A perfect game is the highest score possible in a game of bowling, achieved by scoring a strike in every frame. In bowling games that use 10 pins, such as ten-pin bowling, candlepin bowling, and duckpin bowling, the highest possible score is 300, achieved by bowling 12 strikes in a row in a traditional single game: one strike in each of the first nine frames, and three more in the tenth frame. Because a strike counts as ten pins plus any pinfall in the next two balls, 30 points are possible in a given frame. In current frame scoring game, 10 strikes in a row means perfect game.
Walter Ray Williams Jr. is an American professional bowler and former horseshoes pitcher. He currently holds the record for all-time standard PBA Tour career titles (47) and total PBA earnings. He is a seven-time PBA Player of the Year, and won at least one PBA Tour title in 17 consecutive seasons ; both of these feats are also PBA records. He starred in the ten-pin bowling sports documentary A League of Ordinary Gentlemen. He is currently active on both the PBA Tour and the PBA50 Tour, and has won 12 titles on the PBA50 Tour. On December 18, 2016, Williams became the first player in history to reach 100 total PBA titles. The total is now 108 as of April 2019.
The PBA Tournament of Champions is one of the four major PBA bowling events. The inaugural event, held by the PBA in 1962, featured all 25 PBA Tour title-holders to date, and was won by PBA Hall of Famer Joe Joseph, who had qualified for the tournament only four events prior. In 1965, the tournament featured all champions since the 1962 event, before officially becoming an annual event in 1966. From 1965 to 1993, Firestone Tire sponsored the Tournament of Champions. From 1965 until 1994, the tournament was contested at Riviera Lanes in Fairlawn, Ohio near the long-time Firestone World Headquarters in Akron, Ohio. In a notable opening match at the 1967 Tournament of Champions finals, Jack Biondolillo rolled the first-ever nationally televised 300 game. Oddly, Biondolillo would only tally a 188 score in his next match, before being eliminated in his third match with a 172 score. Biondolillo's feat was not matched until 2015, when Sean Rash rolled the TOC's second televised perfect game in the second match of the stepladder finals. The tournament has also seen a pair of televised 299 games, by Don Johnson (1970) and Mika Koivuniemi (2011). The 2011 event also featured the lowest-ever game bowled in a nationally televised PBA event as well as the largest pin differential in a PBA match, when Koivuniemi defeated Tom Daugherty in the semifinals, 299–100.
Chris Barnes is an American professional bowler currently on the Professional Bowlers Association (PBA) Tour. He attended Topeka High School, and then bowled collegiately at Wichita State University, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Business Management. He was a member of Team USA for four years.
Kelly Kulick is an American professional bowler and sportscaster. She has won ten professional women's bowling titles and one PBA Tour title. She is a 14-time member of Team USA. Kulick is currently a pro staff member for Storm Bowling, Vise grips and High 5 gear. She has won four medals at The World Games, including two golds.
The Professional Women's Bowling Association (PWBA) organizes and oversees a series of annual tournaments for the top competitive women ten-pin bowlers. The series is often referred to as the "women's tour" of bowling. The PWBA was formed in 1960 but ceased operations in 2003. The PWBA Tour was re-launched in 2015 by the United States Bowling Congress (USBC) and Bowling Proprietors’ Association of America (BPAA) with a three-year funding commitment. In addition, through a new partnership with the Professional Bowlers Association (PBA), the PBA began conducting PWBA Regional (women-only) events and PWBA members are now allowed to bowl all PBA events.
The PBA Tour is the major professional tour for ten-pin bowling, operated by the Professional Bowlers Association. Headquartered in Seattle, Washington, 4,300 members worldwide make up the PBA. Within the membership, a small percentage of the bowlers compete on both a national and international level, forming the PBA Tour.
