A Fresh Example Of A Ten-Second Rule Violation Unbeknownst To The Broadcast Team

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Here’s a public service message for those not aware of a rule seemingly known to most with a golf pulse: you cannot let the ball hang on the cup edge for longer than ten seconds in hopes it might fall. This was an easy one but because we’re in a State TV era where it must be positivity all the time, we can’t know for sure what caused the Golf Channel broadcast team to not even suggest a possible rules violation (while fans watching and Tweeting knew it right away—see replies to the video posted above.

To recap: Seonghyeon Kim obviously took way too long with his ball on the 18th hole edge and was penalized one stroke after the CJ Cup final round. On cue, the Tour’s rules staff saw the obvious breach and this news was Tweeted:

The rule:

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They did eventually acknowledge the breach, with Steve Sands suggesting the broadcast team was “worried about the time frame” but that it didn’t seem to be “much of an issue.”

Kim’s ball hung on the edge for 24 seconds.

Russell's Exit Interview: Slow Play, Field Sizes, Sitcoms And Late Evening Golf

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The PGA Tour won’t be quite the same without former Mickey’s theme park employee-turned-golf-pro-turned longtime rules official, Mark Russell.

Hopefully he’ll still get called Slugger in an airport (hopefully) and get in plenty of golf as he turns to sitcom writing and more late evening rounds. He also touches on this idea of 156 player fields, slow play and suggests it’s time to trim things down.

From his “exit interview” with Golfweek’s Adam Schupak.

Q: Don’t you want to give out one last slow play penalty (during the final round of the Wyndham Championship) for old time’s sake?

MR: (Chuckles) Not really. Again, we’ve got 156 players, we should never do that in 2021. This Tour should be 120 players maximum. You know, when they came up with (fields of 156), there was no place to play. Now we’ve got the Korn Ferry Tour. We’ve got PGA Tour Champions, tours in Canada and Latin America, too. You know, if you’re good enough, you’re going to be right back here. But I mean, 156 guys, there’s groups waiting 10, 12 minutes at the turn to play. That all goes away if you did that, like at Bay Hill, 120 players and we give them 12-minute intervals and they can’t catch each other. I mean, the slow players have no place to hide.

Most of the slow players play so much better if they go ahead and play. You know, I said, we oughta make them play like that on the range. You can only hit one ball a minute, and then they’d realize. But for the most part, like I say on Thursday and Friday, we breed slow play. There’s no place to go.

While I’ve had my share of spirited chats with Russ about field size (me fighting for a 144-player “Open” field here in LA), he’s right. I concede. It’s looking like the combination of all reachable par-5’s and drivable 4’s, while a huge issue, matters less when fields are getting huge enough to welcome back winners from the late 90s!

Slugger Has Given His Last Ruling And Driven His Last Cart Without A Roof

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Adam Schupak at Golfweek files a wonderful send off to Slugger White, longtime PGA Tour rules official, good player and nice fellow who had more early wake-up calls and listened to more lame player gripes than we’ll ever know.

On how it all started:

With career earnings of $32,279, White determined it was time to find another line of work to make a living. He was a finalist for a handful of club pro jobs in the northeast, but every time he was the bridesmaid.

“I look back and think, you know what, they really did me a favor,” he said.

It just so happened that then-PGA Tour Commissioner Deane Beman, a former player in his own right, was seeking former players to work in tournament operations. Longtime rules official Mike Shea called White to see if he would be interested.

“It kind of fell in my lap,” White said.

Rory On Arm-Lock Putting ("I would like to see addressed") And Green Reading Books ("It's made everyone lazier")

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Strong stuff from Rory McIlroy at the 2021 U.S. Open. As noted in today’s Quadrilateral, these comments and the apparent bifurcation of the rules attempt by PGA Tour players will have huge ramifications if true.

Two key exchanges:

Q. When you were answering the question about the greens book, you said that you thought maybe it would be better for golf if there wasn't a greens book. I think that's pretty much what you said. Can you talk about what other things you'd like to see changed that you think would better golf that currently are being implemented in the game right now? Like if it's anchoring putting, whatever it might be.

RORY MCILROY: I thought we got rid of anchoring putting three years ago.

