The new furniture arrived that morning. David Krol and his wife splurged for the delivery costs, because for the first time in their lives, they could afford these kinds of luxuries. Less than a week earlier, he’d quit the day job he’d held since he was a teenager at a bowling center called Andy B’s in Springfield, Missouri. All of these crazy things had happened, and they had happened so quickly that he barely had time to process just how much his life had changed. Even now, it all kind of feels surreal, the way people see Krol practicing at Andy B’s or one of the other alleys nearby and treat him like some kind of local celebrity.
“I always thought about, ‘What if I quit my job and became a professional bowler?’’ he says, a ceiling fan whirring above his head. “But now all these doors have opened up.”
A year ago, Krol bought a Subaru Crosstrek and decided to make a full-time run at the Professional Bowlers Association Tour. He was 28 years old. He’d done well on the regional circuit and dabbled in some national tournaments, but bowling full-time on the PBA Tour meant he’d have to drive across the country, pay for his own lodging, and go through a grueling series of pre-tournament qualifiers, or PTQs, just to have a shot at the money and to qualify to be on Tour full-time.
He always wondered, 'What if I quit my job?' The answers are coming quickly. [PBA courtesy photos]
“Before the season, you’d say that’s probably not possible,” one person said of Krol’s lofty ambitions, and that person happened to be Tom Clark, the commissioner of the PBA Tour.
Honestly, though, Krol would have said the same thing about himself. He knew it was at least highly unlikely, if not impossible, but he’d been dreaming of this since he was a kid. He couldn’t get it out of his head; if he didn’t try to do this now, he figured he’d regretit forever. Money was a concern, but money was always a concern. He and Hazel, his wife, had bought a house in Nixa, but she had a solid job managing a bowling center in Branson, and Krol had landed a few sponsorship deals from winning some regional titles.
“My salary can cover our bills,” Hazel told him. “Just go. Don’t worry about anything.”
It was now or never, he figured. So he decided to take a chance. He got into that Subaru and he chased his dream across the country.
Krol grew up in the small town of Nixa, about a half hour outside of Springfield. But he also grew up in bowling alleys from the time he was 3 years old. His parents bowled in leagues, and they’d take Krol with them. His mom called him her Little Booger; his nickname became Boog. He was so little that he would bowl two-handed, and he never gave up that style; over time, it became more popular among the professionals he emulated.
At Nixa High School, Krol helped lead the bowling team to consecutive state titles. During his senior year, he decided to give up his amateur status and see if he could build bowling into a career. He got a job at Andy B’s in Springfield, finished his degree, and bowled constantly on the weekends. “It showed me that if I could be a weekend warrior,” he said, “I could make enough money to survive.”
For a few years, Krol pieced things together. But as he hit his mid-20s, with a house and a wife, he wondered if he should go to college, study accounting and join the 9-to-5 world. He was having a hard time bowling well, and he couldn’t figure out why. Hazel insisted that he keep trying, so Krol dug deeper. He’d signed a sponsorship deal with a bowling ball manufacturer, and he thought, Maybe that’s what’s holding me back. He began trying different brands of balls, and his game suddenly came back. “Instantly, my score shot up,” he says. “And my confidence shot up as well.”
Krol backed out of his contract with that ball company. He’d struggled with confidence since he was a kid, partly because of angst over his size. But as he rediscovered his game, he also got himself into better shape. “I’m 5-foot-3, and I was 255 pounds – not healthy one bit,” he says. “But I went hard in the gym for six or seven months and I lost a hundred pounds.”
He’d work his job at Andy B’s and then spend his spare time on the lanes, working on various aspects of his game. His weight loss allowed him to have more control over the ball. In 2023, he bowled several regional tournaments, one tier below the PBA Tour – and things went well. He won an event in Oklahoma and another in Kansas. At an event in Lebanon, Missouri, he rolled four 300 games and nearly set a new eight-game scoring record. He’d bowled big events here and there on the national tour, mostly just chasing the money, but had never made it to the championship round. Still, winning those regional tournaments gave him a financial cushion, just enough to think about going national for an entire season and not worrying about going bankrupt.
“All my friends were like, ‘You have to pursue it next year,’” he says. “And I finally had the confidence in myself.”
In late February, in the dead of winter, Krol drove that Subaru 16 hours to the PBA Delaware Classic. He bowled in the PTQ tournament and qualified for match play. And then he kept winning until he made it all the way to the televised finals.
Krol was so excited that he flew Hazel and his mom up to watch. He didn’t sleep well the night before; about an hour and a half before the event, he broke down. This was actually happening, he thought. And then Hazel said to him what she often said.
“It’s just bowling,” she told him. “You’ve already gotten to this point. You win or lose, it’s just a game.”
Krol settled down. And he won the tournament.
Some of it, he would admit, was a good fortune – utilizing that two-handed style, he hit several of what are known as “Brooklyn strikes,” in which the ball essentially crosses over from one side of the lane to the other on the opposite side of a player’s natural pocket, before knocking down all ten pins. “It was probably the luckiest title I’ll ever have,” he said. “But I’m OK with that.”
The emotion of his journey finds its way to the surface. [PBA courtesy photos]
A few online skeptics, of course, wouldn’t let him forget those Brooklyn strikes. As happy as he was, Krol wanted to prove he wasn’t a fluke. A conversation with Jason Belmonte, one of the best bowlers on Tour and a pioneer of the two-handed approach, helped him find perspective. “He had a pretty controversial couple of years, and he said he let it affect his career, and he really regrets that,” Krol says. “He was like, ‘Don’t let people take this away from you.’”
Krol qualified for the PBA Playoffs in May, a postseason bracket-style tournament. And he won four straight matches over ranked bowlers to win the title, and to qualify for the Tour as a full-timer next season. No PTQs. No online nit-pickers. He finished ninth in the final Tour standings and earned $128,200. Boog Krol had finally proven he belonged on Tour all along. He just needed to find the confidence to believe it himself.
Krol flew back from the finals in Florida and went straight back to work the next day at the front desk at Andy B’s. “My first night back to league (bowling) was crazy,” he says. “It’s getting to the point now where I can’t go practice without being asked some kind of question. It’s like, I’m a public figure now. From being a nobody to people actually wanting to talk to me is weird.”
He spent a few weeks at home this summer, taking some time to breathe in the town where he grew up: Nixa, Missouri, a short drive from Springfield. The day after we talked, he left for a coaching clinic in South Dakota, and then another one in Minnesota. He just got invited to be a celebrity guest at an event in Costa Rica. (How strange does that sound – Boog Krol, a celebrity?) He and his wife Hazel just scheduled a cruise, and then in early 2025, he’ll embark on a full season on the PBA Tour as one of its rising young stars. “I don’t want to say I built a legacy,” he says. “But I want to make this a lifelong career now.”
He’s thinking about paying off that Subaru, though he isn’t sure yet. He needs a little time to process. Some time off. Then he can start thinking about how to prepare for next season – about ensuring, step by step, that he can continue to ensure his place in a sport that he nearly gave up more than once. “This is all new to me,” he says with a smile, that ceiling fan still whirring above his head. “I’m just some schmuck from Missouri.”
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