Unplayable Lies: Open Detritus

In which we deal with that lingering bad taste in our mouths....

Fox as Savior - Yeah, I'm gagging on this one a bit, but since I didn't actually see it I'll have to defer to those that did. More accurately, a carefully chosen subset of those...specifically including Martin Kaufmann and John Strege. From the former:

We certainly can’t accuse Fox Sports of carrying water for the U.S. Golf Association.

These television “partnerships” between networks and sports properties tend to be cozy relationships, but when the whole Dustin Johnson kerfuffle busted out on the back nine Sunday, Fox dealt with the situation head-on.

Jeff Hall, the USGA’s managing director, Open Championships, was brought into the 18th tower to be interrogated. OK, they kept it civil, but Fox announcers Paul Azinger and Brad Faxon made clear they were not happy with the prospect that the USGA would dock Johnson a penalty stroke because his ball moved on the fifth green.

“It sounded like Jeff Hall (indicated) they’ve already made the decision that it’s going to be a penalty,” Azinger said after Hall had departed.

“I’m really fired up. . .” Faxon said. “They have to take (Johnson’s) word for it that it didn’t move. … What other sport would wait until the end to make a decision. This is ridiculous.”

Fox anchor Joe Buck read tweets from Rory McIlroy and other prominent players blasting the USGA.

And from the latter:

We certainly can’t accuse Fox Sports of carrying water for the U.S. Golf Association. These television “partnerships” between networks and sports properties tend to be cozy relationships, but when the whole Dustin Johnson kerfuffle busted out on the back nine Sunday, Fox dealt with the situation head-on.

Jeff Hall, the USGA’s managing director, Open Championships, was brought into the 18th tower to be interrogated. OK, they kept it civil, but Fox announcers Paul Azinger and Brad Faxon made clear they were not happy with the prospect that the USGA would dock Johnson a penalty stroke because his ball moved on the fifth green.

“It sounded like Jeff Hall (indicated) they’ve already made the decision that it’s going to be a penalty,” Azinger said after Hall had departed.

“I’m really fired up. . .” Faxon said. “They have to take (Johnson’s) word for it that it didn’t move. … What other sport would wait until the end to make a decision. This is ridiculous.”

Fox anchor Joe Buck read tweets from Rory McIlroy and other prominent players blasting the USGA.

Good on them. I'm not surprised to see that from Zinger and Faxon, but you never know what orders are being barked into their headsets. It was disconcerting and disturbing, and to have pretended otherwise would not have played well...

Any guesses on how The Shark would have handled it? OK, that was harsh....

Shack gives them those and other props in this post, specifically citing their successful use of technology, including this:

—Flight Track, showing the player teeing off with a side graphic depicting the flight of the ball and various numbers. Easily the biggest innovation in golf viewing based on the viewer reaction on social media and in the press center.

Couldn't agree more.... very effective, though to be fair you couldn't do that when we ere all watching 13" screens.

I expected to see more attempts to capture the contours of the greens, and with Gil Hanse and Bob Ford available they could have done far more to set up the holes as players were preparing to hit approach shots.

From my limited viewing, I find the Fox pacing a bit jarring at times, though that's admittedly inherently subjective. Shack has some coverage critiques as well, and they're typically thoughtful and well worth your time.

He touches on Mark Brooks as well, who was easily the weakest link in their coverage and also to my mind extraneous in some of "Let's go to Holly" moments....Apparently Brooks' work last year on featured group coverage earned him the field promotion, and Shack speculates that he's uncomfortable in front of the camera... If Mark Loomis thinks he can grow into the role then he should let him do so, but this is yet another instance where Fox only covering USGA events is a limiting factor....

Were you aware of the Saturday fiasco?

Never? Well, except for the next ten U.S. Opens.... And to be clear, they didn't switch for a regular-season baseball game, they switched for a regular-season baseball game's pregame show... I've read about contractual commitments, but don't they have the same commitments to the USGA?

