Sandbagging

K!LL!@N

I don't know if this term is used in leagues in Ireland or not, as i never bowled league before i left.

Basically a sandbagger is someone who bowls much higher than their average.

Myself, my wife and our two friends joined a league in September.
All of us pretty much beginners so of course we had no handicap or established average.
So now that we're over half-way through the season we're being called sandbaggers almost every game as we're generally bowling better than our averages but still have handicaps in the 50-60 range.
Mostly it's all in jest but on Monday night one of our opponents was being particularly rude about it, which upset my wife and put her off her game a bit.

The funny thing was, that this one lady and her friend both had similar handicaps to ourselves, the 3rd guy on their team had a handicap of 15 and the 4th guy was a scratch bowler who was sick so they automatically got his average which was around 200 or so.

This has turned into a bit of a rant and i'm not sure i even have a point to make anymore.

Just wondering if people come across the same thing in Ireland?

Killian

r3nu4l

It is definitely used as a term of abuse in Ireland alright.

When I first started bowling I had a 144 average after about six months, nothing special. I was asked at very short notice (one day beforehand!) to stand in on a competition for a girl who was sick and couldn't play that night. The competition was at a different centre to where I was bowling at the time. I was delighted and said yes.

It was a handicap tournament of three games in the first heat. So I step up and bowl a 180 game. My highest score at that time. Second game I bowl a 181 and the guys are getting seriously pissed off. I'm delighted because I'm new to the sport and bowling out of my skin Third game I bowl a 160 and the two opponents accuse me of being a sandbagger and actually lodge a complaint.

So my centre has to fax the last 21 league scores to the competition centre and have to check up with the Irish Tenpin Bowling Association to prove my average is only 144. They still didn't take it well and it took months before they would accept that we hadn't pulled a fast one.

Considering that I was a last minute addition, had a higher handicap and yet suddenly bowled high scores I could understand how they felt but it didn't make me feel good at the time. It put me on a downer for a bit but months later I met the guys again and bowled against them at my own centre and they trashed me, so I guess they felt better.

It's a bummer and sad that people get like this just because you are on very good form. Mostly, these people are idiots, sometimes like in my case, it was probably an understandable reaction

Magic Pips

My highest game ever was actually bowled in a competition in stillorgan, i think i had about 5 strikes in a row with a 135-ish handicap... needless to say there were questions asked! But it was all in good humour, generally i've just bowled with/against nice people - long may it continue!

r3nu4l

Funny this thread came up when it did...

Last Sunday I was on my way into my local bowling centre and a guy was coming out the doors wearing a T-shirt that said:

"Prepare to be sandbagged!" on the back

I suppose that's the humourous way of looking at it and to be honest I'm sure it's something that many people get accused of in their earliest bowling days.

cast_iron

I remember the first competition I entered. The guys at the alley suggested we give it a go as we were regulars.
Started with a 60 odd handicap, and we ended up winning it overall (it was a doubles). Lets just say we didn't need to be asked to enter the next time.:)
I suppose it was a form of sandbaging, but nothing intentional and nothing we could do about it anyway.

r3nu4l

This is why I prefer Scratch competition, nobody can accuse you of sandbagging if you are playing scratch

Although if I entered a scratch competition anytime soon, I'd be easily beaten by most people. I need to find my form again

DubTony

I just found the bowling forum through a link from someones post in Poker.

I haven't bowled for about 10 years (my car was stolen with the gear in the boot, and I just never went back)

One of the last leagues I played in was in Bray. (Is that still there?) It was a Friday night league and it kicked off at about 6pm. Lanes were oiled regularly just before we started and I just couldn't hit a damned thing. I averaged about 150 for the league and we managed to sneak into the round robin final (6 teams, five games). The final, however, was played on a Friday night at 8. Lanes had dried out nicely and over the five games I averaged 230. We won the thing, but the atmosphere in the pub afterward was a little bit hostile. The thing was I used to bowl in Crumlin and a bit in Tallaght so none of the players knew me, so I looked like a real chancer. Good times though. I remember them fondly.

r3nu4l

DubTony wrote:

I just found the bowling forum through a link from someones post in Poker.

Welcome to the bowling forum DubTony Hopefully it will encourage you to get back into the game

I can imagine you looked pretty dodgy alright, showing up with a low average and bowling some monster games It is a little too easy for a disgruntled player to accuse someoen of sandbagging, tbh, it seems to be the sore losers who do it. I haven't yet met a bowler who was happy to bowl a bad game even on purpose. There is a certain satisfaction ffro watching all those pins colapse at once

r3nu4l

K!ll!@n, I just had a thought. You are bowling in the States so I'm wondering does you bowling alley use house oil patterns or Sports bowling patterns?

Obviously because it's much harder to bowl a good score on a Sports bowl pattern, if your gf suddenly started bowling a high score it would make others suspicious even if it was just a fluke on her part.

Either way, at least you can let her know that other people have also been on the receving end of bad losers accusing them of sandbagging!