Q. I don't know, did we?

RORY MCILROY: No, probably not (laughter). Yeah, that is certainly something that I would like to see addressed, as well, and I think there's a common consensus with the players on that one too. Look, the game of golf is in a great place. I think we always have these conversations of what we can do to make the game better or grow the game or expand the game.I think it's in a pretty good place. Yeah, there's a couple of little things that us golf nerds want changed, whether it be green reading books or arm-lock putting or whatever it is, but from a whole and looking at the game from an entirety of it, I think it's in a really good place.

Forget Brooks-Bryson, let’s get Rory paired with an arms-locker!

But let those words sink in. The Vice Commissioner and key vote has just kick-started what should be debated about the current anchoring rules. He’s also took down green books:

Q. Can you expand on just why the green books are such an advantage?

RORY MCILROY: It's not that it's an advantage really, it's just taking away a skill that takes time and practice to be mastered. I think reading greens is a real skill that some people are better at than others, and it just nullifies that. It nullifies that advantage that people have.Yeah, honestly, I think it's made everyone lazier. People don't put in the time to prepare the way they used to, and that's why you see so many more players at Augusta, for example, take their time around the greens, hit so many more putts, it's because they have to. It's because there is no greens book at Augusta. Look, it might take practice rounds, it might make practice rounds a little longer, and you might have to do a little bit more work, but I think, once we get to the tournament rounds, it will speed up play, and I think it will help the guys who really have done their homework, it will help them stand out a little bit more.

Report: PGA Tour's PAC Votes To Outlaw Green Reading Books By Season's End

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The players are bifurcating back to restore skill!?

No really. In a move no one saw coming and will have huge ramifications on multiple levels, the PGA Tour Player Advisory Council reportedly voted to get rid of green reading books by season’s end.

Eamon Lynch with the Golfweek exclusive that will be especially interesting given today’s USGA press conference.

The Tour’s Player Advisory Council voted to outlaw the books at a meeting two weeks ago. Support for the ban among the 16 players who comprise the Council was described by one person who was present as “overwhelming.”

“The books should be banned,” the player added. “Green reading is a skill to be learned.”

The skill word is huge here and will liven up other discussions about distance, grooves, rangefinders and any other number of things that have altered the sport.

Despite claims otherwise, the books slow the game down, provide an awful look for the “product” and have likely reduced time put into practice rounds in search of local knowledge. Oh, and the whole general skill of reading greens, imagination, etc. that was warned about when players fought to have the (expensive) cheat sheets.

The USGA and R&A attempted to reduce their influence—even while including them in official yardage books for their Opens—by changing rules on size of the information accessible during competition. The change has had the opposite effect, with players pulling the books closer to their face, appearing to work harder at reading smaller lines and only highlighting the absurdity of the books.

Lynch’s report says the vote would ban the books in Tour events by the end of the 2020-21 season in August.

The irony of players via their PAC in taking back an element of skill for the sport is beyond heartening. This move could also embolden the other organizations to expedite rule changes with skill in mind.

Roundup: This Special API Week Edition Of Not Playing It As It Lies

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This week in the PGA Tour’s assault on play it as it lies was busier than most!

We start in reverse order with round three of the 2021 Arnold Palmer Invitational where preferred lies (lift, clean, place) were invoked due to “anticipated wet conditions.”

The same golf course that was turning crispy Friday afternoon is apparently going to require preferred lies Saturday afternoon. The forecast does call for rain but as of 1:05 pm ET the drops had not fallen.**

A similar precog approach happened at Pebble Beach earlier this year. The AT&T is spread over two courses and equity was the goal for players spread between Spyglass and Pebble over the opening two rounds.

But the API is played at just one golf course, the conditioning has been raved about and did I mention rain had not fallen yet?

Next in assaulting the original founding principle of the rules, we go back to the API’s round one where Patrick Reed demonstrated he’s learned absolutely nothing from Torrey Pines earlier this year.

As this clip shows, he continues to spend an inordinate amount of time touching everything around his ball:

And last but potentially least, I’ve got this unidentified player below at 17-18 taps in his line. Could be 16. You get the idea.

While technically this is allowed under the rules, it’s a rather blatant example of bending the spirit of the rules. As many warned when the USGA/R&A softened standards on spike mark tapping, this kind of thing would eventually happen.

But this is also a reminder for those who care: the rule change was made in the name of repairing “damage”. How long before a player brings out their beloved (smooth) foam roller to ensure they have no “damage” to contend with?


**Other than a few drops and brief shower, the rain never came.

But the Tweets were fun.

Place That Club Carefully Behind The Ball, Kids: Knox and McNealy Penalties At Pebble

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One of the more bizarre changes in player behavior of the last five or so years has to be the way players ground their club behind the ball. Often, not gently and occasionally, for questionable reasons (Brooks Koepka called this practice out last year.)

That said, two players who had no intention of improving their lie suffered one-shot penalties that played a role in the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am’s outcome. (Video of both incidents below and to the credit of the PGA Tour, remains posted online.)

Saturday, Maverick McNealy placed his club behind a ball sitting high in the rough and it moved. The PGA Tour referrees assessed a penalty under Rule 9-4.

Sunday, it was Russell Knox in the first fairway and on live television. His penalty assessment did not come until he was on 5th hole once officials reviewed the tape. (Eventual winner Daniel Berger was a witness struggling to get clarity on the current rule, one appears confusing to players believing inadvertent actions such as this were changed in the 2019 rules revision).

From Keith Jackson, quoting Knox on his penalty.

Asked to explain the events of the first hole, Knox gave a firm indication of his mood when he said: "Yeah, I wanted to tee my ball up in the fairway to gain an advantage but sadly I got caught, which sucked!

"But, no, I just was getting comfortable a little. I guess I put the club down, moved up, a little waggle, came down and the ball just creeped a little bit, and then obviously I was deemed to have addressed it. And even after I kind of walked away, the ball still moved a little further, like 30 seconds later, which was weird.

"It's just one of those horrible rules which every one of us is against. There's no advantage gained in any way, and it happened to Maverick McNealy yesterday, my playing partner, so it's just, it's one of those kind of horrible rules that got me on the first hole.

"At first, the ruling was that I didn't cause it to move, because it was such a grey area there, and ultimately we got it right and I did address the ball, so I should have been penalised. Obviously it's a rule which I wish they would eliminate."

McNealy’s ball was perched high after taking embedded ball relief. James Raia reports for the Monterey County Herald on another bad break.

“We made the right call and we have the best rules staff in golf, but it was an unfortunate situation,” McNealy said. “I flew it over the green with my pitching wedge and it embedded. I took a drop, relief from the embed and when the ball landed, it popped back out of where I dropped it

“It was kind of perched on the back of that little hole it made. And when I looked at it, as I addressed the ball I was being very careful, because I thought it was in a very precarious spot, but it fell forward back into that hole and ended up being a one-shot penalty.”

The two incidents:

Flashback: How The Game Has Changed Files, Tiger Asks Trey Holland For Embedded Ball Relief Edition

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A week after Patrick Reed’s remarkable request, approval and endorsed embedded ball relief saga at Torrey Pines, it’s still the talk of 19th hole banter (at a safe distance). Playing it as it lies remains under assault on the PGA Tour. I’ve yet to hear from anyone who liked what they saw.

Then we added Wednesday word of a volunteer confessing to having accidentally stepped on Rory McIlroy’s ball. If true, it solidifies key differences between Reed and McIlroy’s situation on top of one other key point: McIlroy’s next lie was essentially no better than the first one.

It’s all pretty strange and was made otherword-bizarre when the rules community could not find one thing wrong wtih Reed’s actions.

It wasn’t always that way.

Thanks to reader E for sending in this gem from the Sports Illustrated when players were not bigger than the game.

Former USGA President Trey Holland wrote this guest piece for SI on Tiger Woods. It’s a fun read but best on the ruling part after Woods hit it some deep Pebble Beach rough:

"Then on the 3rd hole he hits his second shot short of the hole,
near a bunker. The ball sinks in the grass. He says to me, 'I
 think my ball is embedded.' If it's embedded, he gets a free
drop. There's an intensity in his voice. He knows how he wants 
this to come out.

"I say, 'Mark your ball, lift it and test the dirt with a finger.
 If the plane of the dirt--not the grass, but the dirt--is broken,
 it's embedded.'

"He tests it. He says, 'I think it is.' I say, 'Let me have a look.' I put my finger down there. I say, 'It's not.' He doesn't say a word. Replaces his ball. Hacks it out. Makes a triple

bogey.

"On Sunday we're back on the 1st tee. He says hi. Doesn't say anything about the ruling. He does his two-minute stare again, plays his final round, wins the U.S. Open. I congratulate him, and he says, 'Thanks, that means a lot. But I sure would have liked to have gotten that drop yesterday on 3.' Twenty-eight hours later and after winning the Open by 15 shots, he was still thinking about it. I was under the clear impression that he wanted to win by 18."

