Bowlers Journal International - February 2008 - (Page 40) ANALYSIS BY JIM DRESSEL HOW CAN DON CARTER 'LOSE' A GRAND SLAM? IT'S ONE THING FOR THE PBA TO DESIGNATE AN EVENT AS A 'MAJOR.' BUT IT'S ENTIRELY ANOTHER TO 'REWRITE' TOURNAMENT HISTORY. IS IT POSSIBLE THE PROFESSIONAL Bowlers Association might disenfranchise some of its legendary pioneers? It’s not a trick question. It has already happened. Oh, it surely isn’t being done intentionally. The Seattle-based pro ”league” may not even know about it. It only came to our attention when we turned to the PBA’s official 2007-08 Media Guide to check out the statistics regarding the career ”major” victories of one of today’s elite talents. The index told us that the PBA actually dedicated a chapter to ”Most Career Major Titles.” So we duly turned to page 164 of the Guide to find the information we sought. However, what wasn’t there made us do a delayed double-take. So we checked again, and sure enough, nowhere on that list was the man who won four All-Stars, five World’s Invitationals, the ABC Masters and the PBA National Championship. We had known all about the controversy over the Masters — whether it was considered a PBA title — but we didn’t know that the organization did not recognize the World’s Invitational or the All-Star (the predecessor of the U.S. Open) as "majors." However, the listing of "Most Career Major Titles" in the PBA Guide indicates that those majors are not PBA majors. So, Don Carter, the PBA pioneer who scored what was publicized as bowling’s first ”grand slam,” appears to have not only relinquished his status as the legendary "king of the majors," but may also be on the verge of becoming a non-person to the PBA — at least, when it comes to receiving recognition for winning the most grueling tournaments of the pre-PBA era. Carter generally is acknowledged to have 11 majors to his credit. He seemed 40 bowlers journal international nonplussed at the PBA’s oversight. “During your era, they’re majors,” he said of the grueling 100-game World’s Invitational and All-Star tests. “Then when you get older, they take them away from you.” The same cannot be said about the Masters. The PBA has always had a view that the Masters events in which it was involved — which was true of those from 1997 on — are considered majors, while those in which it was not, are ”regular” events. The theory just doesn’t wash with some. Pete Weber, for instance. When told that he’d tied Earl Anthony with eight majors after winning the ’07 U.S. Open, he wanted to know if Anthony’s octet included Earl’s pair of Masters triumphs. When told, ”No,” he had a classy response: ”As far as I’m concerned, those two Masters crowns means that Anthony has 10 majors. So I don’t care what the PBA says, I still have some catching up to do.” The controversy over PBA’s inconsistent treatment of the Masters flared up when Walter Ray Williams Jr. emerged as the PBA career title leader with 42 titles after he won the 2006 Japan Cup. Included in WRW’s victories was a Masters crown, while Anthony’s two Masters victories were not counted toward his 41-title total. Fortunately, WRW settled the issue recently when he won PBA titles #43 and 44, leaving him the unchallenged titles leader. WHAT IS A ’MAJOR’? It’s the central question of this opus, but, as syndicated columnist extraordinaire and long-time PBA historian Chuck Pezzano said, ”I don’t think there’s a definitive answer.” According to the estimable Noah Webster, ”major” means “greater in size, amount, number or extent great- er in importance or rank.” When it comes to being a major sports event, the “esteem” in which the competition is held — or the level at which the game is played, a la Major League Baseball — would seem to have quite a lot to do with it. As for bowling events, majors have traditionally been defined as such by a variety of sources, such as the media, the players themselves, the fans, the industry in general, and the PBA specifically, among a gaggle of others. A consensus, in other words. Which is why it was generally accepted that Don Carter, for example, was credited with scoring bowling’s first ”grand slam” — it simply wouldn’t have been a slam if it didn’t involve four major titles. Now? According to Mike McGrath, who won three of the choice events, ”A ’major’ seems to have become whatever the PBA says it is.” We like the definition offered by Matt Fiorito, another PBA Hall of Famer and long-time bowling columnist of The Detroit Free Press. ”Majors are in the eye of the beholder,” he says. Fiorito expands: ”Being a major usually depends on the inclusiveness of the field, the amount of prize money and the hype the event achieves. ”It also is imperative that the events be able to attract sufficient media in order to merit the label.” Another key is the player’s mindset. Fiorito says it can’t be ignored. ”If it is a bona fide major, you’ll find a lot of players saying, ’This tournament is one I really want to win.’ That’s because the really good ones put on a different game face for those tournaments, which is why the fickle media accepted them as majors. ”For example, when you look at Earl Anthony’s record in the PBA National, FEBRUARY 2008
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