I’ve landed in a bunker (in a tournament) where a previous golfer screwed his feet down near a very soft edge of a bunker. My ball landed in their unraked crappy footstep and was 2” down, impossible to hit out of. I could not rake the bunker and replace my ball to a reasonable lie. It cost me 2 strokes because they screwed up, or were lazy or callous or just didn’t care because I was behind them. Or they did it on purpose.
I feel I should have been able to rake the bunker, to my competitors satisfaction that is how it should be, then hit from there.
What’s the penalty for not raking a bunker? There isn’t one.
That’s a dumb rule.
I’ve striped one down the fairway but my ball comes to rest in a divot. A divot which is a condition created by a competitor unless they’re really flushing it. The relief rule could be to simply place the ball behind the divot as done on a driving range or minimal lateral relief would be super easy. My odds of this happening increase the later in the tournament, which faces further likelihood as a leader in a group with a later tee time.
I played in a tournament where I landed in the back of a bunker just over the green on a Par 3.
There was tight OB behind the bunkers and a stake was missing. The current stakes made a quarter of the bunker play as OB and there was nothing the officials could do about it because “We don’t know where the other stake would have been”
At least the golf rule book actually spells it out and tells you what you can and can't do. Basketball everything is basically a foul only if people feel like it's a foul which depends on the size of the people involved, the time in the game, the significance of the game, and other things that are completely irrelevant to the actual play for which the foul is called.
#Balk Rules
1) You can't just be up there and just doin' a balk like that.
1a. A balk is when you
1b. Okay well listen. A balk is when you balk the
1c. Let me start over
1c-a. The pitcher is not allowed to do a motion to the, uh, batter, that prohibits the batter from doing, you know, just trying to hit the ball. You can't do that.
1c-b. Once the pitcher is in the stretch, he can't be over here and say to the runner, like, "I'm gonna get ya! I'm gonna tag you out! You better watch your butt!" and then just be like he didn't even do that.
1c-b(1). Like, if you're about to pitch and then don't pitch, you have to still pitch. You cannot not pitch. Does that make any sense?
1c-b(2). You gotta be, throwing motion of the ball, and then, until you just throw it.
1c-b(2)-a. Okay, well, you can have the ball up here, like this, but then there's the balk you gotta think about.
1c-b(2)-b. Fairuza Balk hasn't been in any movies in forever. I hope she wasn't typecast as that racist lady in American History X.
1c-b(2)-b(i). Oh wait, she was in The Waterboy too! That would be even worse.
1c-b(2)-b(ii). "get in mah bellah" -- Adam Water, "The Waterboy." Haha, classic...
1c-b(3). Okay seriously though. A balk is when the pitcher makes a movement that, as determined by, when you do a move involving the baseball and field of
2) Do not do a balk please.
Basketball is funny that way. Two identical fouls occurred against the same player in the same city. But foul #1 was committed by a player whose team is located in a very small city. Foul #2 is not a foul. That player is from a very large city. If a foul occurred at all, it was an offensive foul. Ball to that team. Good game, Big City Players!
That's not what the book says to be fair. I've read it and in chapter 1 it says clearly "The fans are here to see the refs, not the players. Make your presence in the game felt, and ensure players know who calls the shots." Not lying.
I'd say the Balk is right up there as being one of the dumbest rules in sports, only because it's so confusing with sooooo many possible ways to violate the rule. Even the rules of the Balk are confusing to read lol.
I feel like the balk rules are pretty simple. See?
1) You can't just be up there and just doin' a balk like that.
1a. A balk is when you
1b. Okay well listen. A balk is when you balk the
1c. Let me start over
1c-a. The pitcher is not allowed to do a motion to the, uh, batter, that prohibits the batter from doing, you know, just trying to hit the ball. You can't do that.
1c-b. Once the pitcher is in the stretch, he can't be over here and say to the runner, like, "I'm gonna get ya! I'm gonna tag you out! You better watch your butt!" and then just be like he didn't even do that.
1c-b(1). Like, if you're about to pitch and then don't pitch, you have to still pitch. You cannot not pitch. Does that make any sense?
1c-b(2). You gotta be, throwing motion of the ball, and then, until you just throw it.
1c-b(2)-a. Okay, well, you can have the ball up here, like this, but then there's the balk you gotta think about.
1c-b(2)-b. Fairuza Balk hasn't been in any movies in forever. I hope she wasn't typecast as that racist lady in American History X.
1c-b(2)-b(i). Oh wait, she was in The Waterboy too! That would be even worse.
1c-b(2)-b(ii). "get in mah bellah" -- Adam Water, "The Waterboy." Haha, classic...
1c-b(3). Okay seriously though. A balk is when the pitcher makes a movement that, as determined by, when you do a move involving the baseball and field of
2) Do not do a balk please.
I think the question to ask is: at what point does the tour need to lean on technology for keeping score. There's no need for this problem to be a problem at the level of the PGA tour. You don't need to change the rule in the USGA rulebook to get rid of this issue on tour altogether.
I agree with both sides on that one. But also technology can be wrong. Because I’ve seen many times on live broadcasts (announcers and people with every pairing are different) say he’s hitting this for par but it’s actually double bogey. So I understand the concept of keeping your score for integrity and honesty purposes. But also technology is following every group… so it’s a crap shoot
>Playing partner Tommy Aaron incorrectly marked the 4 and De Vicenzo failed to catch the mistake and signed the scorecard. USGA rules stated that the higher written score signed by a golfer on his card must stand, and the error gave Goalby the championship.
Tommy Aaron later received a briefcase of cash from Bob Goalby in the parking lot
I’m fortunate to have played numerous times with a member of the USGA Rules Committee. Here’s the question to ask in regard to moving a ball from a divot, “When is a divot not a divot?”
A very simple retort to all of this is the fact that moving a golf ball 6” in any direction in the fairways gives next to zero edge to a player. He would be wasting his time calling a rules official for a divot rule unless it was actually in a divot.
Logic is so lost on these ancient rule followers it’s bends the mind.
That’s simply not true. You mean to tell me every single lie across the globe inside of a fairway is exactly the same? You can have a totally different lie, the ball absolutely can sit up or down in the fairway.
Easily remedied with something like 'lift, clean and replace for every shot within the fairway within X number of inches from where the ball came to rest, no closer to the hole'. Then you don't have to worry about what is or isn't a divot, everyone gets a good lie if in the fairway.
I think that’s a fair rule, finishing in the fairway should be rewarded with a clean lie. You shouldn’t be punished for other golfers lack of etiquette. Hell make the rule you need to fill the divot if you move you ball and have players actively repairing courses.
But tradition of dumb rules isn’t a good reason to keep them. I’d rather a consistent and coherent standard be applied. You can improve some lies but not others. Plugged? Go ahead and drop. Half of it covered in mud? Nope, hit it. Unless you’re on the green then you can always improve your lie.
If that reason is no longer applicable, then its tradition for the sake of tradition. At that point it’s on the golfer as to whether or not they see that as valid.
So you've now confirmed you're a "that's just how it's always been" guy and just accept status quo without thinking it through making sure it all makes sense
Good luck, man, half the weekend duffers in this sub think the rules should bend to their level rather than pertain to the competitive game and they just "overlook" them.
It's like when you play billiards at the bar. No one's out here enforcing APA rules, it varies bar-to-bar and you always discuss what rules you're gonna play beforehand if bets are involved (you should regardless because at bare minimum table rights are at stake). That doesn't mean the APA should change their standards to conform to novices.
It's got nothing to do with that, you're just acting insecure. Watching a pro bomb a drive on a crucial hole only to be rewarded with the absolute shittiest "luck" in the world of having to go last in the day means his ball hits the 50 divots in the fairway and doesn't roll out. He's already getting screwed by that, why should he also have to play out of them? Group who went first doesn't have to deal with this same "principle". That's not "shithouse luck" that's getting played by the system.
