Columnist Ron Kantowski: Dollars for bowling as women receive PBA nod

Friday, April 9, 2004 | 9:45 a.m.

Ron Kantowski is a Las Vegas Sun sports writer. Reach him at ron@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4088.

The fact that women became eligible to compete on the PBA Tour last Monday hasn't created the kind of stir at your local bowling center that would develop if, say, the cigarette machine suddenly ran out of Camels.

But it did give the senior touring pros loosening up for match play at the American Bowling Congress (ABC) Senior Masters at the Suncoast Bowling Center something to talk about Thursday.

In a policy change that it believes to be a first in professional sports, the PBA has announced it will allow women to join its membership immediately. Women will need to meet the same requirements as men, which is to maintain a 200-average or greater for two consecutive 66-game league seasons.

Women who join the PBA will be allowed to participate in PBA regional events and in theory, will be eligible to compete on the PBA Tour via qualifying tournaments. It's an option that some may explore, given the women's pro tour capitulated late last year due to lack of funds.

At least, that's the spin -- or should I say hook? -- that the PBA is putting on it.

"We have had requests from women over the past year to participate in our regional events," PBA Commissioner Fred Schreyer said in a statement. "We thought about it for a long time and concluded, why not? We currently allow non-members to participate in our tournaments, and we felt that if a woman can meet the same criteria, she should be allowed to compete and become a member."

But there is a percentage of male touring pros -- like 100 percent of the ones age 50-older I spoke with at the Suncoast -- who believe the PBA's change of heart regarding women is more about money and publicity than equal opportunity.

You've heard of Bowling for Dollars? This may be more about Dollars for Bowling.

"The PBA wants their money is all," said Gary Dickinson, a former Senior Masters winner, as he took a long, thoughtful drag on his cigarette.

"I don't know how many of them will want to be part of a dog-and-pony show," added Ron DeGroat, a veteran pro now residing in Las Vegas who helps supplement his income by cherry-picking pro events in his back yard.

Neither Dickinson nor DeGroat said they had a problem competing against women -- in fact, DeGroat coaches several female pros. But both said including women in PBA events, provided they cash a check that would have previously gone to a man, will make it even more difficult to carve out a living on tour when it already takes a titanium axe.

For instance, the Senior Masters, the most lucrative tournament on the old guys' circuit, offers a total purse of just $159,250 and $20,000 to win. That's about what Tiger Woods will tip the clubhouse boy at Augusta this week.

"When I turned 50, we had 17 tournaments and we were on TV every week," Dickinson said. "Now there's no TV, and we have only 7 or 8 events. The PBA hasn't been very good to us seniors."

Dickinson said he believed there were only three or four women good enough to compete with the men, mentioning the Dorin sisters, Carolyn Dorin-Ballard and Cathy Dorin-Lizzi, and Anne Marie Dugan among that group. DeGroat thought there might be a handful of others who might be able to knock 'em down with the boys, adding Henderson's Wendy Macpherson and Carol Gianotti-Block to his short list.

DeGroat said there are a lot more 240-average players on the men's tours than the women's, which would make it difficult for the women to cash a paycheck. He said when you do the math, adding in travel expenses, it probably wouldn't make financial sense for women to bowl with the men, unless they could do it close to home.

That precedent already has been established. In the ABC Masters, a non-PBA event that has been open to women for roughly 10 years, Dana Miller-Mackey posted a 3-2 match play record against some of the top male players in 2000, when the Masters was in her hometown of Albuquerque.

But as the senior players indicated, before the women can compete with the men, they first must have a desire to do so.

Macpherson, for one, isn't interested.

Reached at Sam's Town Thursday, where she was working a High Roller event for amateur bowlers, Macpherson said she was comfortable with her standing and reputation among her peers and had little else to prove to herself or others.

"At this point, it's not something I would be interested in," said Macpherson, 36, a 19-time national champion who was named the pro bowler of the 1990s by the Women's International Bowling Congress and has earned $1.2 million during an 18-year professional career.

"My belief is men have their place and women have theirs. I don't know how competitive women would be. But maybe somebody may come along and I might end up eating my words."

Macpherson said if the circumstances were right, she might try entering a men's regional, but that would be it.

"If it didn't cost a lot to drive there," she said, adding that a job at Sunset Lanes is keeping her occupied as well as preparing her for a life without competitive bowling, if the women's tour isn't revived. "But I have no bare-roots desire to compete against men."

Still, at the PBA home office in Seattle, where many of its executives struck it rich while employed at Microsoft, there's a hope the addition of female players might give pro bowling the shot in the arm it so desperately needs.

I must confess that since ABC handed Chris Schenkel and sidekick Nelson Burton Jr. their walking papers, the last bowling match I watched it its entirety was Bill Murray vs. Randy Quaid in "Kingpin." Before that, it was one of those made-for-TV, battle-of-the-sexes matches at Sam's Town many years ago featuring Norm Duke and Robin Romeo.

Duke won -- by rolling a perfect game. I can still see him hustling back to his chair as his string of strikes grew longer, puffing away on a cigarette he cupped to his mouth as the enthusiastic crowd chanted his name.

Maybe it was a groove of oil flowing toward the pocket that was responsible for Duke's 300. But I'll go to my grave believing that it was the presence of a woman that allowed me to witness perfection.