Would Things Have Been Different For Patrick Reed Under The Old Rules Of Golf?

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That would be the pre-January 1, 2019 rules.

Alistair Tait believes so in recoiling at the soft glove treatment Reed received thanks to a change in language.

Reed called for a rules official because he believed his ball was embedded. Ninety-nine percent of players would have waited for the official to arrive on the scene. Not Reed. He lifted the ball and moved it.

The current rules give Reed the benefit of the doubt that he acted reasonably. Here’s an excerpt from the new rule book that helps exonerate Reed:

“The player’s reasonable judgement will be accepted even if, after the stroke is made, the determination is shown to be wrong by video evidence or other information.”

The professional golf tours must have celebrated when that line was written, when the new rules came into effect. In most instances now they can just accept a player’s word and move on. No need to hand out too many pesky penalties.

By receiving no punishment for his crime of rushing to his ball and lifting it from underneath that huge lip, Reed used both the rules and the fear of modern players to his advantage. You have to tip your cap. But when these things keep following him around and he’s seen as having gotten away with something, the new rules ultimately let him and the game down.

"He's protected by the Tour and that's all that matters, I guess.”

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It was the final line in Xander Schauffele’s post-round 2021 Farmer’s Insurance Open press conference but it should also set off alarm bells in the Global Home.

Q.  Did you have a chance to see what happened with Patrick Reed yesterday?

XANDER SCHAUFFELE:  Not ‑‑ I didn't search for the videos, I just have heard talk amongst the boys out here.

Q.  Have you ever ran into a situation like that on the golf course?

XANDER SCHAUFFELE:  I would not put myself and create a situation like that. That's kind of ‑‑ I wouldn't. If my ball's embedded, I usually will wait and call someone and kind of wait until everyone's on the same page, wait to look at video. So I try to avoid situations like that just for that reason.

Q.  Just to be clear, you wouldn't have picked the ball up?

XANDER SCHAUFFELE:  No. I would wait for an official. You can put a tee in the ground and check your ball. I mean, he did everything by the book according to the official and everyone stood by there. Obviously the talk amongst the boys isn't great, I guess, but he's protected by the Tour and that's all that matters, I guess. 

Oh boy.

Protected by the Tour is not a good perception to have players sense about a player, particularly one with a less than stellar body of work.

Well Xander, say hi to Ross Berlin for all of us. Loves the ponies and has great stories to tell along with taking excellent notes for the folks back at the Global Home.

Farmers: PointsBet Refunds All Pre-Tournament Outright Win Bets Not On Patrick Reed

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PointsBet Sportsbook, NBC and the PGA Tour’s top preferred gaming partner, announced a refund after Patrick Reed’s Farmers Insurance Open win for those who bet pre-tournament on an outright winner other than Reed.

Given the nefarious drop excused by on site officials but widely panned by most everyone else, including his peers, the result was tainted even with Reed ultimately securing a five stroke win. It’s a brilliant ploy by PointsBet for publicity and setting the tone of doing the right thing as gambling enters American wagering.

The dollar amounts were likely miniscule at this point, making the gesture a brand-building play as much as anything. Still, it’s not a glowing endorsement of the Tour’s handling of Reed while setting a bold precedent.

That said, this also highlights the issues golf will face when perceived cheating, questionable rulings, undisclosed injuries or even course setup gaffes could lead the betting public to feel the “product” is untrustworthy.

Will Gray explains at PointsBet where the announcement even came with a graphic.

Patrick Reed Singles Out Rory McIlroy To Defend His Latest Rules Run-In

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This one warrants more investigation given the source and only a brief CBS showing of Rory McIlroy’s third shot on 18 at the Farmers. But in defending his latest rules run-in, Patrick Reed took to Twitter and suggested McIlroy took embedded ball relief at the 18th without calling an official. Beyond suggesting his situation was in the clear, it is not evident what the inference is beyond suggesting Reed is being unfairly targeted.

An account since deleted called YumYum Ravioli started this notion picked up by Reed.

Yes I just typed that.

The traditional Reed family burner account has also been pushing the McIlroy story in manic fashion after Saturday’s Farmers Insurance Open happenings.

A sampling of replies, of which there were way too many to link and post:

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McIlroy discussed the Torrey Pines rough after his round but made no mention of any situation on 18.