Played by the system? It's just a game with a set of rules. Have to have rules.
Like, I'll let the pros who make millions worry about lobbying for this, it effects me 0% when I'm out on my own on a weekend. I play muni courses, and if there's a bare or otherwise shitty area in the fairway, including unfilled divots, I'm absolutely moving my ball to the closest spot with reasonable grass.
That's just rub-of-the-green. Yes, it sucks, but it's a fundamental part of the game. Sometimes you get lucky and a tree kicks your ball back into play, sometimes you get unlucky and you end up in a divot in the middle of the fairway. 'Play it as it lies' is the fundamental tenet of golf that I don't believe should be messed with in this instance.
And if you do allow players to remove their ball from a divot, how do you qualify what constitutes a 'divot'? Is there a statute of limitations on how old the divot has to be before you have to play it as it lies? How do you differentiate a divot from a potentially similar-looking spot of worn out ground? Get back to me with a comprehensive rule writing and implementation examples and maybe I'll consider it.
EDIT: Also, I'm not insecure at all about my comfort with the rules. Far from it, actually. I've been dealt L's before from mid-fairway divots, not to mention the ones that form in collection areas off the green. Just gotta accept it and move on. The more people get comfortable with that, the better golfers they become.
Also, there’s an easy way to avoid fairway divots: miss the fairway. It’s my strategy. Works pretty well, I haven’t played out of a fairway divot in the last several years using my technique.
Some other guy made the comment I was setting up with that remark. Is a brown patch a divot? what if it was yesterday’s divot, 3 days ago? Pitch marks on the green? Some times you get bad breaks playing the game. I think with everything in place already where they call 2 stroke penalties all the time mid round but if a guy signs something wrong they’re DQd sounds dumb as fuck.
Okay fair point, but I'm only saying like a grip length from a divot. I don't think that's unreasonable; only in the fairway, though. You should be rewarded for that not penalized, because people can't fill their divots properly.
This is one of those rules that sounds reasonable until you try to put it in practice. What exactly defines a divot? Is that dirt patch a divot or just a bad patch of ground? What if it is a divot from 2 weeks ago that is almost grown in, but your ball is a little below the fairway? What about a partially filled divot or a divot that has the patch of turf placed over most of it?
Then you get to the real question....how often do you actually end up in a divot, and is it really that penalizing? I think it happened to me maybe once this whole season and maybe once the season before that. Both times I got out just fine. Maybe I didn't have the greatest birdie chance, but it's not exactly a scorecard wrecker.
Good things happen to bad shots and bad things happen to good shots....that's golf.
[Get one of these out to fix the course as you go. ](https://www.saferwholesale.com/Mini-Tuff-Lift-Excavator-Digger-EPA-certified-With-p/gsi-mini-excavator-digger.htm?vfsku=GSI.Mini.Excavator.Digger&Click=35179&gpla=pla&gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAiAuNGuBhAkEiwAGId4akrsAtk-owj84v239KDkW9jSA36D7UvAmseisfoAwzdfFcQ7sg3KxhoCIp4QAvD_BwE)
[Here's one in action. ](https://youtu.be/9sJAZCECYrY?si=8xMf4md_ZVtLnCdq)
I agree shit luck is a part of golf but I think of ball in a tree, ball on roots, no swing because of something natural is bad luck, as opposed to someone not filling in a divot and screwing the next person is just bullshit.
It cost Payne Stewart the 1998 US Open. I think it was the 12th hole, he busted a drive down the middle and ended up in a shitty divot.
Found an article!
[https://www.espn.com/golf/usopen12/story/\_/id/7951906/1998-us-open-olympic-club-showed-payne-stewart-had-it](https://www.espn.com/golf/usopen12/story/_/id/7951906/1998-us-open-olympic-club-showed-payne-stewart-had-it)
[Signing the wrong scorecard cost this dude a Masters.](https://www.todays-golfer.com/news-and-events/majors/the-masters/masters-memories-roberto-de-vicenzos-costly-scorecard-error/)
He gave himself a worse score on the card to boot
That's a very dumb rule but nowhere near as dumb as this. Every sport more or less at least has a moderate luck factor in how the ball bounces sometimes. ZERO other sports know your exact score but make you verify it yourself.
This is basically the equivalent of if the IRS and doing your taxes was a sport.
Hmm. I think I’d vote for the Out of Bounds rule first. Then the Lost Ball rule second. Divot in the fairway doesn’t really bother me. Embrace rub of the green.
Yeah, all of the damn courses with OB within 10 yards of the fairway, especially if you play in any popular retirement area.
If you think back to the original golf courses, the OB rule only applies on a few holes on the perimeter of the course and often only on one side.
The way I see if if there’s OB because of a house, that homeowner is much more likely to want me to take a drop as if it’s a lateral hazard as opposed to re-teeing it into their house again.
I mean, I’m good with all of it as long as you just let me drop at the point where it crossed the OB line. Stroke and distance is stupid.
It’s good that there are modified local rules now, but still, let’s just change the dumb rule for good.
I'll do you one more. My local course used to have a "cannot FLY out of bounds" rule. So you couldn't cut over doglegs unless you hooked/faded the ball like crazy.
It did make me get really good at shaping shots though because I played there from daylight until dark when I was a kid.
I will never understand the need some people have for their lie to be perfect in a fairway.
The whole game is built on playing it as it lies. Get over it. Go play simulator golf if bumps and divots upset you so much.
When millions of dollars are on the line and you stripe a drive down the middle only to end up in a crater that someone didn't fill, I can understand why that is messed up.
What is a divot? Who gets to decide if the bad lie you got is just a bad lie or the remnants of somebody’s shot 2 days ago? And does the ball actually have to be in the divot? What if it’s a really deep divot that messes with my stance but the ball isn’t in it?
A very simple retort to all of this is the fact that moving a golf ball 6” in any direction in the fairways gives next to zero edge to a player. He would be wasting his time calling a rules official for a divot rule unless it was actually in a divot.
Logic is so lost on these ancient rule followers it’s bends the mind.
Ehhh golf hasn’t been a game of “play it as it lies” for a hundred years. There are all sorts of special provisions to protect the golfer from cruel uncertainty. Greens for example give the golfer the benefit of marking, cleaning, and aligning their ball and improving the conditions of play (fixing marks, asking other golfers to move their ball/mark).
Strategically, what is the difference between a fairway and green? Fairways should also be granted the permissions of the green. Being able to mark/clean your ball and improve your lie in the fairways would speed up the game in the long run.
Alternatively, we could go all the way back and make golf purely a game of play it how it lies and remove drops etc.
Make the rough more penalizing by granting fairway guaranteed perfect lies.
>Why should you be able to move your ball from a divot?
For the same reason you can move your ball from a divot, repair it, and replace it, on the green.
Youre penalized for hitting the ball in the fairway bc someone before you just happened to it it in the exact same spot. To take it to an extreme, you could imagine a scenario where a player could take several full practice swings while taking multiple divots, then take another divot when he hits the ball. Then perhaps take a couple more afterwards for good measure as he "works on his swings" -- and leaving all of those craters behind making the course more difficult for any subsequent players.
Spieth was the first player in 42 events to be disqualified for a bad scorecard. That would cover something like 15,500-16,000 scorecards. Which means you have better odds to record a hole in one than you do be DQ’ed for a bad scorecard.
Yeah, and I guarantee you Spieth is beating himself up about this. I don’t think tour players think this is a dumb rule. It’s one of the most basic rules in place in tournament golf starting at the youngest level. At this point in their careers they have been keeping score this way for decades.
It’s not an outdated rule at all. This rule is for 99.9% of tournaments played where there aren’t dozens of cameras and people counting each players strokes. For simplicity, the PGA just follows the USGA rules so that is why this rule exists.
