Oh where, oh where has my darn mojo gone?
Oh where, oh where can it be?
This BowlStar ain't sparklin'
Her bowling's no fun:
Please bring back my mojo to me
Bring back, bring back
Bring back my mojo to me, to me
Bring back, bring back
Bring back my mojo to me!
It
was Philly Teams week on Week 7 of the Philly Pinoy Mixed Fall League (MFL),
and our leaguers came decked in Eagles, Flyers, Phillies and even Philly Pinoy
shirts! Yeah, go Philly! We all belong!
My
Team Papaya came all decked in Eagles shirts: fly, Eagles, fly! We
were up against Team Duhat with my godsister Brenda del Rosario Cooper, her sweet hubby Jeff Cooper and the other child bowler in the league, Victor Ficcara. Here is a photo taken
by May Liboon of Teams Papaya and Duhat (minus Victor) just after the start of Game 1.
There
was a Team Captains Meeting held right after practice had finished. We agreed that contrary to our league rules,
any prebowl scores completed prior to our Sunday 5:20 pm league start time on a given week would be
honored. We still would greatly
appreciate it if the League Managers and their Team Captains are informed right
away of any MFL player’s intentions to prebowl, but we will honor any prebowl
scores logged with Limerick Bowl regardless.
Here is a photo of the 2014 MFL Team Captains with the League Managers
JC Squared, courtesy of May Liboon. Wow, look at all those smiling, happy
people: they are ready to BOWL!
We
warmly welcomed to the MFL this Sunday the new team member of Team Mangga,
Derek Sanchez, filling the slot vacated by Lowen Gono, who withdrew due to
shoulder injury. Here is a photo of
Derek with teammate Jon, taken by May Liboon.
Welcome to the MFL, Derek! We are
extremely grateful you can join the league at this juncture. Get well soon, Lowen, we look forward to having
you bowl with us again in the near future, God willing!
So right after the Team Captain's Meeting, Game 1 began. Victor still had not arrived for Team Duhat so we put in his blind score. There was a 68 pin deficit for Team Papaya to make up off the bat, which made Gabriel comment: " We are going to lose" which off course made me respond "Heck no, we are going to WIN!" It was looking and feeling good as we all got strikes in the beginning of the game, which explains the smiles we have on the picture of both teams at the beginning of the blog. After that frame, we seemed to somehow slow down as the lanes started getting to us. The lanes were not too oily like last week, but there was still something off with our ball trajectories. I was doing my best to keep up with Jeff who seemed to have a hot hand with his James Bond 007 ball. In the end, Team Papaya was lucky to end up with a win, with only 9 pins difference, which was less than the 10 pins off Victor's blind! Darn, if he was present, we would not have been so lucky....
Game 2 was the Jeff Cooper Show! Wow, strikes were flying off his hand like misses were an impossibility. To make matters worse for Team Papaya, Victor showed up just before the 4th frame and started off with strikes and spares of his own. Patay kang bata ka, concede, concede...but never give up! We fought hard, but odds were against us. Jeff was unstoppable and logged a score close to 200: amazing, amazing and zuper well played! Brenda was solid and getting some fabulous spares herself. Victor had already exceeded his average by the 9th frame. Game 2 was won by Team Duhat with a commanding lead on Team Papaya. Our photographer par excellence May Liboon captured this image of Team Duhat's Jeff with his wonder ball.
Even as Team Duhat was soundly beating us, they were stil telling us how "we look like the videos on YouTube when we hit the 10-pin" and how "they need to play well coz they were playing with their bowling idols". Jeff pointed out to me that he noticed how much I was doing, collecting and checking payments, making sure folks were doing OK, writing on my notebook, etc. while all they had to do was relax and play. Awww, thank you for noticing, but it is no excuse coz I do this every week, I should still be able to play well regardless! But thank you, thank you to Team Duhat for being so gracious and appreciative! Photo of Team Duhat: thanks to May!
Game 3 was a nail biter. Team Papaya was still struggling, but Team Duhat's relentless run had somehow run its course and they started struggling as well. Once James pretended that it was "just practice" the strikes started coming back. On the lanes next to us, my GoPapa Joel, who had just been awarded a mug full of goodies by Limerick Bowl for his amazing 709 series and two 250+ games last week, was somehow struggling bad, unable to convert. I may have stolen his mojo coz I was playing a clean game and had a string of strikes going into the 10th frame. Romy (Guyabano) and Rico (langka) had completed their games and were telling me that if I strike out in the 10th frame, I had a chance for a 216 score: sure, what are the odds? As Jeff closed out his 10th frame and I got ready to throw, the difference showing was 21 pins. "Just relax and throw," I told myself, and was rewarded by a strike. Breathe, breathe, relax and throw and...another strike! Mini dance, happy dance (over 200 already, whoo hoo!) then breathe, breathe, I get 8 pins but it is over and unbelievably, Team Papaya wins Game 3 and comes home with a tie against Team Duhat! BowlStar blogger Jing gets a 214 game to boot: yebah ebah ebah! Here is a photo taken by May of me after one of my strikes...I can feel it, my mojo is BACK!
The MFL Week 7 League Standing Sheet has been posted on the Limerick Bowl website. Here is the summary of Week 7 team standings.
