All four finalists will be in action in the very first match this Sunday as bowling fans will experience the unique pace and player strategies of the "eliminator" format beginning with this week's telecast of the Professional Bowlers Association World Championship Don Carter Division finals at 1 p.m. ET on ESPN from the South Point Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas.

Designed to provide bowling fans with more action and more exposure for their favorite players, the PBA has incorporated the eliminator format into its entire series of PBA World Series of Bowling telecasts.

In addition to the five-show PBA World Championship, the format will also be used for the finals of all four of the PBA's "animal pattern" championship events, the Carmen Salvino Classic and Elite Players Championship.

In the eliminator format, the four players bowl at the same time to start each telecast. The player who bowls the lowest score in the first game is eliminated and the other three advance to the second round where the same format applies.

Game three features the two surviving players, who bowl one more game for the title or division crown in the case of this week's show. The format means nine games will be seen in full on the telecasts, as opposes to six in more traditional formats.

For decades, the PBA's "stepladder" TV format would pit the No. 4 qualifier against the No. 5 qualifier in a one-game match. The winner will bowl against the No. 3 qualifier, and so on.

The leading qualifier would bowl only one game to either win or lose the title. In recent years, a bracket-style format with two semifinals and a final became a regular format on the PBA Tour, and stepladders included four finalists rather than five.

The change to this alternative format for this year's WSOB, according to PBA Commissioner Tom Clark (pictured right), is aimed primarily at enhancing the bowling fan's television experience.

"Bowling fans will notice an increased amount of action in every show," Clark said. "In the first match, four players bowling at the same time means more shots, more styles and more personalities. Right from the beginning, fans will be introduced to all four players, enabling them to form opinions and develop rooting interests.

"Unlike the traditional stepladder format, which has been a PBA mainstay since it debuted on television in the early 1960s, there is less of a competitive disadvantage for players coming on cold and more potential for players to gain more telecast exposure.

"The eventual champion will have survived all three games in the telecast, meaning that he'll be on the entire show from start to finish, guaranteed," Clark said. "The fact that the winner will be on the entire show means fans will get a better chance to follow the player's progress and adjustments throughout the show."

The eliminator format was introduced in the 2009 Don Johnson Eliminator in Columbus, Ohio, and a variation of the format was used from start-to-finish in last season's Dick Weber PBA Playoffs.

Clark said this season will not see a complete departure from the classic stepladder. "The stepladder is still a brilliant format to bring excitement and fairness to televised bowling," Clark said. "Later this season, the traditional stepladder finals format will continue to be used for the USBC Masters, U.S. Open, PBA Tournament of Champions and some of the Xtra Frame Tour events."

Last year's WSOB shows including the PBA World Championship used the stepladder format exclusively. Last year's PBA World Championship winner Chris Barnes sees pros and cons to the eliminator format.

"It's a format that I personally like," Barnes said of the eliminator. "You get a chance to be on the lanes and it rewards good bowling that consistently gets better. If there is a downfall it's that the top seed doesn't get to bowl for the title automatically, but the top seeds are only 6-11 in the last two years, and the top seed here got to pick the pattern."

Clark said that the eliminator theoretically also cuts down on "blowout" matches by virtue of more players fighting for survival up to the one-on-one final, and said another reason for the eliminator format in the WSOB's two-lane arena setting was the fact practice off the pair was impossible.

"The eliminator format creates an obvious and identifiable differentiation between the preliminary matches and the final," Clark added. "The final game is the only time the pace returns to a traditional one-on-one format, but it elevates the final's intensity and creates a special distinction because the two finalists already have bowled two games against each other. It creates some unique strategies that never existed in stepladder events."

Sunday's Don Carter Division final will feature Stuart Williams and Dominic Barrett, both of England; Osku Palermaa of Finland, who became the second player in PBA Tour history to win a PBA Tour title with a two-handed delivery (Jason Belmonte of Australia was the first) will be trying for his second Tour title after winning last season's PBA Shark Championship in the 2010 PBA World Series of Bowling. Rounding out the foursome will be Jack Jurek of Lackawanna, N.Y., trying for his third Tour title.

Over the following three consecutive Sundays (except Christmas Day), the Billy Hardwick, Johnny Petraglia and Mike Aulby Division finals will air on ESPN at 1 p.m. ET, with all four winners advancing to the World Championship finals on Jan. 15 at 1 p.m. ET.

To qualify for the Division finals, the 16 finalists survived a 40-game marathon contested on five different lane conditions against a field of 204 players.

Bowling fans can catch enhanced pre- and post-tournament World Championship coverage on PBA.com's online bowling channel Xtra Frame.

 

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