Interesting rulings from the U.S. Junior Amateur
Wendy Uzelac reports from the U.S. Junior Amateur. MORE
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Wendy Uzelac reports from the U.S. Junior Amateur. MORE
SCGA Director of Rules and Competitions, Mike Sweeney, is working as a Rules Official at the U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship at Cantigny Golf Club, July 9-14, 2007. Here is the second installment of some incidents that have occurred as Mike is walking with a different group each day.
July 11, 2007
Resumption of Play: We awoke to beautiful sunny skies, which meant that the thunderstorms were behind us and we were in store for lots of golf. We resumed play at 7:30 a.m. and all three players’ ball marks were still in their position on the putting green. The maintenance staff had added tees behind the player’s coins to ensure that they were not moved during the morning course preparation. The players knew they needed birdies to make the cut and were firing at the flagsticks. Watabu birdied holes 5, 6, and 7…with a 50-foot chip in on 5, a 30-foot birdie putt on 6, and a 10 footer on 7. He got hot and lucky at the same time to finish with a 68 to securely make the cut.
Morning Round: The groups originally scheduled to play Tuesday afternoon were now teeing off Wednesday morning. I walked with the group of Brian Kim (Univ. of Duke student from Yorba Linda, CA), Casey Sutherland (Univ. of Nevada student from Reno, NV) and Matt Corrigan (a firefighter from New York City).
Rule 6-5 states that it is the responsibility of the player to play the proper ball and that each player should put an identification mark on his ball. It was especially important for this event as the rough was grown to about 3.5 – 4 inches and you could not see the ball unless you were standing on top of it. When I saw how Corrigan marked his golf balls I knew he would not have any problem playing a wrong ball. He had one golf ball marked with the NY Mets Flag (which took up a quarter of a ball) and another golf ball marked with the NY Yankees logo. I asked him who his allegiance was too and he said he was a Yankees fan but his two sons each loved a different NY team so he had to mark a ball for both of them. For this day the Mets ball was in play and the Yankee ball was to be used as the provisional.
Hole #7, the same hole that I had the Watabu ruling on, came up again, this time getting Brian Kim. Kim hit his tee shot into the brush left of the fairway. We were able to find it and he was able to knock it back into play. Unfortunately his third shot went into the same area of thick brush that Watabu’s ball had gone the morning before. Like Watabu, we found the ball and Kim decided to try to play it to the green. Big mistake….as he could only advance it two feet into more dense brush. He decided to take an unplayable (Rule 28) and drop within two club lengths of where his ball lay, no closer to the hole. He was able to punch onto the green and two putt for a 7. Unfortunately that hole cost Kim the chance to make the cut to match play as he missed the cut by one stroke.
For the remainder of the week I was a referee for match play and saw some amazing golf. The only rulings that really came up during the match play was a few more unplayable lies and lost ball searches in the thick rough. I worked 5 matches and every one was decided on the 18th hole with two going 20 holes. Congratulations to Aaron Goldberg (San Diego State student from Encinitas, CA) who was the SCGA member to advance the farthest in the tournament. Goldberg advanced all the way to the quarterfinals before being defeated on the 18th hole of his match versus Derek Fathauer.
By JEFF NINNEMANN
SCGA Assistant Director of Rules and Competitions
Empire Lakes Golf Course • California Amateur Qualifying • May 7, 2007
On a day where at least two or three tornados must have touched down in Rancho Cucamonga, the 12th hole at Empire Lakes took the cake (thus far) for being the toughest hole in relation to par on the SCGA Tournament Calendar. One individual’s tribulations contributed to that stat significantly…
Player A lay three next to the forward tees (keep in mind this is a scratch event); no one knows how it took him three to get there, but in the words of Col. Al Davis, “It will remain a military secret.”
Player A’s fourth shot found the hay (brutally thick rough) to the right of the 12th fairway. Fearing that it may be lost, he properly announced and played a provisional ball which found the hay to the left of the 12th fairway.
After searching for his ball in the right hay for a few minutes, Player A found “a ball” and managed to advance it up the fairway. In the meantime, Player A instructed his fellow competitor to pick up his provisional ball “since he had found his original”.
Upon reaching the putting green and marking this ball, it became apparent to Player A that he had played a wrong ball from back in the hay. The definition of Lost Ball states that “time spent in playing a wrong ball is not counted in the five-minute period allowed for search.” Therefore, the rules allowed Player A to return to the hay and continue searching for his original ball. Player A’s five minutes eventually expired and thus his original ball was officially “lost”.
Let’s take a moment to recap…
• Player A lay four in the right hay;
• He then played a wrong ball, which is a two-stroke penalty under Rule 15-3b;
• As he was unable to find his original ball, his provisional ball became the ball in play under penalty of one stroke (Rule 27-1);
• Since he previously lifted this ball, which was to become his ball in play, he incurred an additional one stroke penalty under Rule 18-2a and was required to replace his provisional ball (which is actually now the ball in play).
By my calculations, Player A has made five strokes and incurred four penalty strokes — he would have been hitting his 10th stroke from the spot at which the provisional ball was lifted.
Decision 27-2b/9 summarizes this exact scenario. Player A went on to make a 13 on this hole, and thus contributed to the hardest hole on the SCGA Tournament Calendar this year.
SCGA Director of Rules and Competitions, Mike Sweeney, is working as a Rules Official at the U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship at Cantigny Golf Club, July 9-14, 2007. Here are some incidents that have occurred as Mike is walking with a different group each day.
