Welcome to the Fall 2023 bowling season! This time we are welcoming 27 members back to bowl, as we have now expanded to three teams who are doing rotating 5-person rosters. We are getting very close to moving up to 5 members as the base team size!
Scoot has been unavoidably detained so will miss the first week of bowling. This is what he gets for trying to overturn the results of last season's championship.
Due to an oversight, the stats sheets for this week were printed without any payment information on them. It's the same as it was for last season, but here's a recap: Fees are $250 per person if paid throughout the season, or $210 if paid in advance. For those of you on rotating teams of 5 — what we need from you is the equivalent payment of four bowlers since only 4 of you can bowl at a time. So anywhere from $840 at the low end if the entire team pre-pays, to $1000 at the high end if the entire team spreads out payments. It is the responsibility of the 5-person teams to determine how much each person chips in and what share of prize money each gets at the end of the season.
Though Scoot is 750 miles away he will still be processing your payments remotely, send your payments via Venmo to @scooterjm and if you are asked to enter the last 4 digits of a telephone number, use 4466. Or scan the QR code to the left.
Here is a quick rundown of this season's teams:
Team 1 - Balderdash: Ben Spencer, Dennis Walling, Michael Gordon, Matthew Taylor, and Chris Windham as a rotating team of 5.
Team 2 - &sqrt;-1: (pronounced "square root of negative 1", "Imaginary Number", or "Team Imaginary") Jim Koger, Nathan Burrows, Scott Murdock, and AJ Hofmann.
Team 3 - Glory Bowl: Brtett Affolter, Carl Mueller, Brian Schaeben, Nicholas Knight, and Kent Harms as a rotating team of 5.
Team 4 - They never gave me a name so they shall be called "LenzCrafters" until they come up with something else: JoAnne Barber, Doug Lenz, Chris Lenz, and Jeremy Varnell.
Team 5 - Vigs Eras Tour 2023: Jonathan Vigliaturo, Seth Gunderson, Nick Kinney, and Aaron Barber.
Team 6 - Sun Dolphins: Ryan Sisco, JC Cox, Ray Scott, Claytown Burrow, and Scott Thompson as a rotating team of 5 who plans to be out of last place at least once this season.
On the St. John's Staff front: Kenny had knee replacement surgery so will not be working for at least the first few weeks of our season. Or at least he isn't supposed to be, but knowing him he might be stubborn and come back earlier than he is supposed to. 
Things to look forward to this season:
- All of the lane surfaces have been completely rebuilt from new material, from the approaches all the way to the back end. So we may see some shifts in scores and what lanes people love/hate as everyone readjusts to the new surface.
- Barring anything crazy, Aaron Barber is all but guaranteed to move up to 4th place for total number of league 600+ series. In addition, Matthew Taylor should move up to 8th place and Seth Gunderson should move up to at least 10th.
- Scott Murdock will cross 1,900 career games early in the season, while Seth Gunderson will move up up to 6th place in that same ranking.
This season should be the last season where we play our poker side game with the 20th anniversary decks of cards that were printed in 2019. Spring 2024 will be the league's 50th season (!!!), so a whole new set of playing cards will be released for that season! So try not to be too annoyed or creeped out when Scoot sneaks up on you throughout the season to get quality live-action candid photos of everyone.
We are also working on a new side game that is expected to debut for our Spring 2024 50th season. And if bowler retention remains high, we might expand to 5-person teams next season in order to help clear some of the people who remain stuck on the waiting list.
We hope you all have a great time this season, even if you finish in last place!
