Reply To: Rules Screw Ups

[Jeffrey Barbas]

Bob and Tommy, I can tell you in this instance the course that was played, there has never been a lake or marsh area on this hole. If these two guys both hit their ball straight toward the fairway but because they just don’t hit the ball that far in the air and the only spot their ball could reasonably for a “virtual certainty” end up was right before the start of the fairway should these guys be penalized for a lost ball and have to come back to the tee box to hit again? Really? This part of the course is normally mowed when they wouldn’t have to worry about a buried mower. Wet conditions this year prevent them from mowing this area right now. Unfortunately for them it was their landing area. I’d stand by the “virtually certain” in this instance especially since I know the course. If it was dry and mowed there wouldn’t be a question that their ball would have been found easily right there or possibly in the fairway if it rolled out. I think we’ve all had that round where we hit a ball and know exactly where we hit it and maybe we are lucky to find it plugged a couple inches under the grass because the course is soaked.
Hopefully we don’t have any conditions like that for the World Am this year. But if we do, I guess we can tell there will probably be more than a few players that will be out to screw us if this happens on a wet course.
Tommy, the reason we have Range Finders is to speed up play. If you take them away your going to have 6 1/2 hour rounds at a minimum. I honestly could care less if the guy has slope on his laser. He still has to be able to hit the shots and make the putts.