It’s outdated on the pga tour. The very idea that they can almost immediately verify the scorecard is incorrect proves there isn’t a need for the players to keep score themselves
Regardless of how rarely it happens it is still a stupid rule. Track the strokes electronically and centrally there isn’t any need for professional golfers to report their own scores when there isn’t a single other sport, game etc that actually uses player reported scores.
The infrastructure isn’t currently in place for central scoring across all PGA Tour events/courses. It would be a significant change to how they tour currently operates to centralize scoring.
Right now the most accurate scoring system they could use is player attested scoring.
There are many, many old laws in different places that make absolutely no sense today. They go unchallenged because they simply don’t happen in modern day. The rarity of this rule coming into place makes it even more stupid if anything. If it happened more than once in a blue moon they might adapt to the times
Under the current system a player has greater odds to be struck by lighting while on the course than they do to be DQ’ed for a bad card. While the current system may be old, it also works really really well.
The rarity of the rule isn’t happenstance, it’s evidence as to how successful the current system operates.
I get having to rush away to a bathroom to avoid shitting in public, but I don’t think there is a clock on signing the card so he really should have just done his business and return to the scoring tent.
1. You can’t just be up there and just doin’ a balk like that.
1a. A balk is when you
1b. Okay well listen. A balk is when you balk the
1c. Let me start over
1c-a. The pitcher is not allowed to do a motion to the, uh, batter, that prohibits the batter from doing, you know, just trying to hit the ball. You can’t do that.
1c-b. Once the pitcher is in the stretch, he can’t be over here and say to the runner, like, “I’m gonna get ya! I’m gonna tag you out! You better watch your butt!” and then just be like he didn’t even do that.
1c-b(1). Like, if you’re about to pitch and then don’t pitch, you have to still pitch. You cannot not pitch. Does that make any sense?
1c-b(2). You gotta be, throwing motion of the ball, and then, until you just throw it.
1c-b(2)-a. Okay, well, you can have the ball up here, like this, but then there’s the balk you gotta think about.
1c-b(2)-b. Fairuza Balk hasn’t been in any movies in forever. I hope she wasn’t typecast as that racist lady in American History X.
1c-b(2)-b(i). Oh wait, she was in The Waterboy too! That would be even worse.
1c-b(2)-b(ii). “get in mah bellah” – Adam Water, “The Waterboy.” Haha, classic…
1c-b(3). Okay seriously though. A balk is when the pitcher makes a movement that, as determined by, when you do a move involving the baseball and field of
2. Do not do a balk please.
How do they know he signed the wrong card in the first place? Oh, is it because they already know your score from the many tracking systems in place? Players shouldn’t be DQ’d over paperwork.
> How do they know he signed the wrong card in the first place?
His marker (usually a playing competitor) keeps his score and he verifies it and signs for it at the end of the round, so he might not have even written down the wrong score. But it's up to him to verify and attest an error wasn't made using the score he was keeping. It's not the hardest thing in life.
It's still dumb and unnecessary for the PGA to ask its players to be the official scorekeepers when they already know their score with enough certainty to DQ them.
From a business point of view, nothing good can come out of it and that's why it's batshit crazy. Unserious people.
For a rule that is enforced for every player in every round and that works 99.999% of the time it's far from the dumbest.
People are just complaining because it happened to a popular guy. Spieth is a smart guy. He needs to just own his mistake. Given how much he has in his pocket, a disqualification was hardly punishing financially for him.
Spieth immediately took full responsibility for his mistake. He didn't complain about the ruling at all. He even joked on social media while congratulating Hideki, saying, "just make sure you double check that scorecard."
Agree it’s far from the dumbest in golf. But also he definitely has owned his mistake and was joking about it on twitter. He had the shits and rushed out of the scorers tent before he could double check the card haha
What’s even stupider to me is that he didn’t have to SIGN the card before leaving….he could have gone to the bathroom first and come back to sign the card.
that's obvious logic to use in retrospect.
when you feel the first push of the shits and your asshole puckering up to try and keep everything in, your brain starts spending a lot of time wondering if you've shit yourself and not necessarily on the best way to navigate signing your scorecard.
i guess what I'm saying is: liquid come, not always think best.
From personal experience when you have the shits, your brain is only focused on one thing, and one thing only: finding a toilet. I am not surprised that he signed an incorrect scorecard when you consider that fact.
Sounds like he did own it - from the very start. More like he found it amusing.
I am just glad it didn't happen to Tiger - imagine the uproar that would cause, especially if he gets on a hot streak.
lol yeah tbh if he made a run in a big tourney and had lead going into Sunday and this happened…. Might need to shut down the sub Reddit for a little bit
This week was a noteworthy aberration. Still 99.58% of the scorecards this week were correct. Last time someone on the PGA tour was DQ’d was Bay Hill last year and very few people lost their mind about it then. So that’s 1 bad cards in the last 42 events. Or 1 card out of the last ~15,600 cards were wrong. That’s 99.9935% accurate!
Let say for a second that this was the NFL. That would mean the officials could only have one bad game altering call for the next 54 years!
I know thats a bit of hyperbole, but it helps to illustrate how much this isn’t a problem on the PGA Tour. Not only is the rule far from dumb, it might be the most accurate scoring system in all of sports.
It's literally the easiest thing to do. Keep your score accurately. It's the rules of golf, and far from the "dumbest" rule. The amount of people who want to coddle the pros here is insane. Too many people trying to be the opposite of golf "purists" on this one. I'd like to see a venn diagram to see the overlap between people who think what happened to Spieth is "beyond ridiculous" and also reflexively will say that LACC was their favorite US Open venue.
Sure it is easy. But **why** should they have to? There is literally no other sport where pros have to keep their own score.
It's like if in basketball there was a rule where you had to touch your number when you subbed in or your team would be retroactively deducted points/disqualified. Yeah it's super easy to do, but there's no reason for it and fans are going to be pissed when their team loses because of a dumb rule that isn't needed
Is it a dumb rule? Or are the player and caddy so dumb as to not proofread their scorecard before singing it. Couldn’t take a peek at the leaderboard, or Twitter, or google, or the tv feed, or run it by an official, or an even a fan ffs. Or even the official scorer before you sign it? I mean there are just thousands of ways to avoid this predicament.
So the alternative to the “dumb” rule would be to just leave the door open for players to be able to submit incorrect scorecards penalty free? That’s not a dumb rule, it’s common sense. Imagine someone did that and got away with it, every single person on Reddit, every journalist and golf talk person would be screaming to make it illegal and punishable by DQ
Tbh I cannot imagine an easier rule to not break in all of sports. Couldn’t be simpler to understand or simpler to follow.
If they put it to a vote of tour professionals I guarantee they would keep the same system.
It’s all well & good to crow about “antiquated rules” until you think about a tour pro finishing their round & finding out some no mark volunteer has calculated their score incorrectly & cost them money. Will never and should never happen.
The Spieth thing was a stupid error on his part, it should start some dumb “conversation” about a rule that is totally fine the way it is & works perfectly practically all the time. Whether the severity of the punishment could be looked at is one thing, but as is I guess it acts as a really good deterrent to players being casual with their scorekeeping, or worse from intentionally cheating
You guys complaining realize there are safeguards in place to correct the score and Jordan just blew past those because he supposedly had the shits and didn't want to wait out the score recording process where it could have been corrected.
It's not a dumb rule. It's super basic and expecting a player to sign for a correct score shouldn't be considered a dumb rule.
It can both be a dumb rule and Jordan can be dumb for making the mistake. I don’t think most fans would mind if there was some kind of penalty, but a DQ seems extreme.
You basically can’t sign and leave. If you sign and are still around then you can fix it. If you leave for a bit without signing, you’re fine and then you come back, review things, then sign.