Ultimately One has to concede that Fox was far better this time around.... they also get props for their bonus coverage, as they were on for thirteen hours on Friday. But to this viewer Joe Buck is simply an unwanted presence, with a booming voice ill-suited to the gentle rhythms of our game. I think we under-appreciate the job that Jim Nantz and Dan Hicks do in managing the traffic flow on their networks, while not overtly intruding on the proceedings.

Rulesgate - I gave you a day off from any discussion of 18-2/.05, so you're going to eat your spinach and you're going to like it.... Though I'll amuse you with this quote that Shack has as a header today:

Sometimes the closer one sticks to the letter of the rules, the farther one gets from the spirit.
S.L. McKINLAY

We're going to start with Max Adler, who I think gets it as wrong as is humanly possible:

If the naked eye cannot be trusted to detect whatever it is you are trying to see, then what you are trying to see does not exist, at least in the realm of sports. In this case, the subatomic physical relationship between air, grass blade and TaylorMade. Microscopes are essential in science and engineering, but when it comes to comparing the athleticism of men and women and calling a winner, reliance on gadgetry diminishes the contest. When a downhill skier loses a race by .001 of a second, does he really lose? Because the mind is incapable of conceiving such an abstraction, the contest is flawed. When a wide receiver’s toe is judged oh just a fraction of a fraction out-of-bounds on what the ref originally called the game-winning catch, does that result sit well? A few years ago or in a different league the catch might’ve been called the other way, and record books start to read like fiction.

Does any part of that ring true? When I see that wide receivers toe come down out of bounds on the slo-mo replay, I'm glad that the technology allows for that level of accuracy, though I might regret the time it takes to do so. The other basic flaw is that DJ himself saw the ball move, so in some manner we're forced to deal with it...

Here's Max's conclusion, which isn't as off-base as the above excerpt would lead you to believe:

But here’s a better idea: Let’s simply get rid of any rules that require a camera. Rule 18-2, which deals with a ball at rest that moves, is absurd. If the five human senses are inadequate, than whatever we are trying to discover is unimportant.

here's the question I'd pose.... is there another rule in sports that requires officials to judge the relative likelihood of causation? And remember this from the decisions that we had a couple of days ago:

If the weight of the evidence indicates that it is more likely than not that the player caused the ball to move, even though that conclusion is not free from doubt, the player incurs a one-stroke penalty under Rule 18-2 and the ball must be replaced. Otherwise, the player incurs no penalty and the ball is played as it lies unless some other rule applies (e.g. Re 18-1).

That highlighted clause is to me the crux of the matter. If we want to analogize to other sports, if there remains doubt after a video review the decision on the field is upheld.

But before we jump to conclusions, you should read Gar Van Sickle's piece on the mess, which provides a necessary existential overview of that which Gary calls a perfect storm:

The whole only-in-golf situation was set in motion the moment Johnson informed a USGA rules official that his ball on the 5th green of the last round of the 116th U.S. Open moved incrementally and that he was not responsible for its movement. From that point on, four basic and competing conditions came into play:

I. A tenet of golf is that you play the ball as it lies.
II. Every time the ball moves, no matter how insignificantly, there must be some accounting of the movement.

III. The player is assumed to be a person of integrity, trusted to mark his card with complete fidelity to the rulebook.

IV. The goal of every player is to turn in the most accurate scorecard possible and to that end the golfer should use all available information.

I know, but is there another sport where the player is responsible for posting his own score? And this is pitch-perfect:

To the public at large, the decision turned into Faceless Bureaucrats v. Stylish Long-hitting Touring Pro. In the court of public opinion, the USGA had no chance. In making the decision it made, the USGA was rejecting Johnson’s own analysis of what happened. This is where the conflict between Condition III and Condition IV comes into play.

Yes, this minutia is deeply tedious. It is not Johnson’s stock-in-trade, or most people’s. But the actions of the USGA were intended to preserve the integrity of the game and the outcome of the championship. The next time a player is in a similar situation, he or she will now have a further understanding of the importance of determining what actually made the ball move. Not that the USGA was trying to teach any sort of lesson. It was trying to sort through the situation it faced with all the available evidence.

