Midweek Musings

Just a reminder that the decision of the judges is final...except when it isn't.

Salvation, Perhaps - The USGA and R&A have descended the mount with two tablets....one, amusingly enough, creating yet another task force.  Sheesh, this explains the forty years in the wilderness....

Ready for some legalese?

New Rules of Golf Decision Limits Use of Video Review

USGA and The R&A Prioritize Working Group to Assess Role of Video 
in Applying Golf’s Rules 

FAR HILLS, N.J., USA AND ST. ANDREWS, SCOTLAND (April 25, 2017) - The USGA and The R&A have issued a new Decision on the Rules of Golf to limit the use of video evidence in the game, effective immediately.

OK, hit me with your best stuff:

New Decision 34-3/10 implements two standards for Rules committees to limit the use of video: 1) when video reveals evidence that could not reasonably be seen with the “naked eye,” and 2) when players use their “reasonable judgment” to determine a specific location when applying the Rules. The full language of the Decision can be found here.

OK, I assume the English translation will be available shortly....  So, a couple of quick questions:

1.  Could Lexi's "sloppy" mark of her golf ball be discerned with the naked eye?
2. Did Lexi use her "reasonable judgement" in marking and replacing her ball?

Thomas Pagel attempts to clarify:

“We are trying to make sure that players that are on television are not held to a higher

Think she'll ever wear this color again?

standard than others playing the game,” said Thomas Pagel, the USGA’s senior director of rules.

“Television evidence can reveal facts that as a human being you could not reasonably have known in the playing of the game. A player could do everything he or she could to get it right, but video evidence could still show that they got it a little wrong. And the only reason we can know they got it a little wrong is because we’ve been able to slow down, pause, rewind, replay, all the things that the player on the golf course doesn’t have the advantage of doing.”

OK, I'm reasonably certain that the marble is under the shell on the left, but the misdirection is having some effect on my choice....   

Pagel goes on:

The “naked eye” standard is a response in large part to Anna Nordqvist being penalized two strokes during her three-hole aggregate playoff with Brittany Lang at last year’s U.S. Women’s Open after high-definition, slow-motion video showed her to have brushed sand during her backswing in a fairway bunker on the second hole of the playoff. Nordqvist said she had been unaware of touching the sand. The new decision states that if a committee concludes that such an act “could not reasonably have been seen with the naked eye and the player was not otherwise aware of the potential breach, the player will be deemed not to have breached the Rules, even when video technology shows otherwise.”

A foundational subtext for the new decision was the one-stroke penalty that Dustin Johnson was assessed in the final round of last year’s U.S. Open after video evidence was used to determine that he had caused his ball to move while preparing to stroke a short putt on the fifth green. Johnson contended that his actions had not caused the ball to move. Unlike Thompson and Nordqvist, Johnson went on to win, but the outcry about the ruling led the USGA and R&A to enact within six months a Local Rule that states a ball at rest on the green that is accidentally moved by the player can be replaced without penalty.

I'm really perplexed....  I don't see where the DJ incident is at all relevant to Lexi's, as the USGA had previously attempted to clarify that rule and made quite the mess of it.  The were locked into a silly concept of the player being deemed to have caused the ball to move if he "addressed" it, and no one knowing whether DJ's placing his putter to the side of, as opposed to behind, constituting an address.  

As for the unfortunate Anna, again it's entirely unclear if this applies.  The language about judgement make sit seem that we're speaking of actions by a player, the location of drops seeming the most likely.  If you don't want Anna penalized for brushing the sand on her take-away, and the vast majority of us will be fine with that, how about we change THAT rule.  Easy enough, no?

But this will no doubt furnish your morning laugh:

Pagel emphasized that the decision did not result from any single incident or set of incidents but rather from the governing bodies’ ongoing effort to keep the Rules apace with modern times.

Nothing to see here, folks... Would you please exit through the gift shop.

There's no spike in traffic, but I get the sense that folks are coming around to my way of thinking.  First, on the clarity thing:

“There’s more gray area than clear definition,” two-time major champion Stacy Lewis said. “It didn’t really clarify anything.”

“I don’t think it changes Lexi’s ruling at all,” Lewis said. “It probably changes Anna’s.”

Probably, maybe, whatevah.....

Like Lewis, Matthew sees the new decision creating a gray area that’s going to land in the laps of local rules committees. 

