Norman Chad: ESPN takes great sport of bowling to new depths

During a checkered and caloried career as America’s Viewer, Couch Slouch has lost countless battles to the lords of sports television. Dick Vitale, Jim Gray, Norman Esiason, Chris Berman, Doug Collins, Bill Walton and Tim McCarver are all still standing – well, McCarver might be crouching – plus, NASCAR and instant replay will be around long after I’m 6 feet under next to some coaxial cables.

And now I’ve lost my most personal battle over my most treasured TV sport:

Bowling.

(Yes, I care about bowling on TV – what of it? I know it seems incongruous: How can the only person named to both People magazine’s “100 Most Beautiful People” and Soldier of Fortune’s “50 Most Feared Men in North America” be so un-hip? I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – bowling just strikes me right.)

I had implored my colleagues at ESPN to make its weekly PBA telecasts more about characters, stories and entertainment than oil patterns, lane adjustments and ball revolutions. And how did they respond?

1. They hired a second analyst for the telecasts, to create conversations about oil patterns, lane adjustments and ball revolutions.

2. They issued a court order barring me from coming within 500 feet of the network’s Bristol, Conn., headquarters.

So the two-man booth of Dave Ryan and Randy Pedersen has become a three-man booth of Ryan, Pedersen and Norm Duke. This allows Pedersen and Duke to engage in an hour-long dialogue on how each bowler deals with the ever-changing lane conditions.

Is he going to make a ball change? Is he moving in? Is he going to hook it more? Is he going to use more lift? Is he going to try more speed? Or go to a straighter line?

This is all riveting stuff – if you happen to be dating Parker Bohn III.

If you’re a “pinhead” – which is what us weekend rollers call the more serious, “Look-Ma-I’ve-got-my-own- ball!” league bowlers – then maybe spirited discussions on oil absorption turns you on. But I’m with the rental-shoe crowd: I’d rather have my head stuck in a ball return than spend a nanosecond hearing about thumb grips.

Granted, the PBA-on-ESPN people have made some effort to broaden their scope – going with a “Young Guns vs. Legends” theme much of this season – but most of the telecasts remain tethered to bowlingspeak.

Let me give you an example – since we have a bit of column space left – from the recent Ace Hardware Championship at Freeway Lanes in Wickliffe, Ohio.

Duke: “At some point in each round, the outside part of the lane would dry up, allowing Tommy Jones to make the big step to the left and just fire to the outside. And with all those revs, Randy, that ball came back toward the pins and just destroyed them!”

Ryan: “This is interesting because for the first time this year we have overlay, a 20-foot Guardian surface of Formica just 5 millimeters thick over the first 20 feet of the lane. Should create some interesting ball reaction today.”

Pedersen: “And this week, Dave, lane conditions was all about friction. You talked about the surface – the difference between wood surface and a synthetic surface is friction. Wood is a much higher friction type of surface. You put the same oil pattern on wood that you do on synthetics, Norm, you got a lot more hook on wood than you do on synthetics.”

Duke: “You do. And you have to guard from your ball rolling out and hitting the pins weak like Walter Ray (Williams Jr.’s) first shot did, leaving the flat 10.”

This was all in the first 7 minutes!

I was pretty much gone by the next commercial break and found myself a Cheetah Pattern nearby, where I bowled a 147 in peace.

Ask The Slouch

Q. I saw disaster in Big D coming the moment Tony Romo set foot in a stretch limo with Carrie Underwood. Agreed? (Scott Gunther; North Riverside, Ill.)

A. Actually, every time Bill Parcells loses a game like that, I figure he’s halfway to Fiji in a canoe by Monday.

Q. After the Fiesta Bowl, Boise State running back Ian Johnson – on national TV – proposed to his girlfriend. Is that binding? (Matt Costa; Pittsburgh)

A. Luckily for Johnson, he likely violated NCAA regulations and the proposal will be invalidated.

Q. Watching you shuck out all that money week after week, should I leave my field of neuroendocrinology to pursue the more lucrative field of sportswriting? (Dink Hodges; Galveston Island, Texas)

A. There are, like, four millionaire sportswriters in the whole country – Kornheiser, Wilbon, Albom and Lupica. Meanwhile, you can’t walk through Beverly Hills without tripping over a neuroendocrinologist.

Q. Does Bill Cowher take his chin with him or is it property of the NFL? (Terri Fawcett; Chantilly, Va.)

A. Pay the lady, Shirley.