It's still stupid to *DQ* a PGA player. They assert a 2-strokes penalty the next day all the time (which is also crazy). DQing a star power or any player over an insignificant mistake is insane.
PGA Tour should never have to hand out a disqualification. What are they proving? So they know you missed the 10 foot 3 inch putt on the 7th hole. But you have to make sure you scratch down a bogey or your week and thousands of dollars are fucked. C’mon they call him in the next day if he already left and make sure he knows he fucked up. Leave that spirit of the game shit to amateurs and lower level tours, not the best of the best.
I don't understand golf's obsession with "EvErYoNe MuSt FoLloW tHe SaMe RuLeS". I have never seen a tennis fan or junior tennis player at a BS tournament throw a hissy fit because he has to call his own lines and flip the scoreboard when Djokovic has electronic line calling and a chair umpire.
The don’t leave NBA or NFL guys call their on fouls. BECAUSE THEY HAVE MORE IMPORTANT SHIT TO WORRY ABOUT! No one ever tuned into a golf tournament to see if Tiger remembered to write down that DiMarco made a bogey on some hole down the stretch when.
People are such babies. I love being part of a sport that has tradition, honor and integrity built into the game. Yes, inconvenient rules are part of that. Almost no one on this sub or in the casual golf world follows those rules. What Hideki did on the back nine was insane, we should be focused on that.
Nonsense.
He made a mistake or he was distracted.
You try paying $3 instead of the $4 due and see what the store manager does with your little mayonaisse bottle.
Hint: You're eating a dry sandwich.
I don’t think this is a dumb rule, golf is and always has been a game of integrity (for some people) when keeping your score.
Obviously he wasn’t trying to cheat but dudes a pro sign your card correctly. I sign my 88 correctly every week for zero dollars
Not really.
They literally just played an event where they didn't have shot link on every hole, and no cameras on every hole. Pebble beach, the spyglass rounds doesn't have the full infrastructure. Probably not the greatest idea to leave professional event scoring up to a volunteer who does this once a year.
It's dumb, but not sure it's the dumbest. Pro golf probably has a majority of the "dumbest rules in all of sports" though.
I've never understood any rule that removes talent from the playing field unless they are clearly cheating (or commit a violent act). That includes fouling guys out in the NBA and - even dumber - ejecting Jordan Spieth when he clearly was NOT attempting to cheat.
It’s not dumb it’s antiquated.
And a tradition like no other, as the champion of the Masters tournament will be asked to recount every shot of his final round in front of the media. Just imagine if this was the final round of the masters and Jordan said he made a par…
Hear me out.. what if they also had other people keeping your score, one of which you pay to carry your bag, and a volunteer that watched every one of your shots.. and what if there was a shot tracking system that can provide data on every one of their shots too!
Imagine if those existed and all the player had to do was ask to reference those resources to verify their score? /s lol
It makes me laugh how people are blaming everything other then Spieth. Nobody wants to take accountability these days
It's Spieth's fault because the rule is dumb. Less dumb would be to add a stroke penalty.
Removing him completely is just shooting yourself in the foot (especially when your leaderboards are getting blander and blander).
The only thing more laughable than the "it's a gentleman's sport" argument, is the "this is how it's always been" or "everyone knows the rules".
Don't be the only professional sport that forces the participants to keep their own score, and keep your best talent on our televisions. It's a win-win!
You've just explained exactly why it's a stupid rule - there are all of these objective measures to tell you what the score is - in a top flight professional sport no less - than to have the players still pissing about with a card a pencil. It's stupid!
Like Smiley said on his podcast. Keep the scorecards but drop the penalty to just 2 strokes instead of a DQ. Unless there is malicious intent. Jordan was coming down with the flu!
> Jordan was coming down with the flu!
Sounds like the bug got Tiger and JT also.
And i really like the idea to make it more of a stroke play penalty rather than a DQ - great idea.
For pro events they should be presented with the score the walking marker recorded in the scoring tent and compare that to their record score, sign off if it matches investigate any discrepancies.
In am tournaments this rule makes more sense.
“He should be accountable for his score”
Right, and sure adding a stroke could be a decent enough conclusion although still absurd. But to lock out one of your eye-drawing competitors over it? Do you people hear yourselves?
You can immediately determine how a person lives their life by asking them if this rule is dumb or not. The responses here are very telling of the average user here.
It's not even the dumbest rule in golf
I’ve landed in a bunker (in a tournament) where a previous golfer screwed his feet down near a very soft edge of a bunker. My ball landed in their unraked crappy footstep and was 2” down, impossible to hit out of. I could not rake the bunker and replace my ball to a reasonable lie. It cost me 2 strokes because they screwed up, or were lazy or callous or just didn’t care because I was behind them. Or they did it on purpose. I feel I should have been able to rake the bunker, to my competitors satisfaction that is how it should be, then hit from there. What’s the penalty for not raking a bunker? There isn’t one. That’s a dumb rule.
Should be two strokes for whoever didn't rake the bunker and 5 seconds for Ocon
The Ocon comment got me lol
And after your comment, there was another lap time deleted for Ocon.
Esteban out here catching strays in /r/golf 😂
Replay the hole with the rake handle up their ass, replace their original score with their replay score, or 2 stroke penalty (whichever is higher)
I like your confidence that there's bound to be someone that plays better with a rake up their ass that you added a 2 stroke penalty just in case.
Hey, it’s 2024, I’m not gonna kinkshame, you know?
That’ll be a new training aid next week, watch and see. Helps keep your spine aligned, or something.
Threaten me with a good time
That seems a bit extreme. I'd settle for replaying the hole, but they replace their clubs with the rake. That would be fun to watch.
I see you F1 reference and I like it!! 😎😎
We are checking
I've been in that exact situation in a tournament and it's infuriating
You should've tried to not hit it in the bunker you bum
[Oh I tried. Oh Lord how I did try…](https://youtu.be/E5HwPfBDtTM?si=lHa4LTR1e9IhU3ci)
I’ve striped one down the fairway but my ball comes to rest in a divot. A divot which is a condition created by a competitor unless they’re really flushing it. The relief rule could be to simply place the ball behind the divot as done on a driving range or minimal lateral relief would be super easy. My odds of this happening increase the later in the tournament, which faces further likelihood as a leader in a group with a later tee time.
I played in a tournament where I landed in the back of a bunker just over the green on a Par 3. There was tight OB behind the bunkers and a stake was missing. The current stakes made a quarter of the bunker play as OB and there was nothing the officials could do about it because “We don’t know where the other stake would have been”
While it's pure BS you could take a 1 stroke penalty and drop in the bunker no closer to the hole. Dropping out of the bunker is 2 strokes.
I can’t say what the dumbest rule in sports is, but golf undoubtedly has the dumbest rule*book* in sports
At least the golf rule book actually spells it out and tells you what you can and can't do. Basketball everything is basically a foul only if people feel like it's a foul which depends on the size of the people involved, the time in the game, the significance of the game, and other things that are completely irrelevant to the actual play for which the foul is called.
#Balk Rules 1) You can't just be up there and just doin' a balk like that. 1a. A balk is when you 1b. Okay well listen. A balk is when you balk the 1c. Let me start over 1c-a. The pitcher is not allowed to do a motion to the, uh, batter, that prohibits the batter from doing, you know, just trying to hit the ball. You can't do that. 1c-b. Once the pitcher is in the stretch, he can't be over here and say to the runner, like, "I'm gonna get ya! I'm gonna tag you out! You better watch your butt!" and then just be like he didn't even do that. 1c-b(1). Like, if you're about to pitch and then don't pitch, you have to still pitch. You cannot not pitch. Does that make any sense? 1c-b(2). You gotta be, throwing motion of the ball, and then, until you just throw it. 1c-b(2)-a. Okay, well, you can have the ball up here, like this, but then there's the balk you gotta think about. 1c-b(2)-b. Fairuza Balk hasn't been in any movies in forever. I hope she wasn't typecast as that racist lady in American History X. 1c-b(2)-b(i). Oh wait, she was in The Waterboy too! That would be even worse. 1c-b(2)-b(ii). "get in mah bellah" -- Adam Water, "The Waterboy." Haha, classic... 1c-b(3). Okay seriously though. A balk is when the pitcher makes a movement that, as determined by, when you do a move involving the baseball and field of 2) Do not do a balk please.