I think that Gary's defense of the USGA is helpful, as much of the criticism is needlessly personal. But I have one mega-caveat, namely that the conditions of the greens makes this an increasingly common, not a perfect storm.

Shack has a curious post about Mike Davis that seems unnecessarily personal... here's his framing of the issue:

The USGA became the story over the players and Oakmont.

The USGA jeopardized their reputation over a strict reading of their rules, instead of taking into account the spirit of the rules or other similar situations from the round, or just simple common sense that said this did not meet the threshold set by Decisions 18-2/0.5.

They risked the reputation of the sport and the United States Open over an obscure "Decision" in a situation brought on by their love of unsustainable green speeds.

A select few people went out on a limb to penalize Johnson, ultimately embarrassing their staff, USGA members and the volunteer referee who agreed with Johnson's view that the player had not caused the ball to move.

The USGA essentially called Johnson a liar by insisting on penalizing the eventual champion.

There's much to be critical of, but you to war with the rule book and decisions thereon that you have.... I'm arguing for a change to the rule, but I'm a bit uncomfortable with the concept that rules officials should defer to the nebulous "spirit of the rule". Now on this I agree completely:

So it was on Monday that Davis finally went public and tried to repair the situation Golf Central, but then inexplicably asked for a "mulligan," a violation of the Rules of Golf!

In other words, the rules sticklers were asking for forgiveness in the spirit of the rules, the same lack of forgiving spirit they would not apply to the Johnson situation. This, even as any combination of factors could have been taken into account--green speeds, referee's decision, DJ's on-course track record--and were not.

Again, very little discussion of the conflict with Rule 34-2.... I think Randall Mell, to whom Shack linked, has it about right:

With the USGA’s credibility so under assault right now, with the world’s best players poised to revolt, with some pushing for the PGA Tour to take charge of their own rule making, it’s more important than ever for Davis to be out front. You may not agree with some of his U.S. Open setup philosophies, some of the creative tweaks he has added to an old formula, but Davis is a persuasive figure. He is a true believer. He is committed to his principles, and he knows how to sell his ideas. He can give eloquent, thorough explanations for the most controversial decisions (i.e., anchored strokes). That’s why his voice is needed to soothe all the angst, to reassure the faithful that reasonable complaints are being heard and reasonable solutions are being sought.

Rule 18-2 – balls at rest moving – needs addressing again. Is the USGA content with the language, with “weighted evidence” and “51 percent” probability, all that’s required for a rules committee to overrule decisions players and referees make on the course? Video review needs some serious wrangling, to prevent or limit the kind of damage Sunday’s review could have done.

Stay tuned, but I think you'll agree that it's time to move on...

Murphy? Is That an Irish Name? - On Monday we featured Employee No. 2's trenchant insights on the Sunday awards ceremony. Now of course her use of the "V" word garnered the strongest feedback, but remember this about the USGA Prez?

Employee No. 2's take: Has she been drinking?

The bride's family hails from County Mayo and I defer to her experience in such matters, but this is now an official Internet meme.

Watch the painful video and see if you can identify any other cause....

Anger Management - Did you catch Spencer Levin's meltdown in the second round? It was pretty epic, and Shack had it here. Apologies for my technical limitations in not being able to embed it, but Levin is a bit of a frequent offender on this score:

Good times.

But get a load of this:

A man and his putter in better times...

Danny Willett admitted frustration got the better of him after smashing the putter he used to win the Masters during the US Open at Oakmont.

A closing 71 left the 28-year-old on nine over par alongside Argentina's Angel Cabrera, who was five over par in winning the US Open at Oakmont in 2007.

"Unfortunately it's now in two pieces," said Willett, whose patience ran out in the closing stages of Saturday's third round of 73. "We'll have to get it refurbed and then I won't be using it again.

I completely get it....after all, what had that putter ever done for him?

The Fashion Beat - Marty Hackel narrates a slideshow on U.S. Open fashions, the hits and misses. I made a snide comment about this on Thursday, but I'm now wondering is they were flannel: