Matt Kuchar Has a Tantrum

[jxdama]

Just  finish the  hole you  jerk. He  is  mad  because  he didnt qualify for the  playoffs so he  thought  it  would  be  cool to inconvenience everyone  involved. He  is a  millionaire from golf and all the  prick had to do was  finish the  hole no matter  how  dark it was.

 

MSN

Since every player has not finished their round, Rai's first PGA Tour win will not become official until Kuchar completes the 18th hole. Kuchar had to win the Wyndham Championship to qualify for the FedEx Cup playoffs by finishing in the top 70 in the standings. This will mark the first year that Kuchar has not qualified for the playoffs since the post-season concept started in 2007.

If  he was within a shot of  making spot num70 i could  understand saying  im going to wait till tomorrow. 

[colin007]

Yeah I never bought his nice guy schtick this guy is a tool

[Archie Bunker]

Will he pay his caddy overtime? I doubt it. 😛

[saevel25]

Should he have finished, sure. Whatever. People do stupid stuff all the time. Nothing to get all worked up about. 

[iacas]

I haven't seen or read anything about a "tantrum"?

[Vinsk]

No tantrum. Just a total douchebag move. Totally out of touch.

[iacas]

Or… maybe* it was a pace of play/slow play protest. There's no real reason they couldn't have gotten the round in. Rai was standing in the fairway for two minutes doing his pre-shot routine, no?

* Not saying it is, just saying… it'd be kind of cool if it was.

[GolfLug]

3 hours ago, Vinsk said:

No tantrum. Just a total douchebag move. Totally out of touch.

That's my take away. The BS about setting an example for Greyserman does not pass the smell test.

Kuchar is too selfish/self-centered to spend an extra second, let alone hanging around on a Monday to benefit anyone else. It's too much of a stretch for him to do it for sake of a slow-play protest either.

This can't be about anyone but himself.

[klineka]

7 hours ago, saevel25 said:

Should he have finished, sure. Whatever. People do stupid stuff all the time. Nothing to get all worked up about. 

Idk about all worked up, but I think it's perfectly acceptable to call out when an athlete is being extremely selfish and inconveniencing quite a few people when it was easily avoidable. 

If he was a rookie/fighting for a tour card, had a chance to make the playoffs, etc. I would likely feel a bit different but the only thing that his result on that hole affected was his own wallet and the guy has made nearly $60M on the course during his career.  

[billchao]

17 minutes ago, klineka said:

Idk about all worked up, but I think it's perfectly acceptable to call out when an athlete is being extremely selfish and inconveniencing quite a few people when it was easily avoidable. 

If he was a rookie/fighting for a tour card, had a chance to make the playoffs, etc. I would likely feel a bit different but the only thing that his result on that hole affected was his own wallet and the guy has made nearly $60M on the course during his career.  

I'm with you on this take. IMO this is a rich guy with a successful PGA Tour career that didn't think or care about what the consequences of his actions would be and how they'd affect other people.

[Ty_Webb]

I'm not sure if I agree about this. He said that he had a chance for a better finish. It might look like that's just thinking about his wallet, but the ranking points could be the difference between qualifying for an event and not. If he genuinely felt that his chances were dented by the light, then I don't think it's that unreasonable to delay finishing. I heard that it was taking them 5.5 hours to play yesterday - maybe that's where our ire should be focused and not on the guy trying to finish the best he can.

[saevel25]

1 hour ago, klineka said:

Idk about all worked up, but I think it's perfectly acceptable to call out when an athlete is being extremely selfish and inconveniencing quite a few people when it was easily avoidable. 

The official told him he could stop because of darkness. Maybe he was tired and done for the day. Yes it is inconvenient. I think people are blowing this out of proportion. 

1. Kuchar was well with his right with the rules to stop for the day. You just can't say, "sorry, he already won so you do not get to stop this time." Rules are not written that way. They shouldn't be. They should be consistent, beginning to end.  

2. Was it selfish, yes. Ok, Kuchar is a human being. Athletes are inherently selfish. Especially in golf, when you do not have a teammate. On the list of selfish things done by athletes, this is pretty dang low. 

3. Does it do anything to discredit the winner has done, no. Does it take away the victory, no. Supposedly they  just named the winner 1 day later, so what. He knows he won. He probably went out that evening to celebrate and didn't even care what Kuchar was doing. As he shouldn't care. 

1 hour ago, klineka said:

If he was a rookie/fighting for a tour card, had a chance to make the playoffs, etc. I would likely feel a bit different but the only thing that his result on that hole affected was his own wallet and the guy has made nearly $60M on the course during his career.  

I do not think it matters. All the golfers play by the rules of golf and rules of how the tournament is run.  Kuchar was well in his right to stop for the day. 

What would you rather do, not care about how you end a tournament. Just hack it out when it's dark out. Card a bogey or worse and go home. Or, take it seriously, postpone your round to the next day and have a high give a shit factor for how you finish a tournament. 