However, Golf Channel’s Rich Lerner took to Twitter to validate Reed and YumYumRavioli’s claim based on reporting by Todd Lewis.

When I find video evidence or Golf Channel shows that incident, I’ll post it. But the suggestion is that the McIlroy behavior was questionable and hopefully the network will produce the goods Sunday.

**Staff, reporting from San Diego for PGATour.com has more on the McIlroy situation after tape surfaced Sunday and was aired on GolfChannel. McIlroy was cleared.

On the surface, the situation looks similar in the way the ball lands and supposedly “embeds”. However, what we don’t see is how McIlroy approached the ball or how quickly he put his hands on it. I find it hard to imagine it was anywhere near Reed’s search for a better lie.

It should be noted McIlroy had an equally horrible lie after his drop:

McIlroy discussed after the round:

Patrick Reed Continues To Bulldoze The Spirit Of The Rules

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Apparently no one told Patrick Reed to not touch the ball unless absolutely necessary. Golf’s like soccer that way.

And you certainly don’t do anything around the ball that could look like you are improving your lie. At least, in the old days before the PGA Tour transitioned to a players-first culture when Tim Finchem retired and marketers took over the executive ranks.

So even with an image-killing incident at the 2019 Hero World Challenge and other run-ins with lie improvement, Captain America has resumed his assault on the most important rule of all: playing the ball as it lies.

Sadly, his 2021 Farmers Insurance Open third round actions were not denounced by the PGA Tour in any way. Official Ken Tackett, who has stood down Bryson DeChambeau’s more absurd relief requests, was debuting in a new role for CBS that will see multiple rules staffers sit in to explain situations. Just a half hour into the new role he was put to a test and mopped up for Reed, sadly. In his defense, Tackett’s paycheck comes from the players. He technically works for Patrick Reed and a cult of personality based in Florida that believes PGA Tour golfers are above golf’s rules. Still, that Tackett could not call out Reed’s premature touching of his ball despite the incredulous reactions of CBS’s broadcast team, has a nefarious aging very poorly.

If you were not watching or following on social media this all sounds a tad silly so we’ll review the facts below for posterity. But there has been a great deal of focus placed on the way Reed’s ball bounced and then purportedly embedded. It is very true that it was almost impossible to embed and therefore need relief. However, Reed was clearly told by a volunteer that she did not see the ball bounce. Fine.

But any elite golfer does not engage in what Reed proceeded to do next: pick up the ball and drop it aside while declaring it embedded, but wanting a second opinion too. If it’s even possibly embedded, you mark and slightly lift up, holding the ball with two fingers to replace it as it sat, and do this preferably under the supervision of a playing partner or official.

Instead, this is what happened:

A careful or proper approach did not happen because Patrick Reed has a complicated relationship with playing the ball as it lies. Especially since after an incident like Saturday’s where he’s (reportedly) told his actions were “textbook,” as he claimed in post round interviews. (A follow-up interview of PGA Tour rules official John Mutch confirmed this to Golf Channel.)

Let’s review some of the evidence, starting with the tape of Reed approaching his ball and starting off ok by yelling to his playing partners he was checking for an embedded lie—but then spiraling from there.

The volunteer was wrong, the ball did bounce and while that was an unfortunate mistake, Reed picking up the ball as quickly as he could AND discarding it, instead of holding it in his fingers to replicate the lie should it not be embedded, suggested he had no intention of ever playing from that lie.

By the time rules official Brad Fabel arrived, there was nothing much for him to look at but the “lip” of the embed he apparently detected under finger after having asked where the ball had gone.

Then there is the bounce issue. The PGA Tour was supposed to have a rules official monitoring telecasts and this would have been a fine moment for that official to radio in that the tee shot bounced. This would signal that Reed’s ball probably did not embed. However, everything transpired quickly and with Reed having moved the ball, it may have all been moot.

The bounce shows an embed was highly unlikely:

After the round CBS stayed on many minutes past their allotted time to break down the situation and wait out Reed, who was busy on his cell phone. The entire time the CBS on-air was skeptical of the story and claims, including lead announcer Jim Nantz who interviewed Tackett after hearing Reed’s case. Tackett made an even less compelling case that Reed had conducted himself professionally the second time around.

Jay Rigdon at Awful Announcing covered the first effort just 35 minutes into the telecast, which was also did not inspire confidence.

