http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/bowling-st-pats-wrong-pants-1.4002840

A youth bowling tournament in St. John's has caused a stir over the colour of a participant's pants.

Seven-year-old Grayson Powell bowled the game of his life on Saturday during a non-league tournament, putting up a high game of 171 en route to a championship win for his team of three.

Grayson was given some harsh news immediately after the provincial gathering — he was disqualified for the colour of his pants.

"The rule is you have to wear black pants," his father, Todd Powell, explained. "The problem I have with it, they allowed him to bowl prior [to disqualification]."

Grayson took part in a 15-minute warm-up. Nothing was said. He then bowled three games — the best three of his young life — and nothing was said.

It wasn't until he was lined up next to his teammates, ready to accept a gold medal for winning the just-for-fun tournament, that Youth Bowl Canada provincial director Gordon Davis pulled Grayson's mother into an office.

Her son, who was wearing faded black jeans, was disqualified.

His pants were just not black enough to meet the tournament's dress code.
"Parents ruin it for kids," Powell said. "If this is what sport is about when it comes to kids...shame on them."

While semantics can be argued — how black were his jeans, really? — Grayson's father has a deeper theory than the colour of his son's pants.
Davis also coaches teams out of a bowling alley in Corner Brook. The teams finishing second and third, who were bumped up to the top spots, were both from his lanes on the island's west coast.

"He should be ashamed of himself," the senior Powell said. "For [Davis] to go back to Corner Brook saying that, 'We won a provincial medal' — no. The three individuals that bowled on Saturday, they are the ones that won that medal."

Davis ejected the Riverdale team to use the provincial win to bolster his own club, Powell alleged.

"He owes these three individuals — three kids — a written apology."
Davis did not return messages left by CBC News.

As for Grayson, he went home feeling dejected, his father said.

When asked by a CBC reporter how the disqualification made him feel, he had only one word.

"Sad."

What makes it look really bad is that the person who made the decision to disqualify the first place team had his teams in second and third place.

Mainzer once again +1000 exactly. This game will NEVER have to integrity it once did. The game is what it is.

If he didn't adere to the dress code he should not have been allowed to even start Bowling. The fact that he was allowed to bowl then disqualified shows poor integrity on the people running the tournament

The people running the tournament may not have noticed until the end of the tournament . I've been to a few youth tournaments where there were several hundred kids and it would be hard to go to each and every lane to visually inspect each child.

In my opinion, this is on the a$$hole parent. There are rules. The parent KNEW the rule. Don't blame poor parenting on someone else.

Actually, the good part of this is that the kid probably learned a valuable lesson.

Unless we see an actual copy of the rules, we're beating a dead horse. If it said dress pants, jeans are out. If they just said black pants, jeans should be in.

From the rules.

1.2 Pants / Shorts
The following items are acceptable attire for the lower portion of the body:
 Dress pants
 Khaki pants
 Golf-style / khaki shorts (solid colour, no designs or patterns)
 Skirts
 Skorts
 Capris
 Black yoga pants (solid black, full-length, no designs or patterns; may contain centre or zone identification).
 Black track pants (solid black, no designs or patterns; may contain centre or zone identification)
The following are NOT acceptable attire for the lower portion of the body:
 Jeans / Denim
 Sweat pants
 Leggings / tights
 Basketball / gym shorts




Looks pretty cut and dry to me. The parents need to take responsibility and shut up. OR, if their precious little spawn of evil is upset, then the parents need to explain how they(the parent) was lazy, or just tried to skirt the rules and screwed the child out of their trophy.


Blaming it on the tournament director is just a low life move.

Its sad that this was the first bowling story that made the newspaper in Vancouver in a couple years

Here's the Rebuttal that was posted by the official: (Its long!)

https://www.facebook.com/nlyouthbowling/posts/970958279703255

basically it reads like the officials all knew at the start, they just kept passing the buck around and dragging their feet till the tourny was going. Saying the program director should have took care of it and we didn't want to embarrass the kids.