Will this ball fit me?

Fits you

Every measurement the seller recorded matches your sheet. Nothing to plug, nothing to redrill.

Close to your fit

Near enough for a pro shop to finish — tape in the thumb, different inserts, or opening a hole up.

Not your fit

It would need plugging and redrilling to work for you — which is normal, and worth pricing in.

Undrilled

No holes to match against — your pro shop drills it to your exact fit.

A fifth state, fit unknown, means the seller hasn't recorded the ball's measurements. It is not a verdict about the ball — message the seller and ask. Every number in a fit verdict was typed by the person selling the ball, not measured by us.

Hand

Right or left. A ball drilled for a right hand is the mirror image of one drilled for a left — the finger holes sit on the other side of the thumb, and the lateral pitches mirror with them. This is the one thing on the sheet no pro shop can adjust, so a mismatch here is always a no.

Grip

The one distinction that changes the geometry: a thumb hole exists or it doesn't. Thumb: The ball has a thumb hole, so it has a measured span. No thumb: No thumb hole — the fit is the finger holes and the bridge between them. It is a question about the ball, not about you: a two-handed bowler who uses a thumb is fitted exactly like a one-hander, and there are plenty of thumbless one-handers.

If you bowl thumbless, a ball drilled with a thumb hole is still worth looking at — the thumb hole gets plugged, the finger holes don't move, and the finger holes are your whole fit. We mark those “close to your fit” and say what the shop has to do. It isn't optional, mind: USBC requires every gripping hole to be used on every delivery, so an unused thumb hole is a balance hole, and the ball also needs a scribed “+” at the palm centre. The other direction is a no — putting a thumb hole into a two-hole ball at the right span is a different job entirely.

Span

The distance from the near edge of the thumb hole — the edge closest to the centre of your grip — to the near edge of each finger hole. Measured separately for the middle and the ring finger, because almost nobody's are equal. Along with pitch it carries most of the weight in a fit, and it is the number that can't be adjusted: a span that is wrong by more than 1/2" means plugging the holes and drilling new ones. Your pro shop has yours written down; it is also on the drilling sheet that came with your last ball.

Where the span is measured from — and why two sheets can disagree

There is more than one convention, and they are not interchangeable. A pro shop may record a full span (edge to edge including the finger inserts), a cut-to-cut span (excluding them), or the hole-to-hole distance the drill actually cut — and the differences run to a sixteenth or more per hole. With no inserts fitted, all three are the same number.

So the sheet asks which one you wrote down — but only if you have inserts or a thumb slug fitted, because with bare holes all three are the same number and there is nothing to ask. When two sheets were written under different conventions, or either of them doesn't say, we won't call it a clean fit: the verdict drops to “close to your fit” and tells you why. Comparing them silently would be a confident answer to a question nobody asked.

One thing we won't do is convert between them. “Centre-to-centre” isn't a defined measurement in the trade, and the “add half the hole diameters” conversion you'll find online isn't traceable to anyone — so we ask instead of guessing.

Thumb hole size

The hole's diameter — USBC allows a gripping hole up to 1 9/16". The two directions are not equally fixable, which is why we treat them differently: a hole bigger than your thumb takes tape, which is reversible, costs nothing and is explicitly allowed in a gripping hole — up to about 1/4" bigger is still workable. A hole smaller than your thumb does not admit your thumb at all; it has to be drilled out, which is routine but permanent, so anything more than 1/4" under is a no.

One number can't describe an oval thumb hole, and plenty of them are oval — a thumb that is wider than it is thick wants one. If yours is oval, record the smaller front-to-back measurement and say so in the notes; the verdict will be reading the round part of the story only.

Finger hole sizes and inserts

Measured the same way, and a hole within 1/4" of yours is a shop visit rather than a reason to pass on a ball. If you bowl with inserts, the size that matters to you is the insert's — and note that changing insert brand changes the span you feel even at the same stated size, because wall thicknesses differ. Inserts are also moulded with pitch of their own, so which one is fitted is part of the fit, not an accessory to it.

Bridge

The gap between the two finger holes — about 1/4" on a fingertip grip and 3/8" on a conventional one. We record it on every sheet and show it on every listing, but only compare it for thumbless sheets: with no thumb hole there is no span to measure from, so the finger holes and the gap between them are the whole geometry.