Team #
|
TEAM
|
RANK
|
CURRENT
|
Wk 7
|
|||
win
|
loss
|
win
|
loss
|
||||
6
|
Guyabano
|
1
|
22
|
6
|
3
|
1
|
|
11
|
Pakwan
|
2
|
18
|
10
|
4
|
0
|
|
3
|
Chico
|
3
|
17
|
11
|
1
|
3
|
|
10
|
Papaya
|
4
|
16
|
12
|
2
|
2
|
|
2
|
Bayabas
|
5
|
15
|
13
|
4
|
0
|
|
13
|
Santol
|
6
|
14
|
14
|
3
|
1
|
|
7
|
Langka
|
7
|
13.5
|
14.5
|
2
|
2
|
|
14
|
Suha
|
8
|
13.5
|
14.5
|
3
|
1
|
|
1
|
Atis
|
9
|
13
|
15
|
0
|
4
|
|
9
|
Mangga
|
10
|
13
|
15
|
2
|
2
|
|
5
|
Durian
|
11
|
12
|
16
|
1
|
3
|
|
4
|
Duhat
|
12
|
12
|
16
|
2
|
2
|
|
12
|
Rambutan
|
13
|
9
|
19
|
0
|
4
|
|
8
|
Lansones
|
14
|
8
|
20
|
1
|
3
|
|
Unfortunately I left all my notes in Downingtown on the fabowlous performances from Week 7, as I write this blog during our trip to the West Coast (dementia hits again...). Apologies to our Breakthrough Players and Shining Stars, as I am forced to focus on the few outstanding performances I can remember intending to highlight based on my poor memory and the Limerick Bowl League Standing Sheets.
Top Male Players: The top three male players from last week (my GoPapa Joel C, Paolo and James) all struggled this past week and logged averages in the 150 range. Joel C (Atis) is able to hang on to his commanding lead. Logging another amazing performance, the rampaging Guyabano anchor Romy leapfrogs to the second place spot: galing-galing, bow! James (Papaya) and Joel D (Lansones) are not far behind Paolo, who remains in the top three.
1. Joel C (Atis) 207
2. Romy (Guyabano) 188
3. Paolo (Bayabas) 185
Top Female Players: The trio of gals from the Philly Pins are
still playing musical chairs with the top three slots, but my idol Alice D
(Santol) is slowly gaining ground.
1. Jing (Papaya) 160
2. Mitchie (Mangga) 156.4
3. Angie (Langka) 156.1
200-Clubbers: We have five (5) this week, including the debut of yet another female bowler, your BowlStar blogger, whose prayers for a better game were answered this weekend: yebah ebah ebah! There were two players from Team Guyabano in the club this week: super wow, matinik talaga!
·
Joel
D (Lansones): 225
·
Romy
(Guyabano): 215, 200
·
Desi
(Bayabas): 210, 201
·
Jing
(Papaya): 214
·
Marlon
(Guyabano): 200
PLAYER
OF THE WEEK is Desi (Bayabas) for logging scores of 210, 201 and 172 which gave him a 194
average for the night against a previous 149 average. Dance, Desi, dance!
LUCKY
STRIKE RAFFLE (50/50): Our Raffle
Queen and our Player of the Week's Lucky Charm, Alice M, was present to take care of the raffles this week: thank you
once more! Our lucky second time winner
was May Liboon with a $37 prize.
Congratulations! Our pot of
additional prize money from the raffles is now $280. We will be sharing with you in the coming
weeks how we will be distributing this bounty to you our players at our
upcoming Finals on November 16. Malapit na!
REMINDERS
on our THEME NIGHTS:
·
No theme is
scheduled this Sunday, October 26 which is also MFL Week 8.
·
Our Bowloween
Night is coming up next week, MFL Week 9, November 2. Go hit the after Halloween sales at the
costume stores. The more artsy amongst
you can go wild, get creative and make your own costume. Can’t wait to see how y’all will come dressed
as….
·
No theme is
scheduled on our last week in regulation play, Week 10 on November 9.
·
It will be
Filipino shirt day on our Finals Week, November 16. Can’t believe it is so close to Finals Week!
ADDITIONAL
ANNOUNCEMENTS and REMINDERS:
·
Please make sure that all bowling fees are paid by next
week, Week 9, November 2, which
happens to be our Bowloween Night. This
will allow Limerick Bowl to have our prize monies available to us on our Finals
Night on MFL Week 11, November 16.
·
Team Captains, this
is another friendly reminder for you to please kindly hand over your team’s pay
envelopes to me by the end of the FIRST game.
Your help is greatly appreciated!
·
Folks, let’s try once
again to take a 5-10 minute break at the end of the first game. This seemed to work last week, let’s keep
doing it!
It
is an exciting match-up with Team Papaya up against the top team, Team Guyabano,
on MFL Week 8. We have been challenging them all week,
telling them they will lose this weekend against us. I hope we play well and give them a run for
their money! Abangan!
My
GoPapa Joel is prebowling due to our daughter’s play rehearsal schedule, so I
will be by my lonesome (square root of JC Squared) this weekend. Can’t steal his mojo and play like him if he’s
not there, but hey, maybe my mojo is truly back to me....
See
you at the lanes, dear MFL players. Bowl,
baby, bowl!
A copy of the Week 7 League Standing Sheets, to remind myself that good things come to those who wait, and that my mojo can be lost and then found when least expected...
No comments:
Post a Comment