How do we, as bowlers, perceive bowling? Each person has to define bowling in their own way - whether it, to them is:
- a Sport, a form of Exercise, a Hobby, or a Recreational Activity
- something they participate in daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, or yearly
- a reason around which a group of people get together, or the reason a group of people get together (Perhaps more clearly stated: Do we come together to bowl, or is bowling the excuse to come together?)
I'm sure that there would be no argument that the individual by default defines bowling for themselves. What gets interesting is when others start looking past the individuals and look for trends that form within bowling, and then start defining bowling based on those trends. Data mining and analysis are powerful tools that various groups use to project/predict the future based on the actions of the past. But as true in every disclaimer in following the stock market: "Past performance is not a complete indicator of future performance." This is especially true for any group that has a vested interest, financial or otherwise, in the future outcome that the data suggests.
The trick with data mining is that it has to be done with as little bias as possible to get the most accurate results. Even then, there is still the potential results bias depending on the argument that one wishes to put forth, and that bias will in turn dictate future actions to be either proposed or enacted. If that sounds familiar - it should: "If men (organizations) define situations as real, they are real in their consequences." As far as bowling is concerned, there are several groups/organizations with vested interests in the health of bowling: the Pro Tour, the USBC, the Ball Manufacturers, the Corporate Bowling Center Owners, the Independent Bowling Center Owners, the Pro Shop Owners/Staff, the League Personnel, the Bowling Enthusiasts, and finally the regular bowlers. Each of these groups look at the health of bowling as a whole, the historical and current data, and make future plans based off of those observations. The situation as I see it however, is that each of those groups look at bowling and see a problem that pertains specifically to them and is the fault of one or more other groups on that list. However bowling as a sport has issues in it's entirity, and only by making bowling as a sport more relevant to the average American consumer will the pressures felt by these groups be relaxed.
Let's take one of those groups, take some of the historical data, relate it to society and technology advances, and follow where it goes.
Taking slices of data to demonstrate a point:
In 1970-71, there were 4,000,000 sanctioned league bowlers. There were 985 sanctioned perfect games rolled, 609 sanctioned 299's rolled, and 94 sanctioned 800 series rolled. The PBA had 35 tour stops including Majors and the Japan cup. Mike McGrath was the leading money winner on tour that year w/$52,049 in winnings.
In 1975-76, there were 4,500,000 sanctioned league bowlers. There were 1913 sanctioned perfect games rolled, 1029 sanctioned 299's rolled, and 304 sanctioned 800 series rolled. The PBA had 34 tour stops including Majors and the Japan cup. Earl Anthony was the leading money winner on tour that year w/$107,585 in winnings.
In 1980-81, there were 4,755,756 sanctioned league bowlers. There were 5549 sanctioned perfect games rolled, 2764 sanctioned 299's rolled, and 1041 sanctioned 800 series rolled. The PBA had 34 tour stops including Majors and the Japan cup. Wayne Webb was the leading money winner on tour that year w/$116,700 in winnings.
In 1985-86, there were 3,624,575 sanctioned league bowlers. There were 6467 sanctioned perfect games rolled, 3066 sanctioned 299's rolled, and 1158 sanctioned 800 series rolled. The PBA had 33 tour stops including Majors and the Japan cup. Mike Aulby was the leading money winner on tour that year w/$201,200 in winnings.
In 1990-91, there were 2,922,829 sanctioned league bowlers. There were 14,192 sanctioned perfect games rolled, 6362 sanctioned 299's rolled, and 2922 sanctioned 800 series rolled. The PBA had 37 tour stops including the Majors, as well as the Doubles Championship. Amleto Monacelli was the leading money winner on tour that year w/$204,775 in winnings.
In 1995-96, there were 2,261,469 sanctioned league bowlers. There were 30,630 sanctioned perfect games rolled, 13,768 sanctioned 299's rolled, and 6619 sanctioned 800 series rolled. The PBA had 30 tour stops including Majors and the Japan cup. Mike Aulby was the leading money winner on tour that year w/$219,792 in winnings.
In 2000-01, there were 1,767,096 sanctioned league bowlers. There were 41,303 sanctioned perfect games rolled, 17,858 sanctioned 299's rolled, and 11,519 sanctioned 800 series rolled. The PBA had 19 tour stops including the Majors, as well as the Doubles Championship. Norm Duke was the leading money winner on tour that year w/$136,900 in winnings.
** Since there isn't a way to accurately determine the number of people in unsanctioned leagues and open play - I will adopt a standard of 1:1 sanctioned bowlers vs. unsanctioned bowlers, and then add 25% for open bowlers. I fully acknowledge that these ratios unsanctioned/open bowlers are arbitrary and the true percentages changed significantly over time, so my numbers are for convenience and cannot be used for a true scientific analysis, but they are statistically close enough for the purposes of my argument.