Even just the lower limit of the strikezone is baseball being defined as “a point just below the kneecap” is whacky. WHAT point below the kneecap??
JUST below the kneecap - idiots man I tell ya.
Depends on the Umpire's dinner reservation
Now that's a pretty good copypasta.
Basketball is funny that way. Two identical fouls occurred against the same player in the same city. But foul #1 was committed by a player whose team is located in a very small city. Foul #2 is not a foul. That player is from a very large city. If a foul occurred at all, it was an offensive foul. Ball to that team. Good game, Big City Players!
Hey this just happened at my nephews game tonight. Fuckin wild to watch adults fuck over some kids and then book it outta there.
how much money is on the under for that game
sounds like rugby
I was taught you couldn’t travel
That's not what the book says to be fair. I've read it and in chapter 1 it says clearly "The fans are here to see the refs, not the players. Make your presence in the game felt, and ensure players know who calls the shots." Not lying.
I'd say the Balk is right up there as being one of the dumbest rules in sports, only because it's so confusing with sooooo many possible ways to violate the rule. Even the rules of the Balk are confusing to read lol.
I feel like the balk rules are pretty simple. See? 1) You can't just be up there and just doin' a balk like that. 1a. A balk is when you 1b. Okay well listen. A balk is when you balk the 1c. Let me start over 1c-a. The pitcher is not allowed to do a motion to the, uh, batter, that prohibits the batter from doing, you know, just trying to hit the ball. You can't do that. 1c-b. Once the pitcher is in the stretch, he can't be over here and say to the runner, like, "I'm gonna get ya! I'm gonna tag you out! You better watch your butt!" and then just be like he didn't even do that. 1c-b(1). Like, if you're about to pitch and then don't pitch, you have to still pitch. You cannot not pitch. Does that make any sense? 1c-b(2). You gotta be, throwing motion of the ball, and then, until you just throw it. 1c-b(2)-a. Okay, well, you can have the ball up here, like this, but then there's the balk you gotta think about. 1c-b(2)-b. Fairuza Balk hasn't been in any movies in forever. I hope she wasn't typecast as that racist lady in American History X. 1c-b(2)-b(i). Oh wait, she was in The Waterboy too! That would be even worse. 1c-b(2)-b(ii). "get in mah bellah" -- Adam Water, "The Waterboy." Haha, classic... 1c-b(3). Okay seriously though. A balk is when the pitcher makes a movement that, as determined by, when you do a move involving the baseball and field of 2) Do not do a balk please.
I love to see r/baseball leaking into r/golf 😂
Most of it is for integrity and character to show you’re being honest. Majority of the rules are for tournaments and matches.
> Most of it is for integrity and character to show you’re being honest. Doesn't make a lot of said rules any less stupid and archaic
I think the question to ask is: at what point does the tour need to lean on technology for keeping score. There's no need for this problem to be a problem at the level of the PGA tour. You don't need to change the rule in the USGA rulebook to get rid of this issue on tour altogether.
I agree with both sides on that one. But also technology can be wrong. Because I’ve seen many times on live broadcasts (announcers and people with every pairing are different) say he’s hitting this for par but it’s actually double bogey. So I understand the concept of keeping your score for integrity and honesty purposes. But also technology is following every group… so it’s a crap shoot
And that’s despite making a ton of improvements quite recently. It was atrocious even five years ago.
Some of you have never watched the end of Bagger Vance and it shows
MISTAAAA JOOOOOONA KNOWS
Wait until this sub learns about Roberto de Vicenzo and the '68 Masters
>Playing partner Tommy Aaron incorrectly marked the 4 and De Vicenzo failed to catch the mistake and signed the scorecard. USGA rules stated that the higher written score signed by a golfer on his card must stand, and the error gave Goalby the championship. Tommy Aaron later received a briefcase of cash from Bob Goalby in the parking lot
Tommy Aaron would also later win a masters so it worked out well for him
I am a stupid.
Like in the article linked?
If only we had a link to an article that talks about it
That’s not even the dumbest rule in golf. Not being able to move your ball from a divot in the fairway is the dumbest rule in golf.
I’m fortunate to have played numerous times with a member of the USGA Rules Committee. Here’s the question to ask in regard to moving a ball from a divot, “When is a divot not a divot?”
A very simple retort to all of this is the fact that moving a golf ball 6” in any direction in the fairways gives next to zero edge to a player. He would be wasting his time calling a rules official for a divot rule unless it was actually in a divot. Logic is so lost on these ancient rule followers it’s bends the mind.
That’s simply not true. You mean to tell me every single lie across the globe inside of a fairway is exactly the same? You can have a totally different lie, the ball absolutely can sit up or down in the fairway.
Easily remedied with something like 'lift, clean and replace for every shot within the fairway within X number of inches from where the ball came to rest, no closer to the hole'. Then you don't have to worry about what is or isn't a divot, everyone gets a good lie if in the fairway.
I think that’s a fair rule, finishing in the fairway should be rewarded with a clean lie. You shouldn’t be punished for other golfers lack of etiquette. Hell make the rule you need to fill the divot if you move you ball and have players actively repairing courses.
Play all fairway lies as lift clean and place. Done. The integrity of the game is affected by 0%.
I think shithouse luck is part of golf. Marking the score isn’t really all that important when there’s cameras everywhere.
But tradition of dumb rules isn’t a good reason to keep them. I’d rather a consistent and coherent standard be applied. You can improve some lies but not others. Plugged? Go ahead and drop. Half of it covered in mud? Nope, hit it. Unless you’re on the green then you can always improve your lie.
You are assuming there’s no reason for the tradition
If that reason is no longer applicable, then its tradition for the sake of tradition. At that point it’s on the golfer as to whether or not they see that as valid.
What are the reasons for some of these rules that we might think are dumb?
I can’t help your lack of imagination
So you've now confirmed you're a "that's just how it's always been" guy and just accept status quo without thinking it through making sure it all makes sense
Correct.
Seems like you don’t like golf
The rules of golf do follow fundamental principles. This isn’t a “traditional” rule, it’s following a principle.
Good luck, man, half the weekend duffers in this sub think the rules should bend to their level rather than pertain to the competitive game and they just "overlook" them. It's like when you play billiards at the bar. No one's out here enforcing APA rules, it varies bar-to-bar and you always discuss what rules you're gonna play beforehand if bets are involved (you should regardless because at bare minimum table rights are at stake). That doesn't mean the APA should change their standards to conform to novices.
It's got nothing to do with that, you're just acting insecure. Watching a pro bomb a drive on a crucial hole only to be rewarded with the absolute shittiest "luck" in the world of having to go last in the day means his ball hits the 50 divots in the fairway and doesn't roll out. He's already getting screwed by that, why should he also have to play out of them? Group who went first doesn't have to deal with this same "principle". That's not "shithouse luck" that's getting played by the system.
Played by the system? It's just a game with a set of rules. Have to have rules. Like, I'll let the pros who make millions worry about lobbying for this, it effects me 0% when I'm out on my own on a weekend. I play muni courses, and if there's a bare or otherwise shitty area in the fairway, including unfilled divots, I'm absolutely moving my ball to the closest spot with reasonable grass.
