Pin Action: Small-Time Gangsters, High-Stakes Gambling, and the Teenage Hustler Who Became a Bowling Champion by Gianmarc Manzione Page B
Authors: Gianmarc Manzione
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chair with his chest leaning up against the back of it. At any given moment kids could hear him grunting offers from behind the lanes at bowlers whose luck was running thin.
“Joe, how much you need,” he’d say in his husky growl and Brooklyn accent. “Mikey, how much you need?”
Bowlers would walk up to Maxie and say “Gimme five,” and Maxie would snap out five crisp $100 bills. His rate was ten percent per week, and everything went fine—as long as you paid him back. The smart ones paid him back right away. One night, Schlegel borrowed about $1,200, then won that much and more in a match and paid back Maxie on the spot. That was how you handled shylocks like Maxie if you knew what was good for you.
Maxie always wore a rumpled suit. He had a balding bull’s head of gray hair and always kept a lit Camel pinned between two tobacco-stained fingertips. Many presumed him to be a gangster, but he always carried himself with an avuncular manner that disarmed those who otherwise might have feared him. The shylocks knew as much about catching flies with honey as the hustlers did. You didn’t get customers by scaring them anymore than you caught fish by letting on how good you were. Even when some customers needed to be scared because they hadn’t paid up, Maxie issued his threatsgently enough that it was almost possible to believe he was kidding.
“You don’t want me to have to hurt you,” Maxie would tell them.
But Maxie wasn’t kidding, especially not the day he sent one of his goons to find Checkbook Al. When the goon found him inside the coffee house at Central Lanes, everyone knew from that moment forward that Maxie never was kidding. Checkbook Al rushed in one day as kids hunched over their hamburgers at the counter. He pestered each of them for money.
“Hey, ya got forty bucks?” he asked.
“Get the fuck away from me,” one kid told him. “You owe me money!”
Then the goon arrived. He was a ruddy-faced moose of a man with broad shoulders who looked like he played left tackle for the New York Giants. The strange thing was that as tough as the guy looked, he nonetheless was wearing a bright pink, fuzzy, pullover sweater. No one quite understood what to make of that bizarre detail.
The goon walked up to Checkbook Al.
“OK, your time is up,” he said. “You got Max’s money?”
“No, I don’t have it,” Checkbook told him.
The goon grabbed Checkbook with one arm and hoisted him up in the air. The two paused nose-to-nose for a second, Checkbook dangling limply in the air. Then the goon tossed him like a football. It was like he had shot the kid out of a cannon. Checkbook went blasting through the windows of the coffee shop and out into the parking lot in a hail of shattered glass. That was all it took to separate the rest of the crowd from their hamburgers. Everybody promptly got up and left. No one looked back. They did not even look left or right. The point was to get the hell out of there. No one bothered to see if Checkbook was alive or dead, and nobody ever talked about it.That was how it went when you took money off a shylock. You weren’t just borrowing money; you were also borrowing time. That night Maxie returned to his backwards chair with his suit and his Camel, barking offers to those in need as though nothing had happened.
Many bowlers sent their opponents off to borrow from Maxie more often than they would have liked. Few bowlers put people in that uncomfortable position more frequently than Schlegel. By the time Central Lanes became established as action bowling’s new gathering place, Schlegel exhibited the raging brazenness of a gambler who knew he couldn’t lose. He sported a T-shirt that said “World’s Greatest Bowler,” pounding his chest like a gorilla and challenging all comers. Gobs of Vaseline from his duck’s ass hairdo melted down his face on muggy summer nights. The proprietor of Central Lanes kept a giant trophy on display beside the check-in counter in
“Joe, how much you need,” he’d say in his husky growl and Brooklyn accent. “Mikey, how much you need?”
Bowlers would walk up to Maxie and say “Gimme five,” and Maxie would snap out five crisp $100 bills. His rate was ten percent per week, and everything went fine—as long as you paid him back. The smart ones paid him back right away. One night, Schlegel borrowed about $1,200, then won that much and more in a match and paid back Maxie on the spot. That was how you handled shylocks like Maxie if you knew what was good for you.
Maxie always wore a rumpled suit. He had a balding bull’s head of gray hair and always kept a lit Camel pinned between two tobacco-stained fingertips. Many presumed him to be a gangster, but he always carried himself with an avuncular manner that disarmed those who otherwise might have feared him. The shylocks knew as much about catching flies with honey as the hustlers did. You didn’t get customers by scaring them anymore than you caught fish by letting on how good you were. Even when some customers needed to be scared because they hadn’t paid up, Maxie issued his threatsgently enough that it was almost possible to believe he was kidding.
“You don’t want me to have to hurt you,” Maxie would tell them.
But Maxie wasn’t kidding, especially not the day he sent one of his goons to find Checkbook Al. When the goon found him inside the coffee house at Central Lanes, everyone knew from that moment forward that Maxie never was kidding. Checkbook Al rushed in one day as kids hunched over their hamburgers at the counter. He pestered each of them for money.
“Hey, ya got forty bucks?” he asked.
“Get the fuck away from me,” one kid told him. “You owe me money!”
Then the goon arrived. He was a ruddy-faced moose of a man with broad shoulders who looked like he played left tackle for the New York Giants. The strange thing was that as tough as the guy looked, he nonetheless was wearing a bright pink, fuzzy, pullover sweater. No one quite understood what to make of that bizarre detail.
The goon walked up to Checkbook Al.
“OK, your time is up,” he said. “You got Max’s money?”
“No, I don’t have it,” Checkbook told him.
The goon grabbed Checkbook with one arm and hoisted him up in the air. The two paused nose-to-nose for a second, Checkbook dangling limply in the air. Then the goon tossed him like a football. It was like he had shot the kid out of a cannon. Checkbook went blasting through the windows of the coffee shop and out into the parking lot in a hail of shattered glass. That was all it took to separate the rest of the crowd from their hamburgers. Everybody promptly got up and left. No one looked back. They did not even look left or right. The point was to get the hell out of there. No one bothered to see if Checkbook was alive or dead, and nobody ever talked about it.That was how it went when you took money off a shylock. You weren’t just borrowing money; you were also borrowing time. That night Maxie returned to his backwards chair with his suit and his Camel, barking offers to those in need as though nothing had happened.
Many bowlers sent their opponents off to borrow from Maxie more often than they would have liked. Few bowlers put people in that uncomfortable position more frequently than Schlegel. By the time Central Lanes became established as action bowling’s new gathering place, Schlegel exhibited the raging brazenness of a gambler who knew he couldn’t lose. He sported a T-shirt that said “World’s Greatest Bowler,” pounding his chest like a gorilla and challenging all comers. Gobs of Vaseline from his duck’s ass hairdo melted down his face on muggy summer nights. The proprietor of Central Lanes kept a giant trophy on display beside the check-in counter in
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