Just one month left to go! The twelfth week of Spring 2022 saw one team climb in the standings, while one team slipped. Two bowlers rolled new personal best games. AJ Hofmann snagged this week's high game with a 234, and high series was earned by Carl Goetz with a 566. No women were present to represent the female scoring contigent. Read on for all the rest of the details!

First up, on lanes 1 & 2: Whenever ChuckaScoot or Going, Going, BALD! has to roll on lanes 1 & 2, I get endless complaints about the quality of the pin action. When both teams are rolling on those lanes, I sometimes wish I'd stayed home. (More on this further down in this post.) Despite all the complaining, Scoot Chuckers collected 3 wins against Baldness while led by Carl Goetz with his 566 series. Conversely, Matthew Taylor with his only slightly-off 547 series showed off for Baldness despite his team notching only a single win. ChuckaScoot climbs 1 spot in the standings to 1st place, while Baldness sink 1 spot to 2nd.

On lanes 3 & 4: In a fairly closely-matched lineup Flamboyant Fluffykins did NOT have a rendezvous with Splits & Giggles due to the forfeiting nature of the latter. Despite (yet also because of due to the way the math works) the best efforts of Dustin and Nathan to screw this up for him in games 1 & 2 (especially game 1), Rilen Schmeltz earned Most Valuable Bowler as he helped Flamboyant at least collect 3 of the 4 possible wins. With Giggles forfeiting, all Flamboyant needed to do was roll within 40 pins of their combined team average each game. But that's just not quite how things went. Flamboyant Fluffykins remains in 4th place, while Giggles remain in 6th.

Finally, down on lanes 5 & 6: Despite the vast difference in win-loss records, an actually closely-matched pair of teams gathered as The Wally McWallingtons spent some quality time with Glory Bowl. Despite a show of strength by AJ Hofmann with his above-average 506 series, The McWallingtons accomplished only 1 win against Glory. Countering this, Kent Harms with his better-than-normal 547 series called the shots for Glory (with props to #1 Power-Ranked and #1 Head-to-Head Nicholas Knight) as his team took the match with 3 wins. The Wally McWallingtons remains in 5th place, while Glory remains in 3rd.

Bowlers who managed to get through a late night at a rowdy 200 Club without getting stabbed include: AJ Hofmann (234), Dustin Schmeltz (207), Kent Harms (213), Matthew Taylor (208), and Seth Gunderson (211)

New personal high games were set tonight by Nathan Burrows (187, previous best 182) and Nicholas Knight (194, previous best 187).

In this week's Tournament of Champions brackets: Nobody claimed victory in Division 1 (though Dennis Walling came closest), while Brett Affolter mopped up Division 2. Nobody claimed victory in Division 3 (though Ryan Sisco came closest), and Nicholas Knight crushed Division 4. In terms of overall points: Matthew Taylor tops Division 1; Dustin Schmeltz dominates Division 2; JoAnne Barber reigns over Division 3; and Brandon Martinez holds the reins in Division 4.

As the person who has been manually typing all the scores in each week and spends a great deal of time looking at the numbers, I've been suspecting something about lanes 1 & 2 so I decided to put it to the test. Yes, lanes 1 & 2 use a separate pool of pins, and those pins are newer. But I wanted to see how much of an effect that actually has.

Overall, yes, as a whole the league performs worse on lanes 1 & 2. On average, people roll 2.3% under average on those lanes. They roll 2.6% over average on lanes 5 & 6. And everyone loves lanes 3 & 4, where we roll an impressive 15.1% over average.

However, when I isolated the league into groups by skill level, the trend I had been suspecting proved true. The higher a bowler's skill level, the worse they do on 1 & 2. Bowlers with averages >= 150 roll a average of 4.7% below average on 1&2. If you're >= 170, it becomes 11.5% below average. And bowlers with averages of 180+ roll a whopping 16.5% below average on these lanes.

But at the other end of skill level, bowlers with averages below 150 roll only 0.1% under average on 1&2, while those with averages below 130 roll 3.3% above average on lanes 1&2, better than they do on 5&6. And bowlers below 120? They roll 8.2% above average on lanes 1&2, more than twice what they do on lanes 5&6.

Comparing scores across seasons, lanes 1&2 slightly underperform our lanes at Gladstone Bowl but are better than lanes 9&10 and lanes 15&16 at AMF. (The other two pairs of lanes score better than Gladstone and on par with AMF.)

So, yes, there is clearly a difference in how lanes 1&2 perform compared to the other lanes. But whatever that difference is, it's something that novice bowlers seems to have an easier time overcoming.

NEXT WEEK:

• First, on lanes 1&2, 3rd-place Glory Bowl will throw some gutter balls with 6th-place Splits & Giggles (hcp 42). Glory is expected to roll a little low and lose the series but avoid getting swept; while Giggles are forecast to raise their average while they enjoy their victories.
• Moving to lanes 3&4, 5th-place The Wally McWallingtons (hcp 124) will chill with 1st-place ChuckaScoot. The McWallingtons might roll a little low and lose the series but avoid getting swept; while Scoot Chuckers ought to hold steady as they enjoy their victories.
• Finally, on lanes 5&6, 2nd-place Going, Going, BALD! will socialize with 4th-place Flamboyant Fluffykins (hcp 126). Baldness are predicted to maintain their current strength as they sweep the series; while Flamboyant is anticipated to raise their average even as they endure a rough night.

^*(Remember, the predicted results above are based on mathematical extrapolations and can be changed by all sorts of factors. If you don't like how your team's results are predicted, you and your teammates have the power to prove the math wrong!)

THIS WEEK'S MVB Rilen Schmeltz Runner Up: (See Posting)	#1 POWER BOWLER Nicholas Knight Runner Up: Rilen Schmeltz	#1 H2H BOWLER Nicholas Knight Runner Up: Rilen Schmeltz
FROM THE GUTTER (GUTTER QUOTE) "Have Dennis's muscles shrunk or did he buy a shirt that fits?" AJ Hofmann, disappointed at not being able to enjoy the sight of those ripped upper arms and chiseled abs.