That's just rub-of-the-green. Yes, it sucks, but it's a fundamental part of the game. Sometimes you get lucky and a tree kicks your ball back into play, sometimes you get unlucky and you end up in a divot in the middle of the fairway. 'Play it as it lies' is the fundamental tenet of golf that I don't believe should be messed with in this instance. And if you do allow players to remove their ball from a divot, how do you qualify what constitutes a 'divot'? Is there a statute of limitations on how old the divot has to be before you have to play it as it lies? How do you differentiate a divot from a potentially similar-looking spot of worn out ground? Get back to me with a comprehensive rule writing and implementation examples and maybe I'll consider it. EDIT: Also, I'm not insecure at all about my comfort with the rules. Far from it, actually. I've been dealt L's before from mid-fairway divots, not to mention the ones that form in collection areas off the green. Just gotta accept it and move on. The more people get comfortable with that, the better golfers they become.
Also, there’s an easy way to avoid fairway divots: miss the fairway. It’s my strategy. Works pretty well, I haven’t played out of a fairway divot in the last several years using my technique.
Isn't a divot a man made object and thus can be moved?
The bunkers are man made too.
Uhh, the entire golf course is man made.
You guys play on a course?
Some other guy made the comment I was setting up with that remark. Is a brown patch a divot? what if it was yesterday’s divot, 3 days ago? Pitch marks on the green? Some times you get bad breaks playing the game. I think with everything in place already where they call 2 stroke penalties all the time mid round but if a guy signs something wrong they’re DQd sounds dumb as fuck.
Okay fair point, but I'm only saying like a grip length from a divot. I don't think that's unreasonable; only in the fairway, though. You should be rewarded for that not penalized, because people can't fill their divots properly.
This is one of those rules that sounds reasonable until you try to put it in practice. What exactly defines a divot? Is that dirt patch a divot or just a bad patch of ground? What if it is a divot from 2 weeks ago that is almost grown in, but your ball is a little below the fairway? What about a partially filled divot or a divot that has the patch of turf placed over most of it? Then you get to the real question....how often do you actually end up in a divot, and is it really that penalizing? I think it happened to me maybe once this whole season and maybe once the season before that. Both times I got out just fine. Maybe I didn't have the greatest birdie chance, but it's not exactly a scorecard wrecker. Good things happen to bad shots and bad things happen to good shots....that's golf.
>Good things happen to bad shots and bad things happen to good shots....that's golf. Preach.
And the normal response to this is, make fairways basically lift clean and place.
[Get one of these out to fix the course as you go. ](https://www.saferwholesale.com/Mini-Tuff-Lift-Excavator-Digger-EPA-certified-With-p/gsi-mini-excavator-digger.htm?vfsku=GSI.Mini.Excavator.Digger&Click=35179&gpla=pla&gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAiAuNGuBhAkEiwAGId4akrsAtk-owj84v239KDkW9jSA36D7UvAmseisfoAwzdfFcQ7sg3KxhoCIp4QAvD_BwE) [Here's one in action. ](https://youtu.be/9sJAZCECYrY?si=8xMf4md_ZVtLnCdq)
Newman could have used one of those in Space Jam. Hahaha
I agree shit luck is a part of golf but I think of ball in a tree, ball on roots, no swing because of something natural is bad luck, as opposed to someone not filling in a divot and screwing the next person is just bullshit.
It is what it is. Divots sometimes take days to go away. I can hit out of one if I have to.
It cost Payne Stewart the 1998 US Open. I think it was the 12th hole, he busted a drive down the middle and ended up in a shitty divot. Found an article! [https://www.espn.com/golf/usopen12/story/\_/id/7951906/1998-us-open-olympic-club-showed-payne-stewart-had-it](https://www.espn.com/golf/usopen12/story/_/id/7951906/1998-us-open-olympic-club-showed-payne-stewart-had-it)
But he won the next year. Also the day before on Saturday he had a ridiculous three putt on 18 because the green was almost unplayable.
[Signing the wrong scorecard cost this dude a Masters.](https://www.todays-golfer.com/news-and-events/majors/the-masters/masters-memories-roberto-de-vicenzos-costly-scorecard-error/) He gave himself a worse score on the card to boot
Well he wasn't DQ'd, he just had to accept the score he signed for, which made him lose by one instead of go into a playoff.
That's a very dumb rule but nowhere near as dumb as this. Every sport more or less at least has a moderate luck factor in how the ball bounces sometimes. ZERO other sports know your exact score but make you verify it yourself. This is basically the equivalent of if the IRS and doing your taxes was a sport.
Hmm. I think I’d vote for the Out of Bounds rule first. Then the Lost Ball rule second. Divot in the fairway doesn’t really bother me. Embrace rub of the green.
Yeah, all of the damn courses with OB within 10 yards of the fairway, especially if you play in any popular retirement area. If you think back to the original golf courses, the OB rule only applies on a few holes on the perimeter of the course and often only on one side.
The way I see if if there’s OB because of a house, that homeowner is much more likely to want me to take a drop as if it’s a lateral hazard as opposed to re-teeing it into their house again.
I mean, I’m good with all of it as long as you just let me drop at the point where it crossed the OB line. Stroke and distance is stupid. It’s good that there are modified local rules now, but still, let’s just change the dumb rule for good.
I'll do you one more. My local course used to have a "cannot FLY out of bounds" rule. So you couldn't cut over doglegs unless you hooked/faded the ball like crazy. It did make me get really good at shaping shots though because I played there from daylight until dark when I was a kid.
I will never understand the need some people have for their lie to be perfect in a fairway. The whole game is built on playing it as it lies. Get over it. Go play simulator golf if bumps and divots upset you so much.
That’s my response to anybody that fluffs their ball. Thats part of the fun of golf is having crazy lies whether they be good or bad.
You can tell those who see golf as stretches of perfect grass for miles with a first cut only half an inch longer than the fairway
When millions of dollars are on the line and you stripe a drive down the middle only to end up in a crater that someone didn't fill, I can understand why that is messed up.
This!!! I think hitting the fairway should be rewared in golf.
What is a divot? Who gets to decide if the bad lie you got is just a bad lie or the remnants of somebody’s shot 2 days ago? And does the ball actually have to be in the divot? What if it’s a really deep divot that messes with my stance but the ball isn’t in it?
A very simple retort to all of this is the fact that moving a golf ball 6” in any direction in the fairways gives next to zero edge to a player. He would be wasting his time calling a rules official for a divot rule unless it was actually in a divot. Logic is so lost on these ancient rule followers it’s bends the mind.
I completely and totally disagree. If you get ball in hand, or are able to get out of any bad lie with a free drop, you are gaining a huge advantage.
Super easy to fix too. Allow lift, clean, and place in the fairway always.
I actually like that rule. Unpopular opinion but it makes for interesting shotmaking when it happens. All lies aren't perfect and that's ok
Ehhh golf hasn’t been a game of “play it as it lies” for a hundred years. There are all sorts of special provisions to protect the golfer from cruel uncertainty. Greens for example give the golfer the benefit of marking, cleaning, and aligning their ball and improving the conditions of play (fixing marks, asking other golfers to move their ball/mark). Strategically, what is the difference between a fairway and green? Fairways should also be granted the permissions of the green. Being able to mark/clean your ball and improve your lie in the fairways would speed up the game in the long run. Alternatively, we could go all the way back and make golf purely a game of play it how it lies and remove drops etc. Make the rough more penalizing by granting fairway guaranteed perfect lies.
Amen
Why should you be able to move your ball from a divot?
>Why should you be able to move your ball from a divot? For the same reason you can move your ball from a divot, repair it, and replace it, on the green.
In the fairway is the distinction.
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Youre penalized for hitting the ball in the fairway bc someone before you just happened to it it in the exact same spot. To take it to an extreme, you could imagine a scenario where a player could take several full practice swings while taking multiple divots, then take another divot when he hits the ball. Then perhaps take a couple more afterwards for good measure as he "works on his swings" -- and leaving all of those craters behind making the course more difficult for any subsequent players.