Maybe Kuchar wanted to prove something to himself. Maybe he wanted to care a lot about how he finished that round. We shouldn't blame him for that because he's old and has been on the tour for years. 

1 hour ago, billchao said:

I'm with you on this take. IMO this is a rich guy with a successful PGA Tour career that didn't think or care about what the consequences of his actions would be and how they'd affect other people.

So, you are saying that taking an action, that is with within his right to do so, did something so bad that we need to be going after him?

How did it affect other people? Can someone explain to me the GRAVE harm he caused someone else here. Seriously, I need an explanation. I am not kidding here. To me, he was at worst, rude. I do not get how him being older and monetarily well off matters in this case. There is more to golf than money. Some people just want to finish the round the best they can. 

Tiger is quotes as saying, he despises shooting over par. Would we care if Tiger said, I am done, when making a par would allow him to shoot even par? 

I am all for players giving it 100% all the time, even if they are struggling. Go ahead and be selfish, that is how you play great golf. 

Yea, his seniority and monetary status has ZERO impact on the judging of his actions here. 

[iacas]

8 minutes ago, saevel25 said:

3. Does it do anything to discredit the winner has done, no. Does it take away the victory, no. Supposedly they  just named the winner 1 day later, so what. He knows he won. He probably went out that evening to celebrate and didn't even care what Kuchar was doing. As he shouldn't care.

They had the award ceremony and gave him the trophy Sunday night.

8 minutes ago, saevel25 said:

How did it affect other people? Can someone explain to me the GRAVE harm he caused someone else here.

It's not grave harm, but like 70 people all had to come back for another day just because Matt Kuchar didn't want to take three or four more shots/putts.

8 minutes ago, saevel25 said:

Tiger is quotes as saying, he despises shooting over par. Would we care if Tiger said, I am done, when making a par would allow him to shoot even par?

I think you'd be surprised.

[turtleback]

Shakespeare said it best, Much Ado About Nothing.

[iacas]

28 minutes ago, turtleback said:

Shakespeare said it best, Much Ado About Nothing.

Eh.

It's a pretty shitty thing to do.

[billchao]

1 hour ago, saevel25 said:

So, you are saying that taking an action, that is with within his right to do so, did something so bad that we need to be going after him?

Come on, man. You know very well that having the right to do something and that thing being the right thing to do can be two different things.

1 hour ago, saevel25 said:

How did it affect other people? Can someone explain to me the GRAVE harm he caused someone else here. Seriously, I need an explanation. I am not kidding here. To me, he was at worst, rude. I do not get how him being older and monetarily well off matters in this case. There is more to golf than money. Some people just want to finish the round the best they can. 

As @iacas mentioned, a bunch of people had to show up on Monday for him. Some of whom presumably had plans to leave Sunday night, had to change travel plans, arrange for new accommodations, etc. Some whom presumably had to pay for these changes out of their own pocket. Was it GRAVE harm? Probably not. Was it enough for me to think he's a douchebag? Yea. Do I find it odd that your post is the longest in this thread despite starting off by stating you think people are blowing the situation out of proportion? Also, yea.

[Vinsk]

1 hour ago, saevel25 said:

How did it affect other people? Can someone explain to me the GRAVE harm he caused someone else here.

And what’s the grave harm Kuchar would’ve endured by finishing one hole of golf that made no difference to his situation at all? Sure it’s a right to end play, but that doesn’t make it the right thing to do.

[klineka]

9 minutes ago, billchao said:

Come on, man. You know very well that having the right to do something and that thing being the right thing to do can be two different things.

As @iacas mentioned, a bunch of people had to show up on Monday for him. Some of whom presumably had plans to leave Sunday night, had to change travel plans, arrange for new accommodations, etc. Some whom presumably had to pay for these changes out of their own pocket. Was it GRAVE harm? Probably not. Was it enough for me to think he's a douchebag? Yea.

All of that ^^^

Not to mention there was probably (don't know for certain but usually this is the case) some sort of hospitality event/tournament on the course today, it's quite common for that to happen the Monday after a tour event. So it's possible that he could have caused that to be delayed as well. 

There is so much that goes into running PGA Tour events that most people don't consider. Like the fact that due to Kuchar's decision (yes I'm aware it was within the rules) things like the ShotLink equipment had to remain up and operational through his play this morning which likely affected plans to get that equipment to Memphis for the next event. 

 

Here is basically how it boils down to me:

The decision he made only benefited himself and inconvenienced dozens to possibly 100+ others. 

The decision he could have made could have slightly inconvenienced himself (for about 15 minutes) with basically no risk whatsoever to his playoff status, financial well-being, job security, etc while making life significantly easier for dozens to possibly 100+ other people.

 

In my opinion him putting himself first over 50-100 other people while he has basically nothing to gain makes him selfish, arrogant, out of touch, etc and gives me absolutely no reason to like him. And FWIW, I think the reaction he is getting from fans and the media is absolutely justified especially considering he has a history of being selfish, lacking empathy, etc.