“I think it muddies the water even more,” Matthew said. “That puts the rules officials in a much harder position. What do they call a judgment call?” 

If Matthew had her way, viewers wouldn’t be able to call in violations, which would have spared Thompson the penalties.

“I don’t think you should be able to phone in after the fact,” Matthew said.

Ron Sirak, a strong supporter of the ladies' game, is the first to go after this issue:

Now the tour has a chance to make its marketing mantra resonate in a very special way.

The LPGA should unilaterally change three rules that are hated by both fans and players. Stop allowing TV viewers to email or call in penalties; stop assessing penalties a day after a round is played; stop punishing players for not recording a penalty they didn't know they had been assessed. 

The LPGA can act unilaterally to change these rules. The pro tours, for example, play lift, clean and place as a local rule when the course is wet. The USGA never allows lift, clean and place at competitions like the U.S. Women's Open. It always plays the ball as it lies. The LPGA can make the rules change a condition of competition. However, the USGA could see such an action as a slight.

Check's in the mail, Ron.... he goes even further with these suggestions for putting these issues to bed:

(1.) Have a rules official watch TV and if they see something, say something. Otherwise, no harm, no foul. No phone calls, emails, text messages, carrier pigeons or mental telepathy from viewers allowed. Those folks will just have to validate their significance some other way. 

(2.) Make every day Sunday. When the final scorecards are signed on Sunday, the tournament is officially over. A penalty learned about on Monday cannot be assessed. Let's treat every round that way. The Saturday round is over when all the cards are signed Saturday. No more penalties issued a day later. 

(3.) What you don't know can't hurt you. How can you be penalized for signing a wrong scorecard if you didn't know it was wrong? Even if you penalized Thompson for not returning her ball to the same place -- and she did not replace it correctly -- how can she be penalized two additional strokes for not recording a penalty she didn't know she had? Of course, before last year she would have been disqualified for the infraction. That's a step in the right direction. Now it has to go all the way.

Ron, you win our first prize, an all-expenses paid week-of-your-dreams in Far Hills, NJ.

Before we go, I have an outstanding IOU to my dear readers....  I promised you a task force, and a task force ye shall have:

The two organizations have also established a working group of LPGA, PGA Tour, PGA European Tour, Ladies European Tour and PGA of America representatives to immediately begin a comprehensive review of broader video issues, including viewer call-ins, which arise in televised competitions.

I'm sorry, a working group....Shack has the first order of business for the task force working group:

But first, we have to decide if we are meeting at Sea Island, Pinehurst, Pebble or Bandon to hash this call-in stuff? Maybe Sand Valley? It's on the way to Erin Hills! Sort of.

Peace In Our Time -  Now that Phil and Tiger are bromantically involved, where should Cupid next look?  If you've been reading this site lately, you'll know who's do for a rapprochement:

Harrington had described Garcia as a sore loser, but speaking at an R&A event yesterday 

afternoon to promote the upcoming Open Championship, the three-time Major champion revealed they cleared the air at McIlroy's wedding in Co Mayo at the weekend. 

"Sergio and I are on a much better footing," Harrington said in quotes reported by the BBC. "We've had a chat, because obviously there was a bit of an elephant in the room about what I said.

"I've got to say, Sergio made it very easy. He was exceptionally good about it. He already was well informed, which was nice. 

"We have decided that we will look, going forward, at our similarities and the good in each of us rather than any other way."

Well informed?  Any guesses?  Appropriately enough, this took place at Rory's wedding, though I'm guessing the photo is from the files...

You're Gonna Need a Bigger Boat - One simply wishes that this survey of Golf in Scotland had included other categories and questions, but we take what we can.

Let me first express my shock at this result:

BEST HOLE – TOM MORRIS, 18TH AT THE OLD COURSE, ST ANDREWS

The closing hole at St Andrews’ Old Course has been voted the Best Golf Hole in Scotland with a 27% share of the vote. 

St Andrews is often regarded as “the home of golf” and performed strongly across the poll. The 18th hole is named after the former open champion Tom Morris who lived in St Andrews. It is easy to see why this iconic golf hole was voted the best; it’s the most photographed golf hole in the world!

Most photographed, sure:

Best?  Not so much, though I do like the hole very much.  The utter simplicity of it, how it finishes in town and, of course, that Valley thing.  The back story on the Valley of Sin is that they were digging out to build a bunker there and encountered a burial ground.  Old Tom told them to leave it as it was at that moment, one of the most inadvertent incidents of shaping ever.