If one goes to Youtube and watches any of the PBA shows from the 1970-1990 era, the first thing that is noticed is that the audience for the event can number in the several hundreds. The centers are well lit, the venue was more of an arena feel as opposed to an auditorium feel, and the crowd was following the action with the same intensity that golf and tennis audiences have. There were viable summer and winter tours, with between 30 and 36 regular tour stops every year - seldom in the same city twice in the same year, which means that the tour was accessible to more and more of the general population. This also meant that the local PBA members and/or kings of the league bowlers had the opportunity to shoe up against the touring pros, and really test their mettle.
Once cable channels/Satellite channels became more widespread, and there were more sports viewing options, ABC started noticing and monitoring a decline in Professional Bowling viewership, and by 1997 had decided to not renew it's contract with the PBA - even though it had been consistently one of the highest rated sports shows for the network. Notice that the number of sanctioned league bowlers between the 1980-81 year and 85-86 seasons had dropped by over 1 million people, and in the next 5 years dropped again by another 700,000 bowlers. Fast forward another 5 years, and by 1995-96 the number of sanctioned league bowlers had declined still further by 650,000 people. If the ratios for unsanctioned bowling declined at the same pace, the total loss of league bowling over 15 years was close to 4.7 million bowlers. Since people generally follow sports that they have an investment in, that potentially equated to a loss of PBA viewership of the same amount.
Now, during this time period we have several external forces at play - the 80's had the end of the oil crisis, the computer technology boom, the economic boom, the slow dismantling of the manufacturing sector in many regions of the US, and generally many more options for the consumer to choose from both in their viewing habits and recreational participation. The 90's had the beginning of the economic meltdown where manufacturing jobs continued to be moved offshore, cost of living increased without workers pay matching pace, fortunes were lost in the .com bust, and consumer debt kept getting higher and higher due to the fervent preaching of consumerism. Technology in the bowling world also made significant strides - going from plastic/polyester balls to resin balls to reactive resin balls, and whereas synthetic lanes had been around since the late 70's, they became more available and widely used in bowling centers. Whereas bowlers had for years had their one ball, one release which worked well no matter what house they bowled in, now there were more options because of ball technology, lane technology, oil technology, and bowlers like Mark Roth showing how to hook the lane as opposed to the straight players using plastic on wood lanes.
For many years, the bread and butter for bowling center owners, whether a Corporate house (AMF / Brunswick) or independently owned, was their league bowlers. It was nothing to have two leagues a night every night, and one or two day leagues as well filling up the house. With the changing of the times, America moving away from a manufacturing base, the sense of community that lead to long term leagues falling away due to the boom and bust of the economy - those leagues started drying up. As the leagues dried up, only those who were really anchored to that sense of community stayed, which was the middle aged crowd. These were the people who were following the PBA tour, as evidenced by the report in 1997 by ABC that showed that 67% of the Professional Bowling viewers were aged 50 and above. The younger generation was not as anchored in that sense of community, and saw many other options for their time and resources. With more sports available for the viewing public once the technology boom hit - the PBA suddenly was not drawing the number of sponsors that it once did. Once sponsorship contracts ended, the sponsors started looking at the return on investment for their money, and since the PBA ratings/market share/viewership was steadily declining - the sponsors started not funding tournaments and television air time like they once did. Local sponsors (like banks for example) used to sponsor tournaments where they would put up the money for the winner, and other sponsors would make up the rest of the prize fund. But when the national sponsors stopped investing in the tour as heavily, the local sponsors were unwilling (or unable) to make up the difference in order to keep the tour stop in their area. This led to the PBA reducing the number of tour stops, and the amount of prize money available, which then made the prospect of bowling for a living more challenging. This eventually almost caused the death of the PBA, and did kill the PWBA. Now the PBA is having to pay for airtime on ESPN, top prize monies for winning events is down to the same levels it was in the 1970's, and the number of true tour stops has dropped to under half what it was in the 1980's. When the tour doesn't come to the cities/regions that supported it for so many years, then the locals do not constantly feel the loyalty to the tour, barring those who watch it on television and the internet - sad at what this organization has become.
"If men (Corporate entities) define situations as real, they are real in their consequences".
Each one of those entities I mentioned earlier (the Pro Tour, the USBC, the Ball Manufacturers, the Corporate Bowling Center Owners, the Independent Bowling Center Owners, the Pro Shop Owners/Staff, the League Personnel, the Bowling Enthusiasts, and the bowling populace) have a thread that can be followed like the one I just demonstrated with the PBA, and they are quite intertwined with each other and factors that are independent of bowling itself. But the argument about the problem being on the shoulders of any one or two of those entities is misguided. The problem is equally shared between them all, and only with all the entities working together in a proactive and thoughtful process will the issues with bowling not being relevant to the general population of America be resolved.
More to follow......
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