PBA Xtra The world, after all, must get on with its
business, even if there are those who wish it would pause for a minute to consider their pain. And professional bowling must find those who will assemble some sort of future at a time when bowling’s future looks far less certain than it did in Roth’s day. In the meantime, the man whose legacy
finds its torch-bearers in those aforemen- tioned names is fighting the battle of his life. The battleground Roth once knew is a
place few others ever know. It is a place where cameras documented his triumphs and failures and a national television au- dience tuned in to watch him do the only thing he ever has known. When Roth won 15 PBA Tour titles in two seasons in 1978 and 1979 combined, that audience num- bered nearly 10 million people. The irony of the battleground Roth
knows today is that it includes places ev- erybody knows. Places like the kitchen, where there is only one spectator now— Roth’s wife, Denise. Some days, Denise catches herself
weighing the immortal against the man— the legend who won his first title with a 299 in the championship match of the 1975 King Louie Open, and the man for whom journeying from one end of a room to the other sometimes requires the effort of a champion. “There are days when I look at Mark go hobbling by in the kitchen and I just want to cry, because I think how debilitating [his stroke] was to him in so many ways,” Denise told Bowlers Journal in a phone interview.
MARK ROTH
MEET GODZILLA, MARK ROTH’S BOWLING CAT It should surprise exactly no
one that Mark Roth has a cat that bowls. “Godzilla” is a 15-year-old Russian blue that was rescued from a dumpster as a kitten. The Roths routinely set up small, plastic bowling pins and a ball for her to practice what she’s learned from her legendary owner. And judging from the results, Mark Roth is one heck of a coach. As you can hear in the video, he gets particularly excited when Godzilla packs a strike.
TOUCH FOR MORE
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