PBA on ESPN
PBA on ESPN is the branding used for Professional Bowlers Association broadcasts on the ESPN cable television network. ESPN's relationship with bowling began in , when ESPN aired the 12 Summer Tour events. By , ESPN would provide exclusive coverage of 20 regular-season events and four to six summer telecasts, all on Sundays or Tuesdays. History. After the PBA's sale and move of broadcasts to ESPN, most tournaments used a "bracketed" format. Each bowler bowled nine qualifying games, with the top 64 by pinfall competing in best 4-of-7 head-to-head matches. The four remaining  bowlers from match play competed in two semi-final matches (#4 seed vs. #1 seed, and #3 seed vs. #2 seed), followed by a final match of the semi-final winners. A few tournaments still used the stepladder format for the finals. The World Series of Bowling. In a cost-cutting effort, the PBA split the 2009–10 season into two segments. The first, the 2009 World Series of Bowling, consisted of seven PBA Tour events—including one major tournament (PBA World Championship) – held in August and September 2009 in Allen Park, MI, near Detroit. All of the events ran in  a split format: the early rounds of each tournament were held on consecutive days in August and September, and ESPN television taped the final rounds for the tournaments on Labor Day weekend (September 5–7). These were aired on seven Sundays, October 25 through December 6, 2009. The second half of the season, running January–April 2010, consisted of 11 traditional touring weekly tournaments, including the remaining three majors. Each event ended with the live ESPN television finals on Sundays. The second half also included three special (non-title) televised events: the Chris Paul PBA Celebrity Invitational, the PBA Experience Showdown , and the PBA Women's Series Showdown. The PBA announced in May, 2010 that it would again cover all of the Fall tournaments for the upcoming season at the World Series of Bowling. The second annual event was held October 24 through November 6, 2010 at South Point Hotel, Casino and Bowling Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. It consisted of five title events, qualifying for the PBA World Championship, and one non-title, made-for-TV event. Based on input from players, as well as corporate partner and ESPN television needs, there were some revisions to the series: In the  the PBA, for the first time, scheduled three consecutive days of live broadcasts for the PBA World Championship finals, January 14–16, 2011. The format was an 8-bowler stepladder. The 8–7 and 7–6 matches aired Friday night, January 14 on ESPN2; the 6–5 and 5–4 matches aired Saturday night, January 15 on ESPN2; the top four then competed Sunday afternoon, January 16 on ESPN. For the , a total of 14 TV broadcasts were taped at the 2011 "World Series of Bowling" in Las Vegas to be aired on later dates. For the first time, the TV finals for the "PBA  World Championship" did not air live. In fact, ESPN only aired the finals of the PBA's three remaining major tournaments ("USBC Masters", "U.S. Open" and "Tournament of Champions") in a live 2012 broadcast. All other ESPN broadcasts for Winter 2012 were taped events from the "World Series", while four additional non-major title tournaments were available live via the PBA's "Xtra Frame" webcast service. For the 2013 World Series of Bowling and into the , the PBA began using lane oil that is dyed blue for televised matches, thus helping viewers not only see the pattern layout but also  see how the play area changes from game to game. Said ESPN Coordinating Producer Kathy Cook, "Until now, one of the most crucial and least understood aspects of the game was invisible." In conjunction with ABC (2011). The PBA, through its renewed contract with ESPN, returned to ABC for the first time in over thirteen years, as it televised the "2011 Tournament of Champions" from Red Rock Lanes in Las Vegas. The event took place on January 22, 2011 in a live telecast, with Rob Stone and Randy Pedersen on the call, and Nelson Burton, Jr. joining them throughout the  telecast with reflections on the history of the "Pro Bowlers Tour" on ABC. The second match of the telecast nearly ended in a perfect game as Mika Koivuniemi defeated Tom Daugherty 299–100. Daugherty broke the old record for the lowest game in PBA History of 129, previously held by Steve Jaros. The match was also the largest differential in PBA history, with a spread of 199 pins. Koivuniemi went on to defeat top seed Tom Smallwood in the final match to take home a PBA-record $250,000 first prize. The end of ESPN's package (2018). On March 21 , 2018, Fox Sports announced that it had acquired the television rights for the PBA Tour, replacing ESPN, with 26 broadcasts on Fox Sports 1 and four on Fox beginning in 2019. Fox's broadcasts total approximately 58 hours, in comparison to the 30 hours of coverage provided by ESPN linear channels in 2018. Commentators. The announcers were chosen by the PBA with ESPN's approval, since the PBA produces their own shows, sells the commercials and bought the airtime from ESPN.