Bowlers Journal International - January 2008 - (Page 103) BY J.R. SCHMIDT TIMECAPSULE FLASHBACK 10 YEARS AGO WALTER RAY WILLIAMS JR. retains the No. 1 position in the PBA Power Rankings through the entire year Chris Barnes, citing declining money-making opportunities in amateur bowling, resigns from Team USA and joins the PBA The Ladies Pro Bowlers Tour name is retired, as the LPBT becomes the Professional Women's Bowling Association. Plans call for the 1998 PWBA season to end with four tournaments offering a combined $650,000 in prize money Kim Adler wins the LPBT Sam's Town Invitational, pushing her yearly earnings over the $100,000 plateau Christian Nokel of Germany and Su-Fen Tseng of Chinese Taipei roll to victory in the AMF World Cup, held outdoors in the shadows of the Egyptian pyramids A Finnish bowler named Mika Koivuniemi wins the $100,000 first prize in the Super Hoinke Classic at Western Bowl in Cincinnati. STEVE NAGY SURE COULD PUT ON A SHOW ONE OF THE SPORT'S ALL-TIME GREATS ALSO WAS ONE OF ITS NICE GUYS. STEVE NAGY LOVED TO TELL PEOPLE about his first bowling ball. The year was 1939, and young Steve had just plunked down five hard-earned dollars to buy a beautiful, red plastic ball. One cold night, he arrived at the lanes with only a few minutes to go before league time, so he set the ball down on a radiator to warm up. Came the first frame, Steve grabbed the ball, sprinted to the line, and rolled a strike. "Of course, it was a strike!" he'd roar. "As soon as it hit the headpin, the ball split in two, and took out the pins on either side!" That tale pretty much sums up the image of Steve Nagy we have today — down-to-earth, a bit disorganized, funny, yet effective. "Nagy didn't look like much; he had a sloppy style," Buddy Bomar once observed. "But he had great instinct, and was one of the best." Nagy was a broad-shouldered, black-moustachioed, Hungarian cabinet-maker from Cleveland. During his heyday in the 1950s, he always put on a good show. He ran out strikes, jumped ball returns, yelled at the pins. More than once, big Steve pulled off his belt and whipped his ball if he was bowling badly. Off the lanes, he was never too tired or too busy to sign an autograph or chat with a fan. The public loved him. So did the other bowlers. And as Bomar said, Nagy could knock down some pins, too. He had rolled a few games as a kid, but Nagy didn’t take bowling seriously until he went to his first ABC Tournament with a Booster team at age 25. That was in 1939, the year of the split ball. During the next decade, he gradually built himself into a national star. In 1952, he was named Bowler of the Year. That honor was based mostly on Nagy’s performance at the ABC. He teamed with Johnny Klares to win the Doubles with a record score that would stand for nearly 40 years. Along the way, Nagy also picked up the All-Events eagle. His 1954-55 season made Nagy a household name. In August, he traveled to Chicago for the "Championship Bowling" TV series and proceeded to roll a 300 game. It was the first perfect game ever captured on film. Half-acentury and half-a-million 300s later, it’s still exciting to watch. A few months later, he was back in Chicago for the All-Star Tournament. Starting slowly, Nagy managed to tie Graz Castellano for the last spot in the finals, won a 2 a.m. rolloff, then got his game together. Over the next few days, Nagy moved up steadily in the standings until he met Ed Lubanski in the ultimate showdown. Lubanski caught a rail at a crucial juncture, and Nagy swept the match and was crowned All-Star champion. Once more, Steve Nagy was elected Bowler of the Year. He also became the first bowler featured on the cover of Sports Illustrated. He is still the STEVE NAGY only bowler with that distinction. Nagy bowled an occasional season with some great teams — Stroh’s and Pfeiffer in Detroit, Falstaff in St. Louis, the National Bowling League entry in Los Angeles. But always he came back to Cleveland. Not that it mattered much. His tournament, exhibition and TV work kept Nagy on the road. One year he slept in his own bed all of 30 nights. He was one of the organizers of the PBA and served a term as president. It was during a Tour event in Boston that Nagy suffered a stroke in 1965. A year later, he was dead at 53. The PBA later instituted a Steve Nagy Award to honor the “good guys” of pro bowling. It could be considered the Anti-Durocher Award. As much as anyone, Steve Nagy showed that nice guys also could finish first. JANUARY 2008 bowlers journal international 103 25 YEARS AGO THE NO. 1 HORSEHOE PITcher in the world, a 22-year-old named Walter Ray Williams Jr., joins the PBA because there's a potentially more lucrative future in pro bowling. "I guess I'm the Earl Anthony of horseshoes," Williams says. "The difference is, he makes money and I don't." "Pro Bowlers Tour" earns a renewal for its five-week spring segment on ABC-TV thanks to its solid 5.0 rating Nikki Gianulias wins her fourth LPBT title of the year and breaks the single-season earnings record for women pros with $45,875 When a Malta center operator raises the price per line from $1.25 to $1.50, the local bowling association calls a strike. After five months, all 300 league bowlers return and agree to pay the new price. 50 YEARS AGO ROLLING ON THE "BOWLing Stars" television program, Lindy Faragalli records a 300 game to earn $10,000 It's a familiar refrain in the World's Invitational Championships: Don Carter and Marion Ladewig win the titles The Falstaff Beer team of Billy Welu, Carl Richard, Woody Hulsey, Harry Smith, Buzz Fazio and Steve Nagy rolls to victory over Reserve Beer in the National Team Championship Brunswick Chairman R.F. Bensinger says the future looks bright for the industry, mainly because of automated pinsetting machines and the in-school bowling program The Chicago "Red Book" bows to industry pressure and changes one of its directory headings from "Bowling Alleys" to "Bowling Lanes."
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