Thought for the Day
Keep skunks, bankers and lawyers at a distance
A week or so ago Brian Davis, the Londoner who has played on the US Tour for several years, lost out on his chance of a maiden PGA victory because of a nonsensical rule that he inadvertently breached while playing from a beach which was deemed a water hazard. On the first hole of a sudden-death playoff against Jim Furyk in the Verizon Heritage he fell foul of rule 13.4 (Ball in hazard: Prohibited Actions) because in the course of his backswing his club lightly touched a piece of reed grass. It was not fixed or growing so was considered a loose impediment and the player was penalised two strokes, effectively ending his challenge for the title.
A great deal was made of Davis’ honesty – which it shouldn’t have been – but almost nothing was said then, or on many previous occasions when ridiculous rules have led to absurd penalties. Yet it seems to me that we golfers should be rising as one and bellowing to the R&A and USGA: ‘Enough is enough and we are not going to put up with this farcical theatre of the absurd any longer.’
Mr Bumble in Charles Dickens’ novel Oliver Twist is the first person, real or fictional, to have said: ‘The law is an ass’ and it’s about time someone added the rider: ‘And the Rules of Golf are the biggest ass of all.’ Davis gained no possible advantage from touching the piece of reed and in fact the only way he could have avoided doing so would have been by not taking a backswing, or at least, not one that began at the ball. To pile absurdity onto the bizarre, the referee with the match, an extremely experienced official with the delightful name of Slugger White, didn’t know if a breach had been committed, and had to radio back to headquarters for guidance. But the nonsense doesn’t even end there because if the piece of reed had been embedded or growing, or Davis had touched it on the downswing, rather than the backswing, there would have been no penalty.
Please, and this is a serious question, can anyone tell me how we golfers have arrived at this irrational and illogical state of affairs? And be honest, if you hadn’t seen or read about Davis’ situation, would you have known what the ruling should have been?
Had this incident been a peculiarly freakish event, likely to crop up once a generation, then it could be happily laughed off (by us, if not by Davis) but it is not. This is the sort of weird situation that crops up time and again and all it seems to achieve is the equivalent penalty of hanging a man for stealing an apple.
Wind back to 2003 and you will remember Mark Roe and Jesper Parnevik being disqualified while in contention for the Open Championship because they forgot to swap scorecards on the first tee. They each recorded the other’s score accurately but the wrong name was written on the top of the card and instead of crossing this through and writing in the correct name, the R&A threw them out of the event.
A few years before this, in the 1987 San Diego Open at Torrey Pines, Craig Stadler had to kneel to hit his ball from under a tree branch on the 14th. To prevent getting mud on his trousers, he knelt on a towel and was consequently considered in breach of the rule that prohibits building a stance (Rule 13:3).
And of course in 1968 Roberto de Vicenzo shot a superb 65 in the last round of the Masters but was annoyed to bogey the final hole. As a result he didn’t properly check his scorecard, marked by playing partner Tommy Aaron, who inadvertently recorded a par four on the 17th, rather than the birdie three de Vicenzo actually made. As a consequence the popular Argentine missed out on a playoff for one of the premier events in world sport and the incident, in different ways, had a dramatically disheartening effect on the man himself, Aaron, and the winner, Bob Goalby, whose victory will always have an asterisk next to it.
Whenever I think of that incident I am reminded of the comment from Gene Sarazen, I think, who said: ‘Roberto made birdie on seventeen, thousands were there to witness it and millions more watched it on TV – I think it would stand up in court.’
And that’s the point. We have a set of rules governing golf which are so complex that only three people in the world truly understand them – and they have to be kept locked in a darkened room lest they frighten the horses – and which are often blatantly unfair. If you commit a real crime and are hauled in front of a judge or magistrate, they are allowed to take account of the circumstances and your motives, and act accordingly but no such interpretation is allowed in golf.
We play a game, for fun, which requires a far higher standard of adherence to the laws than those demanded in criminal trials. I don’t know how we got here, but I do wish the sport’s lawmakers would seriously consider giving us a way out.
Quote of the Week
The golf swing is like a suitcase into which we are trying to pack one too many things
John Updike
Whereas I totally agree that Davis gained no advantage i suspect the reason why the penalty was upheld is that the rule is simply written that way and how would you draw the line between gaining no advantage when hitting/moving a loose impediment and gaining an advantage so one ‘black and white’ rule for all.
Also, the forgetting to swap the card fiasco is a bit misleading imho. they were not thrown out for forgetting to swap cards. they were DQ’d for signing a scorecard with a lower score than they actually took on at least one hole. Admittedly, this only happened BECAUSE they forgot to swap cards though. I also thought it harsh as did the officials which is why new procedures to avoid this in the future were brought in afterwards – as I remember reading.
Just my 2p
I know exactly what you mean, Alan, and space always precludes me from saying everything I want (being a gabby sort) but in the pro game at least, where players always have access to officials, I believe there should be room for realistic, practical interpretation – and there is, in fact, precedent for this. When Bobby Locke won the Open (I’m not sure which of his victories) he marked his ball a clubhead away on the 72nd green because he was in someone’s line, and in his excitement, forgot to replace it properly. Technically, therefore, he didn’t penalise himself for playing from the wrong place, and consequently signed an incorrect scorecard. The R&A decided that, because he would still have won even by adding the penalty, they would waive disqualification – and quite right, too. That’s all I’m asking for, a bit of common sense because as it is judgements are made on the strictest possible interpretation of the Rules – the Craig Stadler case being the most obvious example – and the rest of us are stuck, in perpetuity, with the nonsensical precedent that has been established. In that instance I think the tournament officials should have said: ‘Course he wasn’t building a stance, he was keeping his trousers clean – now get a life’ (the issue was raised by one of those interfering busybodies watching on TV).