OK, I get it. But as explained in last month's JPA, that's how it is right now at the game's highest level. There will be another trip to Pro Shop 401 before spring, but you have enough to chew on for awhile.

     And now something we haven't done since the late 90's, take a trip and visit some of the greatest bowling balls of all time. Starting with Brunswick's Mineralite and Black Beauty, what bowling balls made the most impact on the game as we know it now. It's tougher these days with balls on the market for only two years or less, but there are a number of magic spheres that people of different styles used with great success. This is just a timeline and not an overall ranking.

     Mid 20th century choices would be Ace Rubber, Ebonite Tornado, AMF Amflite, and Brunswick Black Diamond. All these were rubber-shelled, but old timers would tell you each rolled a bit differently traveling down the lane. This was due to different densities and thicknesses of the weight block combined with filler material(sound familiar?) Some of the pancake or hamburger pattie-sized blocks were thinner or thicker depending if cork or rubber were used inside. The Amflite had two memorable versions featuring teaching aids. The 1950's edition had the thin red line embedded in the surface through the label area to assist in throwing the desired full roller release of the day, while the 1960's version had the three white dots above the fingers allowing the three-quarter roll player the same privilege. Those three white dowels lead us into our next ball.

     The 1960's brought in the polyester era and the pearlized look. Columbia Industries made this ball with a dowel mark of its own right in the center of the grip which was white in color. But serious bowlers did not know this ball was that far ahead of its time. Lanes were still wood coated with shellac, so the rubber ball still had decent grip. Not known at the time were the polyurethane coatings on the horizon which this new plastic ball gripped even better then the rubber ball did at that time. But this White Dot was prettier than the all black ball. And this ball had a much smoother inside finish rather than the cork and rubber feel. Nor did it leave any black marks once a hole was made slightly larger. Soon, there would be numerous colors and once sales took off, other manufacturers jumped with their versions as well.

     The 1970's ushered in the end of the shellac-coated lanes. It wore off too fast. Plus, it was quite flammable in its liquid state, so applying it was tricky at best, but so were the first urethane finishes. One thing really stood out. The serious bowlers noticed the hard rubber ball did not grip the same once a center switched from shellac to urethane coated wood lanes. What would grip now? At this point, a few knew a poly-based surface gripped another poly-based surface. But the reaction was just as good, if not better. Sometimes the ball would come in at a little sharper angle. What could we do to make the plastic ball grip even more? One man took this to the extreme in soaking balls in different solvents, trying to find what would make the shell even softer, allowing him to hook the ball more and play a different part of the lane than others. Toluene and methyl ethyl ketone (MEK) were a couple of the more successful solvents used and by early 1973, Don McCune had stepped from average professional to Player of the Year. By experimenting on which chemicals and length of soaking time, he began a revolution still going strong today.

     By mid-1974, hardness regulations were put in place for both league bowlers and professionals by their respective governing organizations, and McCune's edge would disappear, but his findings would be just beginning. Manufacturers would try to mass-produce a softer plastic ball. The most successful was one of most recognizable ball of all time, the Columbia Yellow Dot. It was used on TV quite a bit by bowlers who delivered it in a straighter manner, like Don Johnson, or by a man who is credited with being the father of the modern power game, Mark Roth.

     But rubber was not done quite yet. Brunswick's plastic was not gripping (or selling) as well as Columbia's, so maybe a softer rubber shelled ball might do the trick. And the Johnny Petraglia LT-48 was born. Ebonite had theirs by the late 70's, the Earl Anthony Magnum 10. These worked on heavier oil when the even a really soft Yellow Dot did not. The softer plastic and rubber covers worked well in the late 70's, when rumblings of a never-before used cover were heard from coast to coast.

     Needing a boost, AMF had discovered what few knew to this point. Poly-based surfaces gripped other poly based surfaces very well. But what about polyurethane? It does grip well and it is also porous, so it will grip even more than polyester. And in 1981, the AMF Angle proved this point very well. Two new factors now came into play. First, this ball needed to thrown a bit harder to keep it online as lanes began to hook more. Ball surface cleaning was not that important, but ball sanding at this point was virtually unheard of at this point. Proprietors and lane men were noticing more lane wear, especially where the ball first makes contact on the lane surface (called 'the heads'). Second, some league bowlers were sanding the ball in between frames for more traction in response to more oil put on lanes, which was legal at the time. Like the ball cover hardness guidelines a decade earlier, this practice was soon outlawed. Not only were lanes getting chewed up, the sand residue landing on the floor was becoming a hazard to other bowlers. This leads us to the mid 80's and next of the greatest bowling balls of all time, the Black Hammer, which we will start with next month.