The first tournament (An exihibition event) of the 2003-4 season was held in Shin-Yokohama, Japan at the 2003 Dream Bowl Match tournament. Here is my report of the third day of the Dream Bowl Match Play tournament in Shin-Yokohoma, Japan. My first match was against defending champion Hugh Miller. On the freshly oiled lanes, I was playing straight up 10. After an opening double I had a couple of bad shots on the right lane while Hugh started with a solid 7 before stringing strikes. I finally got lined up and started to strike. Hugh left back to back solid 8 pins in the 9th and 10th frames to shoot 258 in game 1. I had a couple of solid 10's to shoot 227. We both started the 2nd game with a double, but I missed a 7 pin in the 3rd frame. Being 44 pins behind Hugh Miller was not where I wanted to be. Hugh missed the pocket in the 3rd frame as he left the 3-9. I started a string of strikes in the 4th frame. Hugh went a bit high in the 5th frame leaving a 4 pin and light in the 7th frame leaving a weak 10. I was continuing to strike and had actually taken the lead as I struck in the 9th frame. But if Hugh were to strike out he would lock up the win by 2 pins. Then Hugh did something both he and I were shocked to see, he tugged the ball and left the 4-6-7-8-10. A 7 pin in the 10th frame essentially gave me the match. I ended up shooting 267 as I struck out against Hugh's 194 to win the match 494-452. Match 2 was against Brian Voss. I was still playing a fairly straight going up around 12 with Brian swinging the ball around 17 out to around 8. Brian bowled very well against me as he had 2 taps in the first game for a 259. I bowled a pretty good game myself, but left a 2-8 in the 10th frame to shoot 246. The odd thing was that the 1st frame of the 2nd game the ball hooked quite a bit leaving the 3 pin. So I made my spare with my strike ball to see what would happen if I moved left and the ball hooked quite a bit more than I expected. So I moved left playing around 14. Brian's 1st shot of the 2nd game was very light as he left the 5-8. He went back to hitting the pocket, but left a 10 pin in the 4th frame with a rip 7-10 in the 5th. I was striking in the mean time with a couple of fortunate strikes when I tripped the 4 into the 9, and ripped the rack when I sent the ball right. In the 8th frame, the ball hooked quite a bit more than expected leaving the 3-6, so I needed to make an adjustment on that lane as well. Brian was striking after the 5th frame up to the 9th frame. We were bowling when the lanes were available instead of TV style. So even though I finished on the right lane I through my first in the 10th frame before Brian. I needed to double to lock up the match. After making a slight adjustment left on the lane I managed to rip the rack on my first 2 shots while Brian threw matching strikes. I shot 267 to Brian's 245 to win 513-504. Brian bowled a very good match, but came out on the short end. Match 3 was against Patrick Allen who qualified in 2nd place. The left lane had quite a hook spot, but if I didn't quite get the ball to that spot it wouldn't hook enough. I played 16 on the left lane and 13 on the right lane. I got the ball into the hook spot in the 3rd frame and left the 3-4-6-7 which I missed. Patrick missed the 2-4-7 in the 2nd frame. I managed a turkey before leaving the 3-6-9-10 which I was able to make. Patrick was only able to get a double before leaving the 4-7-10 which he missed. A double in the 10th gave me a 208 while Patrick had 181. We both started striking in the 2nd game. Patrick had a double and a turkey while I started with a 4 bagger. Patrick chopped the 4-7 in the 7th frame while I picked up a 2-8 in the 6th frame. We both were tapped at the end of the game giving me 224 to Patrick's 215 to win 432 to 396. Match 4 was against Byeong-Yeol Moon, one of the many Korean professionals who bowled in the tournament. I had the left lane hooking a bit more and played around 14 on it while I played a bit straighter up 13 on the right lane. I started with a double and a 4 bagger. Mr. Moon had a couple of bad shots for spares and then had a turkey. We both had some taps at the end of the game before bad shots in the 10th frame. I had a 236-214 lead after game 1. I had a turkey while Mr. Moon was alternating strikes and spares before finally getting a double. A bad shot in the 7th for Mr. Moon separated 2 doubles. I had a 4 bagger at the end of the game with the help of a tripped 4-7-10 in the 10th to shoot 245 against 215 to win 481-429. I was now in the semi-final match against Koichi Kawada. Mr. Kawada is a 20 year old amateur player and one of 4 non professional players who made the top 64. He beat Chris Barnes and Brad Angelo in two of his previous matches. I believe that he bowls for Team Japan and would like to compete as an amateur for a while longer. He throws the ball very well and when he decides to become professional, he should do very well. We bowled our match on a fresh pair of lanes where TV cameras were set up. The two semi final matches would be bowled intertwined with each