Pitches

The angle each hole is drilled at, relative to a line through the ball's centre — recorded per hole, the way the drilling sheet draws them. Forward means the hole's centreline passes above the ball's centre; reverse means below. Every hole has two: linear pitch, which runs forward or reverse, and lateral pitch, which runs left or right. Each axis has exactly two directions, which is why the sheet asks for a direction and an amount rather than a signed number.

Pitch is not a small thing — it decides how securely the ball sits on your hand and when it comes off, and a badly pitched thumb is the usual cause of squeezing, hanging up at release, or dropping the ball. But it does not decide whether your hand fits: the holes are still where they are. So a pitch difference makes a ball “close to your fit” however far out it is, and never a no. Take it to your shop before you bowl with it — and be clear-eyed about the fix, because there isn't a free one: the pitch is the angle the hole was drilled at, so changing it means plugging that hole and drilling it again. An interchangeable thumb's inner sleeve, or a differently moulded set of finger inserts, buys you a little either way and no more.

PAP (positive axis point)

The point where your axis of rotation leaves the ball at release, written from the grip centre — so much across (“over”) and so much up or down, e.g. 5" over and 1" up. Typical values run about 3 1/2" to 5 1/2" over.

It belongs to you, not to any ball — it is a property of your release, and every layout number in every system is measured from it. On a listing, the PAP recorded is the one the ball was laid out for, which tells your pro shop what the previous owner's shop was drawing from. It never changes a fit verdict, because it describes how the ball was made to roll, not whether your hand goes into the holes.

Two margins per measurement. Inside the first, the ball is drilled the way you are and every listing carrying it is marked Fits you in green. Inside the second, a pro shop closes the gap without plugging anything, and the listing is marked Close fit in yellow. Past it, the ball was drilled for somebody else's hand — “Not your fit”.

The thumb hole is the one that isn't symmetric at the green tier, because the two directions are different jobs: tape fills a hole that is slightly too big, and nothing fills one that is too small.

A measurement either side left blank is simply not compared. That is why a sheet with only a hand on it isn't enough to save: it would match every ball on the site.

These margins are our judgement about what a pro shop can do without plugging, not a measurement of anything. Treat a verdict as a strong hint that saves you a message, not as a promise — and when a ball matters, ask the seller for a photo of the holes and take both sets of numbers to your own shop.

Fit is one question; whether USBC will let you use the ball in certified league or tournament play is a separate one, and it turns on how the ball was drilled. Three things are worth checking on any used ball before money changes hands.

An extra hole that isn't a grip hole

Balance holes have been illegal since 1 August 2020, with no grandfathering. A ball can carry at most five gripping holes — one per finger and one for the thumb, all for the same hand — and every one of them must have a digit in it on every delivery. So a drilled-but-unused hole is a balance hole by definition, whatever it was drilled for. The two exceptions are a vent hole (1/4" or less, and it must intersect a gripping hole) and a single 5/8" mill hole.

The practical version: a three-hole ball bought by a two-handed or thumbless bowler needs the thumb hole plugged before it is legal, and any old-style weight hole has to go the same way. That is ordinary pro shop work — just budget for it.

Cracks and fissures

A crack — under 3" long and under 1/8" wide — bars the ball only if it is in your track area, and one between the gripping holes inside the span may be repaired with approved plug. A fissure — 3" or longer, or 1/8" or wider — bars the ball from certified play anywhere on it and may not be repaired. Worth a photo request before you buy.

Plugging, and the serial number

A plugged and redrilled ball stays USBC-approved — that is why “it needs plugging” is a price conversation and not a dealbreaker. One catch is coming, though: from 1 January 2027, identification markings may not be re-engraved, and a ball whose serial number is unreadable is out of certified competition permanently. If a layout would plug over the serial number, brand or series name, that is the moment to say so.

Rules summarised from the USBC Equipment Specifications manual and Playing Rules. They change; when a ball matters, check the current text at bowl.com or ask your pro shop. ReRack doesn't inspect balls, and a listing's fit verdict says nothing about its legality.

Your pro shop has them, and they will read them out — they keep a card for every customer, because they need it every time they drill for you. Failing that, the drilling sheet that came with your last ball has the whole set on it, and a ball you already own can be measured directly: span is near edge to near edge with a ruler, and hole sizes come off the drill bit gauge in about a minute.

You don't need all of it. A hand, a grip, two spans and a thumb size is enough to save the sheet and get useful verdicts; everything else sharpens them.

Fill in your fitment sheet →