Hammer Taboo Black/Purple/Blue Bowling Ball

The Taboo’s Gas Mask core provides a unique shot shape that borders on skid/flip with smoother surface finishes; more of a skid/hard arc at box and more aggressive surface finishes. The Taboo’s coverstock is versatile and relatively strong at P1000, P500/P4000, and P2000 surfaces. Brunswick Pro Anvilane: A good match at the box finish and P1000/P2000 touch-ups HPL/SPL: A good match at P4000 and P1000/Rough Buff or P1000/Resurrection Wood: Similar to HPL/SPL finishes with a smoother shot shape. Guardian: I haven’t found a good combination on Guardian. This may be due to my high tilt and the ball seems to go left in the Guardian, then slide coming off the Guardian, then move. The core/surface combination seems to accentuate the different lane sections. I have better matches, asymmetric and symmetric, for these challenges. My Taboo is drilled 50 x 4” x 30, no weight hole, 15 lb 6 oz out of the box, 2 ox top weight box, pin-out 3” (4” x 3 ¼” with a 2” pin to VAL buffer). Intermediate mass bias is 0.016 box, differential RG is 0.060, RG is 2.50: Strong, flaring and relatively early. The pin is just right of ring finger, CG on the midline in the positive side weight quadrant. Mass Bias is just right of the thumb hole. The Taboo is good on red patterns: Okay on white and blue patterns though not as forgiving as several other balls in my bag. The Taboo tends to accentuate differences in my release. As a result, I tend to use it more often on easier patterns and switch to other more forgiving balls on more challenging patterns. In my part of the country (desert southwest), there are large numbers of Taboos on the lanes. Lower tilt players seem to excel with the Taboo. Higher tilt players, such as me, tend to be more condition-specific with the Taboo and other Gas-mask core Hammers. The 50 x 4” x 30 layout is a good match for many lower tilt players. If I were to drill another Taboo, I’d go with a layout closer to the benchmark layout for my tilt and speed: 45 x 4.5” x 50. This ball has plenty of back-end and doesn’t need the help provided by low angles to the VAL. One of the strengths of the Taboo for me is its ability to recover from deeper lay-down points when pointed to the track. Good 10-pin carry and trip-4 ability from inside angles. Conversely, there are better carrying pieces in my bag from outside lines. All-in-all, the Taboo is a good ball worth your consideration for medium to medium-heavy conditioning patterns.