other. Norm Duke was to bowl Yasuyuki Sadamatsu in the other semi-final match. The four of us were allowed 15 minutes of practice. My match was to bowl the first game of our match first. Then the Duke-Sadamatsu match was to bowl their 1st game after 4 practice balls. We were then to finish our match after 4 practice balls with Duke-Sadamatsu to finish their match after us. With the lanes very tight, I decided to play very straight up 11 after practice. The right lane had just a pinch more hook and my first 2 shots were a bit high for a 4 pin and a 2-8 which I spared. Mr. Kawada was opting for a shot a bit more outside with a bit more hook than I was playing. He started with a double before leaving a 4-9 for an open. I struck followed by a 4 pin in the next 2 frames. Mr. Kawada left a 10 pin in the 4th frame which he missed followed by a strike. I started striking in the 5th frame. Mr. Kawada doubled and then left a rip 7-10 for another open. I continued striking until my 2nd shot in the 10th when I left the fast 8 (4-7) to shoot 246. Mr. Kawada struck out for a 211. In the other semi-final match, Norm Duke took a 1 pin lead after the first game when he shot 206 to Mr. Sadamatsu's 205. Norm looked like he was trying to play a board or two left of where I was playing with a pinch more hook while Mr. Sadamatsu was playing a fair amount of hook left of the 3rd arrow. In our 2nd game of the match we both started with a double, but Mr. Kawada left the 6-10 which he missed to the right. He followed that with a 7 pin. I continued to strike. Mr. Kawada left the 3-4-6-7-9-10 in the 5th frame for another open. I left a bucket in the 7th frame when I got the ball a pinch right on the tight lane. Mr. Kawada threw a 4 bagger before leaving a 10 pin in the 10th frame to shoot 206. I struck out for a very nice 276 to win the match 522-417. Norm Duke and Mr. Sadamatsu had a very close match with the lead changing hands by a pin or two in the frames leading up to the 10th. Norm needed 3 strikes to win the match, but left a 4 pin to give his opponent a chance. Mr. Sadamatsu threw a perfect strike to win the match by less than 10 pins. I continued to play a very direct line in the championship match. Mr. Sadamatsu started the match with a strike. I started with a 10 pin and a strike. Mr. Sadamatsu then left the 3-4-6-7 which he missed by only knocking over the 6 pin. He followed that with a strike. I went a bit high in the 3rd frame leaving only the 4-7 for a spare followed by a strike. Mr. Sadamatsu then doubled, but left the 2-7 which he spared. I finally doubled myself, but then left a rip 7-10 in the 6th frame. Mr. Sadamatsu doubled. I left another 10 pin before striking in the 8th. Mr. Sadamatsu left a 2 pin with a strike in the 9th. I struck out to shoot 226 while Mr. Sadamatsu doubled before leaving a 7 pin on his 2nd shot in the 10th frame to shoot 210. I started the 2nd game with a strike while Mr. Sadamatsu started with a 9 pin and a strike. I added two more strikes as did Mr. Sadamatsu. I went very high in the 4th frame tripping the 4-7-10 for a strike and then left the bucket (2-4-5-8) on the tight left lane which I spared. Mr. Sadamatsu then left the 2-8-10 which he missed followed by a strike. I was now 37 pins in the lead with 5 frames to go. I struck in the 6th followed by a 10 pin. Mr. Sadamatsu doubled in the 7th frame and then left a 4 pin in the 8th frame on a very high hit which he missed. Needing marks in my remaining frames to win, I left the 2-8 which I barely made as the ball nearly missed the 2 pin to the right. I followed that with a 6-10 for another spare. Mr. Sadamatsu doubled before leaving a 10 pin on his 2nd shot in the 10th to shoot 211. I only needed count and threw the ball wide as I left the 1-2-8 for a spare and shot 219 to win the match 445-421. This was a rather remarkable win considering that with 5 games to go in qualifying I was about 130 pins behind 64th place. Then all I had to do was win 6 matches. I guess that saving my best bowling for the end of the tournament was not such a bad plan. If I could only do that all of the time! One disappointing thing about the win was that the PBA had decided not to count this as an official event even though the money will be considered official. So I still have 37 official PBA titles. However, Earl Anthony won the ABC Masters twice when it wasn't considered an official PBA title. I have now won the Kanto Dream Match Play tournament twice and they both didn't count as official PBA titles. In my 6 matches I had 92 strikes, including 2 tripped 4-7-10's, out of 138 shots. I missed the pocket 20 times. My strike percentage on pocket shots was 90 of 118 or 76%. I had 3 opens, 2 splits (3-4-6-7, rip 7-10) with one missed spare (7). I did manage to pick up the rest of my spares which included three 2-8's, 3-6-9-10's, two 2-4-5-8's and the 1-2-8 plus many other simple spares. I threw the ball much better than I did in qualifying and had some pretty decent carry not to mention a couple of breaks in my matches which you need to win a tournament like this. Walter Ray