiced balls, it seems obvious that bowlers would not do well in an Peterson Classic type event--let alone The Toledo Open. It would be credible if an 900 series were rolled (and sanctioned) there. Possible? Not likely
I started bowling in the early 1980's. I was looking for something competitive to repalce the sports I had grown up playing, and I found bowling. In 1980 the balls were still relatively simple, and the "short oil" era had not begun yet. I fell in love quickly, and bowling became my number one thing to do!
Sadly, I have seen it slowly deteriorate into what it has become, and that is a mere caricature of what it once was. The simple spheroids of yesterday have been replaced by the gyroscopic balanced bombs we have today, and the oil is now something to aid the scoring pace instead of something applied to protect the lane surface.
The kid in the movie "The Incredibles" said it best: "When EVERYONE is super, NOBODY will be". That has sadly come to fruition. No longer are we amazed, and awestruck, at the skill and power of the professional player, especially when we can go to Saturday morning junior leagues and watch 10 year olds doing things that the professionals couldn't do back then.
I love bowling, and will continue as long as I can, but I'm starting to think I might actually outlive the game itself.
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