Here is my report of the PBA Denny's World Championship:

This was the last tournament of the season open to all PBA members and the last for players to get crucial points for an exemption into the tour next season or the Japan Cup. And since the PBA Player of the Year award is the closest since I've been on tour, the players are giving it their all.

The players were divided into 3 squads. Each squad bowls 6 games for each of the first 3 days and then the top 1/3 players bowl another 9 games to get into match play. The top 8 players will get seeded into the 'super 16' bypassing 2 matches which the next 32 players will need to win to get there. I was the 'A' squad. I used a 1000 sanded Awesome Finish which is a 100% reactive ball. I really like the way the ball rolls as it gives me a little bit more hook on the back end. I was planning on playing outside around the 1st arrow, but the lanes didn't react the way I was expecting, so I moved left and started the first game playing left of the 2nd arrow on one lane and right of the 2nd arrow on the other. I ended up moving right after the 2nd game and started to hit the pocket better. I had a lot of strikes, unfortunately I had quite a few splits. In the 2nd block I played outside of the 1st arrow. After a horrible start I got things going and finished really strong the last few games. In the 3rd round I was on the 'burn' squad, so I played around the 4th arrow hooking the ball. I bowled pretty well and made the first cut easily. In the 4th round I started playing between the 1st and 2nd arrows. I moved a pinch right after that, but couldn't get much going. The last 3 games I moved inside of the 4th arrow. My carry went from pretty good to bad. Fortunately I had enough pins from my first 18 games to hang on to 30th place.

My round of 40 opponent was Ritchie Allen. Ritchie broke his wrist last summer and deferred his exemption to next season. He has bowled the last 2 majors and is bowling very well. I started the match trying to play outside of the 1st arrow with a sanded Awesome Revs. But the reaction I had was marginal and I kept throwing bad shots. Ritchie on the other hand was playing close to the 4th arrow and throwing the ball very well. In the 3rd game I moved left to around the 7th board and switched to newly drilled Awesome Finish. I finally started striking and won games 3 and 4 to tie the match at 2 games a piece. In game 4 I had a little help from Ritchie as he missed the pocket quite a few times and left a weak 10 in the 10th frame not to beat me. In game 5 I switched to the other Awesome Finish I had been using most of the week. I threw the ball really well the last 3 games, but had quite a few taps. The last game was really frustrating as it was the deciding game and I never struck on the right lane despite never missing the pocket. After starting with a rip 7-10 on the left lane, I left a solid 4 pin, solid 8, solid 10, solid 8 and another solid 10 on the right lane while Ritchie started with a 7 bagger which included a tripped 2-8. Ritchie bowled a great match, but I don't know that he should have outscored me by almost 200 pins when he actually missed the pocket more times than I did. Bowling can be a very frustrating sport sometimes, and on this day (March 22) it was very frustrating for me. For the first 3 days my carry was 76% when I hit the pocket on 80% pocket hits with quite a few off pocket strikes. On Thursday for the 4th round and match play round, my carry was 64% on 82% pocket hits and no off pocket strikes. It is amazing what can happen sometimes. Hopefully next week at the Tournament of Champions, my carry is well over 70% and I hit the pocket a lot.