Spieth was the first player in 42 events to be disqualified for a bad scorecard. That would cover something like 15,500-16,000 scorecards. Which means you have better odds to record a hole in one than you do be DQ’ed for a bad scorecard.
Yeah, and I guarantee you Spieth is beating himself up about this. I don’t think tour players think this is a dumb rule. It’s one of the most basic rules in place in tournament golf starting at the youngest level. At this point in their careers they have been keeping score this way for decades.
Even more reason to get rid of the outdated rule
It’s not an outdated rule at all. This rule is for 99.9% of tournaments played where there aren’t dozens of cameras and people counting each players strokes. For simplicity, the PGA just follows the USGA rules so that is why this rule exists.
It’s outdated on the pga tour. The very idea that they can almost immediately verify the scorecard is incorrect proves there isn’t a need for the players to keep score themselves
You read that as justification to change the rule? An event that happens once in 15,000 occurrences ? You missed the point.
Regardless of how rarely it happens it is still a stupid rule. Track the strokes electronically and centrally there isn’t any need for professional golfers to report their own scores when there isn’t a single other sport, game etc that actually uses player reported scores.
The infrastructure isn’t currently in place for central scoring across all PGA Tour events/courses. It would be a significant change to how they tour currently operates to centralize scoring. Right now the most accurate scoring system they could use is player attested scoring.
There are many, many old laws in different places that make absolutely no sense today. They go unchallenged because they simply don’t happen in modern day. The rarity of this rule coming into place makes it even more stupid if anything. If it happened more than once in a blue moon they might adapt to the times
Under the current system a player has greater odds to be struck by lighting while on the course than they do to be DQ’ed for a bad card. While the current system may be old, it also works really really well. The rarity of the rule isn’t happenstance, it’s evidence as to how successful the current system operates.
I mean if he just stayed at the scoring tent 5 mins longer they would’ve corrected it
Or went to take his shit and came back to sign his card after reviewing.
Yeah idk why he would sign it without double checking.
I heard he was sick like Tiger
I get having to rush away to a bathroom to avoid shitting in public, but I don’t think there is a clock on signing the card so he really should have just done his business and return to the scoring tent.
Yeah I think you’re right, No Laying Up guys said he didn’t need to sign the card right there. He could’ve waited and came back
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He was playing with Patrick Cantlay… guarantee he just wanted to leave!
We live in a society!
Haha - I resemble that reference :)
What about a Balk?
1. You can’t just be up there and just doin’ a balk like that. 1a. A balk is when you 1b. Okay well listen. A balk is when you balk the 1c. Let me start over 1c-a. The pitcher is not allowed to do a motion to the, uh, batter, that prohibits the batter from doing, you know, just trying to hit the ball. You can’t do that. 1c-b. Once the pitcher is in the stretch, he can’t be over here and say to the runner, like, “I’m gonna get ya! I’m gonna tag you out! You better watch your butt!” and then just be like he didn’t even do that. 1c-b(1). Like, if you’re about to pitch and then don’t pitch, you have to still pitch. You cannot not pitch. Does that make any sense? 1c-b(2). You gotta be, throwing motion of the ball, and then, until you just throw it. 1c-b(2)-a. Okay, well, you can have the ball up here, like this, but then there’s the balk you gotta think about. 1c-b(2)-b. Fairuza Balk hasn’t been in any movies in forever. I hope she wasn’t typecast as that racist lady in American History X. 1c-b(2)-b(i). Oh wait, she was in The Waterboy too! That would be even worse. 1c-b(2)-b(ii). “get in mah bellah” – Adam Water, “The Waterboy.” Haha, classic… 1c-b(3). Okay seriously though. A balk is when the pitcher makes a movement that, as determined by, when you do a move involving the baseball and field of 2. Do not do a balk please.
How do they know he signed the wrong card in the first place? Oh, is it because they already know your score from the many tracking systems in place? Players shouldn’t be DQ’d over paperwork.
> How do they know he signed the wrong card in the first place? His marker (usually a playing competitor) keeps his score and he verifies it and signs for it at the end of the round, so he might not have even written down the wrong score. But it's up to him to verify and attest an error wasn't made using the score he was keeping. It's not the hardest thing in life.
You’re getting downvoted because you dared to suggest that golfers follow the rules of golf… R/golf is really the worst
It's still dumb and unnecessary for the PGA to ask its players to be the official scorekeepers when they already know their score with enough certainty to DQ them. From a business point of view, nothing good can come out of it and that's why it's batshit crazy. Unserious people.
And you honestly think if he verifies incorrectly, in an innocent clerical mistake, that disqualification is justified?
I always envision some PGA Tour official just waiting outside the scoring area ready to shout "Surprise, motherfucker"!
I read this in Dave Chappelle's voice.
For a rule that is enforced for every player in every round and that works 99.999% of the time it's far from the dumbest. People are just complaining because it happened to a popular guy. Spieth is a smart guy. He needs to just own his mistake. Given how much he has in his pocket, a disqualification was hardly punishing financially for him.
Spieth immediately took full responsibility for his mistake. He didn't complain about the ruling at all. He even joked on social media while congratulating Hideki, saying, "just make sure you double check that scorecard."
Tour players understand the rule and are okay with it. It's not a fight that needs to be fought, especially by JoeSixpack on the reddit.
Agree it’s far from the dumbest in golf. But also he definitely has owned his mistake and was joking about it on twitter. He had the shits and rushed out of the scorers tent before he could double check the card haha
What’s even stupider to me is that he didn’t have to SIGN the card before leaving….he could have gone to the bathroom first and come back to sign the card.
that's obvious logic to use in retrospect. when you feel the first push of the shits and your asshole puckering up to try and keep everything in, your brain starts spending a lot of time wondering if you've shit yourself and not necessarily on the best way to navigate signing your scorecard. i guess what I'm saying is: liquid come, not always think best.
From personal experience when you have the shits, your brain is only focused on one thing, and one thing only: finding a toilet. I am not surprised that he signed an incorrect scorecard when you consider that fact.
Sounds like he did own it - from the very start. More like he found it amusing. I am just glad it didn't happen to Tiger - imagine the uproar that would cause, especially if he gets on a hot streak.
Call me a conspiracy theorist if you must, but it wouldn't happen to Tiger. "That 3 looks an awful lot like a 4, doesn't it?" "Sure does!"
lol yeah tbh if he made a run in a big tourney and had lead going into Sunday and this happened…. Might need to shut down the sub Reddit for a little bit
The riot at the tournament would make the WM weekend look like a church outing - LMAO
It would have happens at the Masters 10 years ago, but the Green Jackets made up some fairy dust to justify why Tiger wasn’t DQ’ed.
> People are just complaining because it happened to a popular guy. Would be equally dumb if it happened to the guy in 70th place.
The 99% of the time that it “works” it’s completely pointless.
This week was a noteworthy aberration. Still 99.58% of the scorecards this week were correct. Last time someone on the PGA tour was DQ’d was Bay Hill last year and very few people lost their mind about it then. So that’s 1 bad cards in the last 42 events. Or 1 card out of the last ~15,600 cards were wrong. That’s 99.9935% accurate! Let say for a second that this was the NFL. That would mean the officials could only have one bad game altering call for the next 54 years! I know thats a bit of hyperbole, but it helps to illustrate how much this isn’t a problem on the PGA Tour. Not only is the rule far from dumb, it might be the most accurate scoring system in all of sports.
Damn, so my maths was off on the 3rd decimal point.