JULY 9, 2007
Morning Round: I was the walking Rules Official with Mark Harrell from Hazlehurst, Ga, Clayton Rask from Otsego, Minn and Tim Madigan from Rio Rancho, NM. It was probably the best group to walk with in the tournament. Harrell (a senior at the Univ. of Alabama) and Rask (5th year senior at Minnesota) both shot 69’s to tie as leaders after the morning round. Harrell had six birdies and Rask had five. Harrell was actually the low amateur at the U.S. Open this year with rounds of 75-76 and was one of the players bumped out of the cut-line (along with Phil Mickelson) when Angel Cabrera made that birdie at the end of the second round. Two great players! Madigan, a freshman to be at New Mexico State, wasn’t too shabby either posting a 72. No rulings with this group — just amazing golf!
Afternoon Round: I was the official assigned to the defending champion’s group. This group was comprised of the defending champ, Casey Watabu from Kapaa, Hawaii, Pat Flynn from Westport, Conn, and Nathan Colson from Milwaukee, Wis. Unfortunately we only played two holes before thunder storms rolled in. The USGA blew the air horn at 2:28 p.m. and suspended play under Rule 6-8 (Discontinuance of Play) for a dangerous situation (lightning). To discontinue play immediately the Committee should blow one prolonged air horn note, repeated. Players could not practice because play was suspended for a dangerous situation.
Flynn’s ball was on the putting green 12 feet above the hole; he marked with a coin and lifted his ball. Watabu’s ball lay in the greenside bunker; he marked with a divot repair tool and lifted his ball. Colson’s ball was 75 yards out in the middle of the fairway; he marked with a tee and left his ball there. All are acceptable forms of marking the ball for a discontinuance of play. We went to an evacuation station in hopes of returning to play after the storm passed through. After an hour of waiting, they shuttled us back to the clubhouse where we learned that play would be suspended for the day. I haven’t seen a lightning storm like that in a long time, quite impressive! We are lucky that we don’t have to worry about too many lightning scares in Southern California.
JULY 10, 2007
Morning Round: Play resumed at 7:30 a.m. (two short air horn notes, repeated) and I am back with the Watabu group. Colson’s ball and tee are still in the place we left them. Under Rule 6-8d (ii) (Procedure when play resumed) Colson was allowed to lift, clean and replace his ball. He could also have substituted a ball, as well.
Watabu’s divot repair tool was still in the proper place in the bunker however the bunker had been raked. Decision 6-8d/2 (Lie in bunker altered prior to resumption of play) covers this exact scenario. We had to re-create the original lie as nearly as possible. Here is the exact Decision:
"Q. After play is suspended by the Committee, a player marks the position of and lifts his ball from a bunker as permitted by Rule 6-8c. When play is resumed and the ball is to be replaced, what is the correct procedure given that the lie of the ball may have been altered by the greenkeeping staff?
A. If the bunker has been prepared by the greenkeeping staff, regardless of whether the ball-marker has been moved, the original lie must be recreated as nearly as possible and a ball must be placed in that lie (Rule 20-3b). The obligation to re-create the original lie is limited to what is practical in the circumstances. For example, a buried lie or footprints around the ball must be re-created whereas the player is not required to replace loose impediments or restore conditions such as washed out areas or casual water that have been eliminated by the greenkeeping staff or have changed naturally.
However, if the bunker has not been prepared by the greenkeeping staff, the player is not necessarily entitled to the lie he had prior to the discontinuance of play (see Decision 6-8d/1). The player must place a ball on the spot from which the original ball was lifted (Rule 6-8d). If the ball-marker is missing when play is resumed (e.g., moved by wind or water), and the spot where the ball is to be placed is impossible to determine, it must be estimated and the ball placed on the estimated spot — see Note to Rule 6-8d(iii) and Exception to Rule 20-3c. (Revised)"
Flynn’s ball marker still was in its original position. He replaced his ball and proceeded to drain the 12-foot birdie putt! “I was thinking about that putt the entire night,” he told me with a huge smile on his face.
The round got interesting for me during play of the seventh hole (which is a par 5 that plays 545 yards). Watabu, playing a rescue club, hooked his approach to the green badly into the forest left of the fairway. He proceeded to play a provisional ball (Rule 27-2) and hit his provisional into the exact same “bad country” his first ball went. He then played a second provisional short of the green but in the rough where we could find it.
Watabu luckily found his original about 15 feet into the forest in some dense brush. He decided to try to hack out ... bad decision, as it turned out. He advanced his ball about six feet into dense brush and bushes. After searching for a few seconds he found what he thought was his ball in play. He tried to hack out again and advanced it a few more feet. After finding the ball again in dense brush he looked up at me in disgust, “I just played my provisional ball.” We searched for a few seconds and found his original a few feet to the left of where he played the provisional. Once the original ball was found the provisional ball is abandoned (Rule 27-2c). I informed him that he was in breach of Rule 15-3 for playing a wrong ball and must proceed with the original. The penalty in stroke play is two strokes. He then decided to declare his ball unplayable. He chose to drop within two club lengths and was able to finally drop out of the dense brush. He then knocked the ball on the green and three putted. All in all that’s 10 strokes, 7 on talent and 3 from penalties. Watabu was definitely rattled as he ended the round with an 80.
If I were him, I would have declared my original ball unplayable (rather then trying to hack out), taking a one stroke penalty and gone back and played from where I last hit from.
Afternoon round:
I went back out with the same group and you could tell Watabu was a man on a mission; he knew he needed some red numbers to get back into the championship. He shot a stellar 31 on his first nine (hols 10-18) to shoot himself back into it. Unfortunately the afternoon brought another thunderstorm and we had to suspend play at 4:00 p.m. Once again the air horns blew for a dangerous situation. Watabu, Flynn and Colson had all played to the 4th green and thus marked the positions of their golf balls with their coins. It looks like they will have the night to think about those putts as this is another impressive Midwestern lightning show! It looks like the second round will not finish until Wednesday and the match play portion of the event may not begin until Wednesday afternoon.
More rulings and stories to come….