The Professional Bowlers Tour, also known as Pro Bowlers Tour, is a broadcast of the Professional Bowlers Association that aired on ABC from 1962 to 1997. In the telecasts, sportscaster Chris Schenkel and the graphics displayed during the show would refer to the show as "The Professional Bowlers Tour", possibly to disambiguate from the NFL's use of the term "pro bowler" when referring to players who were selected for the Pro Bowl—an event also televised on ABC for many years.
Tommy Jones is an American professional bowler currently on the PBA Tour.
The PBA Women's Series was a mini-tour for female professional bowlers. It was started in 2007 as a way to bring women's bowling back to television after the Professional Women's Bowling Association (PWBA) disbanded in 2003. Sponsored by the United States Bowling Congress (USBC) and its website bowl.com, it ran concurrently with several stops on the Professional Bowlers Association's men's tour.
Wesley Clint "Big Nasty" Malott is an American professional ten-pin bowler who resides in Pflugerville, Texas. He has ten titles in 14 full seasons on the PBA tour, having won at least one title in four straight seasons. Malott also won the 2006–07 Showplace Lanes Megabucks Shootout, which is not a PBA Tour event. He has finished runner-up in a PBA major tournament five times.
Patrick Allen is a left-handed ten-pin bowler currently on the Professional Bowlers Association (PBA) Tour. He has won 13 PBA titles, including two majors.
Ryan Jacob "Rhino" Page is a left-handed bowler on the Professional Bowlers Association (PBA) Tour, and was the 2008 PBA Rookie of the Year. He is also a former U.S. Amateur champion, winning the event in 2005. A San Diego, California native, Page now resides in Orlando, Florida. Page attended the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas. He helped the Jayhawks win the school's first-ever Intercollegiate Bowling Championship in 2004, and was named the MVP of the championships.
Michael Todd Fagan is an American professional bowler on the PBA Tour. He has also participated in World Bowling Tour (WBT) and European Bowling Tour (EBT) events, and as a member of Team USA in international competitions. Known for his high backswing, he is sometimes known as the "King of Swing". He has a high RPM rate, but also has a smooth release, so his style can be classified as either a cranker or a power stroker.
Thomas Smallwood is a professional ten-pin bowler currently competing on the PBA Tour and resident of Saginaw, Michigan. On December 13, 2009, the right-hander won his first PBA Tour title and first major in the PBA World Championship, defeating 2008–09 PBA Player of the Year Wes Malott in the final match. Smallwood has won three PBA Tour titles, two of which are majors.
This is a recap of the 2011–12 season for the Professional Bowlers Association (PBA) Tour. It is the tour's 53rd season, and the third straight season in which all of the first half events were condensed into the PBA World Series of Bowling (WSOB). The season consisted of 15 title events. This is also the final season in which the PBA is using an "exempt" player list. The "exempt" status for touring players will not be carried into the 2012–13 season.
Ryan Ciminelli is a left-handed ten-pin bowler from Cheektowaga, New York. Since 2007, he has competed on the Professional Bowlers Association (PBA) Tour. Ciminelli has won seven PBA Tour titles, including one major championship, in addition to 12 PBA Regional titles. He has earned over $590,000 on Tour to date, and has rolled 13 perfect 300 games in PBA competition. Ryan is a staff member of Motiv Bowling and Turbo Grips. He was given the nickname "The Ryan Express" in the 2012 Tournament of Champions TV introductions, while his DV8 bio listed the nickname "Hit Man".
The 2018 PBA Tour season, the 59th season of play of the U.S. Professional Bowlers Association's (PBA) ten-pin bowling tour, began on January 26, 2018. The season included 21 singles title events, two doubles title events, and a non-title team event. The 2018 season was used to mark the PBA's 60th year of operations, which included a 148-player PBA 60th Anniversary Classic in Indianapolis, and the unveiling of the Tour's top 60 moments.
The 2019 PBA Tour season, the 60th season of play for the U.S. Professional Bowlers Association's ten-pin bowling tour, will begin in January 2019 with the PBA Hall of Fame Classic in Arlington, Texas. The current season schedule has 28 singles title events, two doubles title events, and two non-title team events.
