Week 1 is now officially in the books. With solid debuts from veterans and rookies alike, this season promises to be an interesting one as seven teams (and one blind team) battle for supremacy to take home the title in December. Two teams of old timers even kicked off their seasons with perfect 4-0 records – an accomplishment that has only happened a handful of times in the league's 10-year history. Want to see how your favorite team fared? Well, you've come to the right place...Before we get started we'd like to officially welcome and recognize the rookies that made their debuts Tuesday night: Aaron Chandler, Brian Cunningham, Chris Able, Chris Massey, Jake Parrott, Jessica Thomas, Rick Heckadon and Sarah Manning. Thanks for joining the league!In the first matchup, returning champion Carl Goetz of the aptly-named Pin Pricks set the pace for his team's night against opponents Feed the Monkey. Putting up a 569 series, Goetz led his team to a rare 4-0 first night series win. With a strong rookie debut out of Monkey Chris Able and his team-leading 425 series, the team finds themselves with no place to go but up . The outcome of the matchup propels the Pricks into first place due to total pins and cages the Monkeys into 8th. Two lanes down, the embattled members of the Ground Zero Mosque faced the debuting members of Drink and Hurl. Starting his season off with one of the league's two 200+ games rolled last night, the Mosque's Jason Carpio put up a 506 series en route to a 3-1 matchup victory against the competition, Drink and Hurl. Made up of four brand new bowlers to the league, Hurl got the best output via lead off bowler Jake Parrott. Parrott, starting the season off with his new personal best high game (a 179), put up a 394 series and helped secure the team's lone victory. The outcome between these two teams finds the Ground Zero Mosque erected in 4th place while Drink and Hurl has a chaser in 6th.Down on lanes 19 & 20, the sunny team Kitten Mittons met up with four people taking a Bowl Movement. Apparently beginning to figure out his new bowling ball, the Kitten's Nick Allegri came out firing with a team-leading 515 series to earn his team three notches in the win column. The Movement, led by last-second replacement Jessica Thomas and her 409 series, managed to poke its head out just in time to win Game #3 and avoiding the sweep. The Mittons, after Week 1, find themselves sitting in 3rd place with their 3-1 record while the Bowl Movement floats in 5th with the opposite record.The final face-off of the night was a fast and furious fete for No Pinheads who found themselves facing the team devoid of any actual bowlers, aka Ray & Stevie. Putting on this weeks' Most Valuable Bowler performance was lead off bowler Aubrey Moren who, coupled with the team's high 495 series from anchor Freda Schroeder, managed to secure a first week sweep and move into 2nd place. Hapless (and memberless) Ray & Stevie see their way to 7th. The only bowlers making their way into The 200 Club this week include: Carl Goetz (223) and Jason Carpio (211). For the full results of this week, please check out Season 22, Week 1.See you next Tuesday!

THIS WEEK'S MVB Aubrey Moren Runner Up: (See Posting)	#1 POWER BOWLER Carl Goetz Runner Up: Nick Allegri	#1 H2H BOWLER David Codding Runner Up: Ken M. Wilson
FROM THE GUTTER (GUTTER QUOTE) "Does this t-shirt idea for my team (the Ground Zero Mosque) make me a bad person?" Scott Murdock, upon showing a sketch of a bowling ball flying like an airplane into two Twin Towers looking bowling pins.

The 22nd season of the VML Bowling League officially begins tonight. With only seven teams signed up, this is the smallest crew we've had since the Fall 2002 season. The Finals are a full four months away. Which two teams will end up facing one another in the championship matchup? Rest assured, returning champions Ian Goetz, Carl Goetz and Ken M. Wilson will do their best to defend their crown and return to the Finals but with several brand new teams in the mix, it's anyone's guess as to who will emerge victorious. So, without further adieu, let's get this party started!Bowlers making their debut this season include Aaron Chandler, Ben Coffman, Brian Cunningham, Chris Able, Chris Massey, Jake Parrott, Rick Heckadon, Sarah Manning and Teresa Deterding. Welcome to the league, new blood! If you have any questions at all please drop Ken or Scoot a line.Now we know that there are several of you that will not be able to make it the first night. This is okay. It's better to miss now than later on in the season when your team will need you. In the event that you cannot make it on a particular night, just alert your team captain or leave a note for Ken and/or Scoot. This way we can make sure that everything is taken care of on the administrative end.We hope that everyone has a fun time this season and good luck to everyone.

It is with great pleasure that we launch the new and vastly improved GutterAlley.com web site. After nearly seven years of faithful service, we've retired the old code in favor of a revised look and feel running on the WordPress engine. While there is still plenty of work to be done porting over code from the previous site, rest assured that we'll bring it all over while adding many new features as well. For those of you in the league this season, Ken and Scoot will be creating you accounts on the site very soon so that you can enjoy a more customized experience. And for those of you who are not in the league this time around – but have bowled in our league before – please contact Ken or Scoot and ask them to set you up with an account. Naturally, development will continue on as the season progresses bringing you the same level of statistics as you've enjoyed in the past. However, the use of Google Charts will make its way onto the site providing you with a deeper level of number crunching of how you're truly doing over the course of the season as well as throughout your career in our league. We plan to implement all of the data we have dating back to 2003 over time so that you can graph yourself – or others – until the cows come home.Many, many more features and enhancements will be added to the site as well but it's coming up on three o'clock in the morning and 'tis time to call it a night.We'll let you in on more as we progress.Stay tuned!