Hi everyone!
This is my first post here at ball reviews.com and I am doing so to clarify the mystery of why I switched balls on the show.
First of all, I used 3 differents Sling Blades all week. One was a 3 1/4" stacked layout with a hole, one was a 4"pin by 2"cg with a hole, and the other was a 3 1/2" label drilling without a balance hole(my axis is 5" across by 3/4" up). All of them had some degree of surface to them, mostly scotch brite. I had found that using these 3 balls allowed me to stay in the track and keep the ball online to the pocket.
Now onto the show!
As most of you know, many bowlers comment on how different the show is compared to the rest of the week....WELL, they were pretty different for me. I had a good bit more hook in the track and they were pretty tight right of 10 and left of 18. I am sure you saw Carol Gianotti's ball go high when it was in the track and when she moved left her ball would come up a little light. Well that is exactly the reaction I got from my sling blades in practice. I decided to use a Vicious pearl(yes, a Vicious Pearl) with surface on it because it was a clean cover with a rollier core. It made me play a little further left, but seemed to get me by the first match.(All week long, the further I moved left my ball would not roll through the pins the right way) I threw 2 sling blades in the 10th frame against Carol to see if I could get back to the right and keep it online. One left a bucket and the other left a 2-pin. I felt that all I would have to do is move 2 right and those balls would work like they had all week. Well, needless to say, they did not work out the way I expected. There was approximately 8 minutes between matches and Michelle got to throw for about 6 minutes on the TV pair. I, however did not get any additional shots on that pair befor the start of the title match. I knew that Michelle's reaction was pretty good and it was going to take a pretty good game to win, so I felt that a ball change was necessary. I was surprised when my sling blade did not read the lane the way I had expected it to.
You know, you only get a moment to make the right decision and unfortunately, my best guess was not the proper one. I do want to thank all of you for watching the tv show and by all of your posts it is obvious that people are watching womens bowling. Unfortunately, the posts are about a ball change that did not work out. Lets not forget that Michelle bowled great all week and bowled 250 on the show.
If I had to do it over again, I would have still gone with my gut and done the same thing. I do not regret anything that I did on that show.
Once again, thanks for taking notice! Hopefully I will get many chances to make the mistake again!!!
You gotta get to the title match to make that decision! And I will take that chance every time!!!
Best of Luck to you all!!
Kendra Gaines