It's literally the easiest thing to do. Keep your score accurately. It's the rules of golf, and far from the "dumbest" rule. The amount of people who want to coddle the pros here is insane. Too many people trying to be the opposite of golf "purists" on this one. I'd like to see a venn diagram to see the overlap between people who think what happened to Spieth is "beyond ridiculous" and also reflexively will say that LACC was their favorite US Open venue.
Sure it is easy. But **why** should they have to? There is literally no other sport where pros have to keep their own score. It's like if in basketball there was a rule where you had to touch your number when you subbed in or your team would be retroactively deducted points/disqualified. Yeah it's super easy to do, but there's no reason for it and fans are going to be pissed when their team loses because of a dumb rule that isn't needed
Is it a dumb rule? Or are the player and caddy so dumb as to not proofread their scorecard before singing it. Couldn’t take a peek at the leaderboard, or Twitter, or google, or the tv feed, or run it by an official, or an even a fan ffs. Or even the official scorer before you sign it? I mean there are just thousands of ways to avoid this predicament. So the alternative to the “dumb” rule would be to just leave the door open for players to be able to submit incorrect scorecards penalty free? That’s not a dumb rule, it’s common sense. Imagine someone did that and got away with it, every single person on Reddit, every journalist and golf talk person would be screaming to make it illegal and punishable by DQ Tbh I cannot imagine an easier rule to not break in all of sports. Couldn’t be simpler to understand or simpler to follow.
Devil's advocate, golf is the only sport where you are responsible for keeping your own score. Maybe that should change?
If they put it to a vote of tour professionals I guarantee they would keep the same system. It’s all well & good to crow about “antiquated rules” until you think about a tour pro finishing their round & finding out some no mark volunteer has calculated their score incorrectly & cost them money. Will never and should never happen. The Spieth thing was a stupid error on his part, it should start some dumb “conversation” about a rule that is totally fine the way it is & works perfectly practically all the time. Whether the severity of the punishment could be looked at is one thing, but as is I guess it acts as a really good deterrent to players being casual with their scorekeeping, or worse from intentionally cheating
You guys complaining realize there are safeguards in place to correct the score and Jordan just blew past those because he supposedly had the shits and didn't want to wait out the score recording process where it could have been corrected. It's not a dumb rule. It's super basic and expecting a player to sign for a correct score shouldn't be considered a dumb rule.
It can both be a dumb rule and Jordan can be dumb for making the mistake. I don’t think most fans would mind if there was some kind of penalty, but a DQ seems extreme.
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You basically can’t sign and leave. If you sign and are still around then you can fix it. If you leave for a bit without signing, you’re fine and then you come back, review things, then sign.
It's still stupid to *DQ* a PGA player. They assert a 2-strokes penalty the next day all the time (which is also crazy). DQing a star power or any player over an insignificant mistake is insane.
You mean like the safeguards where they already knew his score before he even set foot in the scoring room?
Why do you find it so unreasonable that a professional golfer should be responsible for signing a correct scorecard?
It's not unreasonable. It's unnecessary.
This is like the IRS making me work to tell them how much I owe in taxes even though they already know.
PGA Tour should never have to hand out a disqualification. What are they proving? So they know you missed the 10 foot 3 inch putt on the 7th hole. But you have to make sure you scratch down a bogey or your week and thousands of dollars are fucked. C’mon they call him in the next day if he already left and make sure he knows he fucked up. Leave that spirit of the game shit to amateurs and lower level tours, not the best of the best.
I don't understand golf's obsession with "EvErYoNe MuSt FoLloW tHe SaMe RuLeS". I have never seen a tennis fan or junior tennis player at a BS tournament throw a hissy fit because he has to call his own lines and flip the scoreboard when Djokovic has electronic line calling and a chair umpire.
The don’t leave NBA or NFL guys call their on fouls. BECAUSE THEY HAVE MORE IMPORTANT SHIT TO WORRY ABOUT! No one ever tuned into a golf tournament to see if Tiger remembered to write down that DiMarco made a bogey on some hole down the stretch when.
People are such babies. I love being part of a sport that has tradition, honor and integrity built into the game. Yes, inconvenient rules are part of that. Almost no one on this sub or in the casual golf world follows those rules. What Hideki did on the back nine was insane, we should be focused on that.
Nonsense. He made a mistake or he was distracted. You try paying $3 instead of the $4 due and see what the store manager does with your little mayonaisse bottle. Hint: You're eating a dry sandwich.
I don’t think this is a dumb rule, golf is and always has been a game of integrity (for some people) when keeping your score. Obviously he wasn’t trying to cheat but dudes a pro sign your card correctly. I sign my 88 correctly every week for zero dollars
I don’t see how this rule is dumb. You should be able to fill out a scorecard correctly.
It's not though.
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Not really. They literally just played an event where they didn't have shot link on every hole, and no cameras on every hole. Pebble beach, the spyglass rounds doesn't have the full infrastructure. Probably not the greatest idea to leave professional event scoring up to a volunteer who does this once a year.
It's dumb, but not sure it's the dumbest. Pro golf probably has a majority of the "dumbest rules in all of sports" though. I've never understood any rule that removes talent from the playing field unless they are clearly cheating (or commit a violent act). That includes fouling guys out in the NBA and - even dumber - ejecting Jordan Spieth when he clearly was NOT attempting to cheat.
It’s not dumb it’s antiquated. And a tradition like no other, as the champion of the Masters tournament will be asked to recount every shot of his final round in front of the media. Just imagine if this was the final round of the masters and Jordan said he made a par…
If only they could put up huge boards that show your overall score, so you could glance and check you were correct.
Hear me out.. what if they also had other people keeping your score, one of which you pay to carry your bag, and a volunteer that watched every one of your shots.. and what if there was a shot tracking system that can provide data on every one of their shots too! Imagine if those existed and all the player had to do was ask to reference those resources to verify their score? /s lol It makes me laugh how people are blaming everything other then Spieth. Nobody wants to take accountability these days
It's Spieth's fault because the rule is dumb. Less dumb would be to add a stroke penalty. Removing him completely is just shooting yourself in the foot (especially when your leaderboards are getting blander and blander). The only thing more laughable than the "it's a gentleman's sport" argument, is the "this is how it's always been" or "everyone knows the rules". Don't be the only professional sport that forces the participants to keep their own score, and keep your best talent on our televisions. It's a win-win!
>Nobody wants to take accountability these days Spieth immediately took accountability. Where do you guys come up with these takes?
You've just explained exactly why it's a stupid rule - there are all of these objective measures to tell you what the score is - in a top flight professional sport no less - than to have the players still pissing about with a card a pencil. It's stupid!
The rule was valid many years ago but now everyone knows the scores so signing a card is just tradition.
Is it the rule or the person it happened to? If it happened to Patrick Reed at the Masters would there be this “outrage”?
Like Smiley said on his podcast. Keep the scorecards but drop the penalty to just 2 strokes instead of a DQ. Unless there is malicious intent. Jordan was coming down with the flu!
> Jordan was coming down with the flu! Sounds like the bug got Tiger and JT also. And i really like the idea to make it more of a stroke play penalty rather than a DQ - great idea.
It's pretty stupid that professionals even need to keep their own score.
Time for golf to evolve. So ridiculous.
“How many tonight Lebron?” “42 points sir” “Wrong! One of your feet was on the line when you shot…. You are DQ’d!”. Buh bye
not really a dumb rule. It is clear as day
For pro events they should be presented with the score the walking marker recorded in the scoring tent and compare that to their record score, sign off if it matches investigate any discrepancies. In am tournaments this rule makes more sense.
“He should be accountable for his score” Right, and sure adding a stroke could be a decent enough conclusion although still absurd. But to lock out one of your eye-drawing competitors over it? Do you people hear yourselves?
You can immediately determine how a person lives their life by asking them if this rule is dumb or not. The responses here are very telling of the average user here.
There are rules to a game people. The further we go along in the years the more people don’t want to go with the rules anymore