2021 PBA Tour season

The PBA announced it would open the 2021 season with a revamped and expanded PBA Players Championship that opens up the event to a broader portion of the PBA membership. Five Regional events (West, Southwest, Central, South and East) will be hosted first. After 28 qualifying games (7 games on each of four different oil patterns), each Region will hold its own stepladder finals broadcast on FS1. The five Regional winners will then compete in the tournament finals held in Jupiter, Florida on February 21, which will be broadcast live on Fox.[1] The Regional concept was introduced, in part, due to travel restrictions that have resulted from the continuing COVID-19 pandemic, and will allow most PBA professionals to compete in safe events closer to home. In addition, the 2021 PBA Players Championship features a $1 million prize fund, with a PBA record-tying $250,000 first place prize.[1]

As of January 15, only the winter-spring portion of the 2021 PBA season has been scheduled.[2] Additional tournaments are to be announced. The PBA Tournament of Champions will take place February 23–28, also in Jupiter, Florida (following the conclusion of the PBA Players Championship finals in the same location). The PBA will then move to Tampa, Florida for World Series of Bowling (WSOB) XII. WSOB XII features three animal oil pattern title events (Cheetah, Chameleon, Scorpion), with these three tournaments serving as initial qualifying for the PBA World Championship major. WSOB XII will also include the PBA Roth-Holman Doubles Championship. The PBA World Championship finals will air on Saturday afternoon, March 13 on Fox, kicking off five consecutive days of broadcasts. The Roth-Holman Doubles, Cheetah Championship, Chameleon Championship and Scorpion Championship will air March 14–17 on FS1.

The U.S. Open was originally scheduled to take place in Green Bay, Wisconsin while the USBC Masters was to be held in Las Vegas, Nevada. In December 2020, the USBC announced the two events will be held in back-to-back weeks (March 30 through April 11) and will both be held in Reno, Nevada due to COVID-19 continuing to impact USBC operations.[3]

Following the U.S. Open is the PBA Super Slam on April 18, which will see the five PBA major winners vying for a $100,000 first prize.[2] The third annual PBA Tour Playoffs has been scheduled for April 22 through May 16. Previous events featured the top 24 players in points through the first 13 events of the season, but due to only nine events being scheduled before the 2021 Playoffs, the tournament will start with the top 16 players only.[4]

The announced events for the 2021 PBA tournament schedule are shown below. Major tournaments are in bold. Career PBA title numbers for winners are shown in parenthesis (#). Winner's share prize money is shown in US dollars ($), except where indicated. Additional tournament dates are TBD.

Tour points are awarded for most events. Besides the season-ending Harry Smith PBA Points Winner award, points are one consideration for Player of the Year voting, and also affect eligibility for the PBA Tour Playoffs, PBA Tour Finals (combined with 2020 points), and the 2022 DHC PBA Japan Invitational. Points for tournaments are awarded differently based on a "tier" system. The tier of each qualifying tournament is shown in the Notes column on the tournament schedule, and is explained below.

• Tier 3: PBA short format or limited field tournaments (2500 points for first, and descending thereafter)
• Tier 2: PBA standard tournaments with a fully open field (double the points of Tier 3 events)
• Tier 1: PBA major tournaments (triple the points of Tier 3 events)

• PBA 2021 Season Schedule