Andrew Anderson, Kamron Doyle Win 2018 PBA Top Player Honors

Tom Smallwood earns Steve Nagy Sportsmanship Award; Chris Barnes wins Tony Reyes Memorial Award

 

AUSTIN, Texas  – Second-year Professional Bowlers Association member Andrew Anderson of Holly, Mich., has been selected as the 2018 Chris Schenkel PBA Player of the Year, and 20-year-old Kamron Doyle of Brentwood, Tenn., has won 2018 Harry Golden PBA Rookie of the Year honors, PBA CEO and Commissioner Tom Clark announced Tuesday.

 

In a live-stream presentation airing on Xtra Frame on FloBowling, Clark also announced Tom Smallwood of Saginaw, Mich., has been selected by his fellow Go Bowling! PBA Tour competitors as winner of the 2018 Steve Nagy Sportsmanship Award while 2018 PBA Hall of Fame inductee Chris Barnes of Double Oak, Texas, has been selected as the PBA Tony Reyes Memorial Community Service Award winner.

 

Anderson and Doyle will be recognized on national television during the PBA Clash telecast that will air on FOX on Sunday, Dec. 23. Smallwood and Barnes will receive their awards during the PBA Hall of Fame induction ceremonies that will be live-streamed by Xtra Frame on FloBowling on Saturday, Jan. 5, from the International Bowling Museum and Hall of Fame in Arlington, Texas.

 

Anderson, a 23-year-old right-hander who is still pursuing a degree in elementary education, returned to Go Bowling! PBA Tour competition in 2018 highly motivated after not being selected to participate in the PBA League Elias Cup competition and won a pair of titles: the United States Bowling Congress Masters (his first major) and the Xtra Frame Greater Jonesboro Open on his way to winning the 2018 Harry Smith PBA Points Leader award. He cashed in 16 of the 19 events he entered and had five top-five finishes, including a third-place finish in the PBA Tournament of Champions. He is the second-youngest player ever to win the award, behind only the late Billy Hardwick who was 22 when he was selected as PBA’s first Player of the Year in 1963.

 

Anderson out-distanced runner-up EJ Tackett of Bluffton, Ind., the 2016 Player of the Year, and Dom Barrett of England in voting by his fellow PBA members and veteran bowling writers. In one of the most balanced seasons in recent memory, 12 players qualified by rule to make the Player of the Year ballot and 10 of the candidates received votes.

 

Doyle also dominated voting, winning “rookie” honors easily over Thailand’s Annop Arromsaranon, the only first-year PBA member to win a title (the PBA-World Bowling Tour Busan Cup in South Korea). Doyle cashed in seven of the 15 events he entered, and had a personal-best third-place finish in the Xtra Frame Gene Carter’s Pro Shop Classic in Middletown, Del.

 

Doyle’s arrival into the PBA Tour ranks has been highly-anticipated since 2010 when he became the youngest bowler ever to cash in a PBA Regional tournament at the age of 12, followed by becoming the youngest bowler ever to cash in the U.S. Open two years later as a 5-foot-5, 105-pound, 14-year-old eighth grader.

 

Smallwood, a 41-year-old country music fan and avid deer hunter, is one of a handful of PBA Tour players to win the Steve Nagy Sportsmanship Award more than once. The 2016 Nagy recipient has earned the admiration of his fellow players despite his quiet, unassuming ability to beat them when the pressure is on. His three PBA Tour titles include a pair of majors: an historic win in the 2009 PBA World Championship after losing his job in the auto industry, and a pressure-packed four-match climb to the title in the 2018 Barbasol PBA Players Championship. He has four additional top-five finishes in majors among his 23 career championship round appearances.

 

The Nagy sportsmanship award has been presented annually since 1966, the year of Nagy’s death, honoring his memory as a PBA Hall of Famer and founding member whose guidance in the PBA’s formation years was considered critical to the tour’s success.

 

Barnes, and his wife, PWBA champion and USBC Hall of Famer Lynda Barnes, have been in a “give back” frame of mind for years. For starters, the Chris Barnes Thanksgiving Classic has awarded more than 260 youth bowlers with more than $200,000 in scholarship assistance since its first event in 2004. Across the years, more than 3,200 young bowlers have participated in the annual holiday event.

 

Even more noticeable has been his involvement in support of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation since the couple’s son, Troy, was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes in 2008. Chris and Lynda played a key role in the formation of Strike Out Diabetes within six months of Troy’s diagnosis, and they have devoted non-stop attention to the JDRF efforts ever since, raising more than $375,000 to assist with creating awareness and advancing education in the fight against juvenile diabetes.

The PBA Tony Reyes Memorial Community Service Award was founded in 2013 to recognize charitable or community service projects undertaken by an active PBA member. The award is named in honor of the PBA Tour champion who lost his life in an automobile accident in 2012.