And this:

BEST PAR 4 – ROAD, 17TH AT THE OLD COURSE, ST ANDREWS

The Old Course at St Andrews also won the Best Par 4 in Scotland for the 17th, Road hole. The Road received over a third of the votes in this category. 

If you have played this hole you will know that shots that veer to the right are liable to end up on the road. Other pitfalls include the devilish ‘Sands of Nakajima’ bunker nicknamed after Japanese golfer Tsuneyuki Nakajima, who took four shots to get out while leading in the third round of the 1978 Open. Other contenders in this category included Royal Dornoch (8th) and Carnoustie (18th).

I've no problem here, except for the bit about it being a Par-4....  Don't confuse me with logic, though about how the 18th at St. Andrews is the best hole in Scotland but not the best Par-4.

But just when you think we're surveying the most famous holes, comes this:

BEST VIEW – 9TH AT CHAMPIONSHIP COURSE, CRUDEN BAY GOLF CLUB

The 9th hole at Cruden Bay Golf Club on the Aberdeenshire coast claimed the award for best view. 

The course, which has stirring views across the Bay of Cruden and Slains Castle, triumphed against competition from the Castle Course at St Andrews, Machrihanish Dunes and Gullane Golf Club, with 20% of the vote. This category included nominations for more than 300 individual holes, which was a real testament to the wealth of beautiful views across Scotland’s courses.

This is a lesser known course and a very new tee box, so well-played, all.

My good friend Nathan Assor (a former golf buddy that has me back to Willow Ridge on Sunday), has just planned his first trip to Scotland, and I'm kvelling with pride.  It's not a full-Monty golf trip, with only four round of golf.  But it's the courses he chose:  Dornoch, Cruden Bay, The Old and North Berwick.  As I told his bride Marcia later, setting aside some geographic issues, could one have chosen four better examples of links golf?  I mean anywhere?

Don't Ask - While I don't advise asking such a question, the answer is quite the thing:

What's your best John Daly story? -Ryan (@therealsneek1)

Is this wise?  OK, buckle in:

The most time I ever spent around Daly was at the 1997 PGA Championship, when I shadowed him for an SI feature. The preceding months had been wild, even by Daly's standards:

He withdrew after the first round of the Players following a late-night drinking binge so

excessive it landed him in a hospital; two days later he checked into the Betty Ford Clinic; a few days after that his third wife, Paulette, filed for divorce; on Daly's birthday, three weeks later, he got dumped by his primary sponsor, Wilson; two months after that, at the U.S. Open, he walked off of Congressional midway through the second round due to the shakes that came with his newfound sobriety. When I caught up with Daly he was still trying to piece his life back together, but the fans had never left him. Following the second round he parked next to Tiger on the driving range. The sun was getting low but the bleachers were packed; Tiger was playing his first major since his game-changing blowout at Augusta. Daly started smashing drivers and the thousand or so fans lining the range started whooping and hollering. At some point he glanced up at Woods, who had stopped hitting balls and was leaning on his driver, hand on hip, enjoying the show. Daly woofed at him. Woods then turned to the crowd, flashed a smile and teed up a ball. The fans roared. Woods brought the club back majestically and … did a little half swing, bunting the ball 100 yards. Then his practice session resumed in earnest. "I can learn a lot from him," Daly told me. "He handles himself so well..

We sat and talked in the locker room at Winged Foot. He pulled from his pockets a dozen sobriety medals that had been pressed on him by fans; AA members receive them to mark various milestones of their journey. Daly was using the medals as ball markers and sources of inspiration. 

I couldn't help but be struck by how Daly seemed like a wounded puppy dog, or maybe a world weary little boy. For all of his screw-ups there was an undeniable sweetness there. I finally understood why so many people still cared about him. He told me he had just written a song, and I had him jot down the lyrics in my notebook: 

"I'm living one day at a time/

Yes I'm doing just fine/

This is my life, let it be known/

This is my life, through the years I have grown/

Please God don't give up on me/This is my life"

I remember thinking after our long chat that Daly had finally found himself, and that he had finally conquered his demons. The next day, while playing the 12th hole, he hit a wild tee ball and chucked his Big Bertha driver into the woods.

 Yeah, how'd that work out?  At least the sponsors' exemptions seem to have finally dried up...