Twitter was also not kind to the on-air official.

The quibbling will continue and Reed will have to live with the consequences. But make no mistake: he has openly exhibited a contempt for the spirit of the rules. The PGA Tour has not given any indication this is a problem.

In the good ole days this would have just been one of those “silly rules of golf” things that people could have mocked. However, with legalized betting and the PGA Tour’s hard push of that new revenue source, a cavalier approach to the rules and the players who bend them will ultimately prove disastrous.

U.S. Open: Mashers Collide In Mamaroneck; Quickly-Refuted Report Suggests USGA Hands Over Setup To Super!

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These guys know how to mash it! Even the golf ball!

Round three of the 2020 U.S. Open features two of the game’s elite, First Team All-American mashers of terra firma in the vicinity of their golf ball.

I bring good news: if their past run-ins with the golf laws are any indication, drama looms this weekend at Winged Foot.

Patrick Reed(-4), was called out on live TV pushing rough down behind his ball in the playoffs, and digging a canal in the Bahamas, and has a lawyer trying to silence those branding him a cheater. He’s also hitting just 38% of fairways and half the greens, so there is a sustainability question heading into the weekend.

Bryson DeChambeau (-3) came to the forefront of rules official bad dreams with incidents along the way, but nothing like this year’s combo package at Muirfield Village. While most of the footage has been taken down after takedown requests by the PGA Tour, though there remains a couple here where Bryson handles a ruling with absolutely no class. The scenes of him turning his driver into a spatula, however, sleep behind a password.

Worse news for officials: Reed loves the pairing, reports GolfChannel.com’s Ryan Lavner. What could go wrong!

For starters, this pandemic-delayed edition of the U.S. Open lacks walking officials and only TV cameras to witness any excess mashing. A belated Happy Saturday to the USGA Rules trailer. Hope you get a good pizza delivered. Then there is the whole these-guys-grow-the-game and they-are-athletes and we-can’t-taint-brands mindset that has so far prevented higher ups from telling players to stop with the lie improvement nonsense.

Mercifully, there were no incidents reported through 36 holes other than NBC’s Jim “Bones” Mackay noting the mitzvah that was Reed’s lie on the fourth. So maybe Reed and DeChambeau have gotten the message. Or they’re just waiting to liven up our Saturday. Coverage begins on Peacock and moves directly to NBC, so check those local listings if they still exist.

In other bizarre U.S. Open news, there appears to be a peculiar vibe developing between the Winged Foot set who were reportedly not pleased with the sensible USGA team attempting to present a tough, smart and efficient setup.

Following the very good round one scoring, Outside The Cut reported this assertion and I have no reason to doubt someone fairly credible in greater Mamaroneck believes this occurred, as delusional as it sounds:

Before that was up too long, Andy Johnson at The Fried Egg asked the USGA’s John Bodenhamer about this report. The reserved Bodenhamer, charged with setting up the course along with Jeff Hall and doing a stellar job, replied quickly to Johnson:

I’m not going to belabor the utter shallowness of a few hundred members of a club hoping for higher scores. But I will say this: keep an eye out in the middle of the night for any weird light and roller sounds coming from Winged Foot. Stranger things have happened.

Cabrera-Bello Gets Tough De-briefing On Close Encounter With Rule 13.3a Infraction

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Golf.com’s Kevin Cunningham follows up on a situation that arose Friday at the Wyndham. I didn’t think much of it because the ball in question seemed to be moving and that Rafael Cabrera-Bello was in his right to walk slowly, even if the period lasted over 10 seconds.

Turns out, the rules officials on site didn’t see it that way. Cabrera-Bellow told what press was assembled at Sedgefield that he had convince officials not to penalize him.

“So what they wanted to speak to me about is they felt that I took too long to approach the hole,” Cabrera-Bello said Friday night. “We reviewed the footage and the referee said that it was so, so close and so tight, but they wanted to know if I have deliberately to slow down my walk to the hole and I told them that I didn’t, I slowed down because I saw my playing partners walking in.”

According to Rule 13.3a, in such a scenario players have a reasonable time to walk up to the ball and then 10 more seconds to wait for it to fall. If it falls in after that time, the golfer receives one penalty stroke.

That would account for the overall 20 seconds here, but let that be a lesson: you have the walk-up time plus 10 seconds—should you be so fortunate to have one teetering on the edge.

The putt: