PGA Fiasco

[iacas]

However, I have no problem with someone that feels that fans should not be on the course and certainly not standing in the hazard. I don't have a problem with it but if they want to change it, it's really simple, put down white stakes and call it O.B. and the problem is solved. This way fans can actually get close enough to see the darn players and there are no hazard issues to complain about.

That would make 90% of the course OB, and internal OB doesn't sit well with anyone.

Erik, at least read my posts before you respond to them.

I've read them. I think you're being reactionary and emotional because it was DJ on the 72nd hole. Nice dig by the way - grow up.

I really can't believe you're making the argument "where are they supposed to stand?" NOT IN A HAZARD.

You keep making the same point and I keep asking the same question: where else could they stand? Seriously, look at a course map, and tell me. You couldn't fit half the number of spectators on the course if they weren't allowed in the bunkers. And what, you're gonna tell them "okay, don't walk in the bunkers" - they're gonna do it anyway. It was impractical not to have them in the bunkers. The PGA did the best they could and the players were clearly told.

Faldo, Fehrety, Nobilo, all guys that know more golf than you and I have all said today that the big mistake the PGA and course officials made was allowing patrons to stand in an area deemed a hazard.

Doesn't make their opinions more valid. Where else were they to stand? I'm not going to go listen to Dan Patrick, and if Feherty, Nobilo, etc. said things, link to and quote them. At least we'll have something to parse.

You guys will, anyway. I've got a tournament to play.

He just said this morning that there were many areas on the course with patches of sand and dirt that were not hazards and that guys were grounding their clubs in them. My point is again if that's the case, if you remove all of those people from the hazard, it becomes obvious that it was a bunker.

Nantz knew it was a bunker. His ball was sitting on sand. Could DJ not have asked? As other golf writers I read have said, "if your ball is on sand, whistles should go off."

Bottom line, Dustin or his caddy should have asked. But he wouldn't have needed to if he could actually see the hazard that was obstructed by hundreds of people.

Hey, it looked like a bunker on TV to me, and I have no doubt that if I'm DJ and I'm actually there and not looking through a camera lens, how much it looks like a bunker only increases, not decreases.

Think of some of the areas you can't stand at Augusta for example.

Stupid argument. Augusta National can fit 25,000+ people without asking them to hover off the ground. Whistling Straits can't fit enough people without them in bunkers. The Augusta comparison doesn't even make sense. Augusta doesn't have 1200+ bunkers. Simple as that.

Here's the question I have - where was DJ's ball, exactly, in the bunker. From the pictures posted above and having watched the replay several times, the area that is marked with a circle in the pictures above is not where his ball was.

That's where his ball was. If the ball was where you say it was he'd have been standing on a big sidehill lie. I wasn't there, but I accept the validity of the people who marked the bunker and took the video and photos that his ball was where they drew the line.

Even if his ball was where you say it was, it's in the bunker. There's sand beneath and to a reasonable distance on all sides of the ball. Enjoy. I'm off to play in my tournament.

[ctyankee]

Obviously, it's unfortunate. And I get that the mob of people didn't make it easy. But, Johnson had played 3 rounds of golf on this hole prior to this PLUS practice rounds. That he didn't know there was a wave of f&*king bunkers to the right of the fairway doesn't wash. He played plenty of rounds there without crowds in those bunkers. That plus the obvious, his ball is sitting on sand.

[Bug Bunny]

I agree it's 100% DJ's fault!!! And I don't mind the PGA allowing the spectators in them BUT I would have liked to see them be able to improve the lie since they allowed sectators to pack them by being there!!!! Anyway, he made a mental mistake! He knows it! He was given the rule! I'm still not sure why it wasn't clearer to him he was in a bunker!!!! I think for the PGA Championship all bunkers should be raked!!! And if the PGA chooses to play a course with 1200 of them, they better buy abunch of rakes!!!

On a side note, I'd LOVE to play that course!!!! I'd lose 30 balls and shoot 130 but I'd love it nonetheless!!!!!!

[iacas]

Obviously, it's unfortunate. And I get that the mob of people didn't make it easy. But, Johnson had played 3 rounds of golf on this hole prior to this PLUS practice rounds. That he didn't know there was a wave of f&*king bunkers to the right of the fairway doesn't wash. He played plenty of rounds there without crowds in those bunkers. That plus the obvious, his ball is sitting on sand.

Agreed. But the apologists are now changing their argument to "fans shouldn't have been allowed to stand in the bunker." What difference that makes I've yet to discover...?

Now late for my tournament. Gotta go.

[DavidFehertysBike]

In hindsight, its easy to say this or that. And hindsight says that DJ was in fact standing in a bunker and shouldn't have grounded his club. But during the moment that in no way appeared to me that it was a bunker or even a waste area. It just looked like a trampled down piece of land. With the crowd so closely packed DJ or his caddy likely had little situational awareness. Putting myself in the situation, i would read that as hardpan, and then move on to concentrate on how i'm going to win this tournament. Its was just a tough break for him. Call it rub of the.... whatever...lol

[rebby]

I hate to jump into this shit storm but...

• At the time of the ruling I initially thought that the ruling was pretty bogus. At first glance, this are didn't look like a bunker to me, it looked like a trampled down area. My yard has a very similar make up and when you trample down an area like that, you get a sand mound, no big deal, no "bunker." However, after seeing replays of location, it's clearly a "bunker," no question about it. Then, the rule about "no waste areas" for the tournament were explained and that removes any and all doubt. It's juvenile to contest this after that explanation.
• I see no issue with the spectators being there, bunker or not. The area for the spectators are clearly defined and the simple way to avoid areas on the course that have been trampled by spectators is to not hit your ball there in the first place. Had you or I hit the ball there, with no spectators, chances are we would have never found our ball. In a way, spectators trampling down these areas are an advantage to the touring pro. They get to find their ball, hit off of a somewhat hardpan like lie and move on, we end up with a lost ball.
• Why should any bunker, much less a bunker way out of the line of "normal" play, be expected to be smooth and raked? Hitting your ball in a bunker is a penalty of sorts. I see no reason why the ground should be smooth and regular. In many cases I agree with the original architect of Oakmont who went so far as to design a special bunker rake that made deep furrows in the sand. Most players screamed that this was unfair but, again, don't hit your ball there if you don't want to accept the penalty for doing so.

[Jay-Bird]

A few PGA officials and a few volunteers are not going to be able to control a huge crowd. Ever. Did you see the little girl building a sand castle in a bunker during Saturday's round?

[heyscuba]

looked like he was closer to the lip than the circle in the pic indicates, regaurdless, it looked like a bunker to me then and now, the close up they showed clearly showed a ball laying in sand, why didn't he or his caddie question it,...?
but people standing in bunkers that may come into play in a major,..? questionable decision in my mind by who ever set up that rule.

[StricklandPropane]

1. Would they have called this on Tiger or Phil? There are enough people saying "definitely a bunker" and enough people saying "no way I thought that was a bunker" to make it inconclusive enough for the rules official to get away with letting it go. I wonder if they'd have the balls.

2. I will never understand litterbugs, anywhere. Even if you're in a rundown part of town, why litter?

3. DJ's vantage point was much different than ours from overhead views and multiple camera angles. I'm not sure if that made it easier or harder to determine if it was a bunker, but what any of YOU thought is irrelevant. I'm more interested in what people on the ground thought.

4. Will rules nerds be watching their TIVO's now looking for other players who may have done the same this week? DQ's are pending hahaha.

[colin007]

those bunkers were disgusting with all that trash, but it is to be expected. low class people litter. lots of golfers/fans are low class. therefore you get all that trash.

[CalBoomer]

Comparing the first picture of this video with the Golftrak animation clearly shows what the problem is. With all the people crowded around (and it was even worse initially), it is much less clear that the area is a bunker. There are no people on the golf track animation which "clearly" shows it to be a bunker. And the description of it by the commentator as a "relatively flat lie" shows that he was not clear that it was a bunker at that time either. All of which strongly supports the argument that fans have no business standing in what the PGA and rules officials consider to be bunkers. As for Jim Nantz, is he a rules official? And a final comment, the wide discrepancy in all the comments in this forum from reasonably knowledgabe people, show that this is a very gray area. The very least the PGA could have done was to acknowledge some culpability in this area with a promise for future improvement. Even MLB apologized when an ump took away a perfect game with a blown call at first base, even though the ruling stood. Clearly the PGA, like the Soccer federation, prefers sanctimony.

[ctyankee]

1. Would they have called this on Tiger or Phil?

They wouldn't have had to and that's the critical point. There is no way that Tiger or Phil would have mucked it up to begin with. Nor would either of their caddies. And if it had been Stevie, he wouldn't have needed tour officials to move the crowd back. He would have told those spectators to get their asses out of there in a way that would gotten their dead relatives to move.

I took a look at the hole on Google Maps using their satelite feature. There are bunkers 3 times farther away from the fairway on 18 then the bunker in question. So, that Johnson walks through the fairway, to the rough to the first piece of sand and thinks that's not a bunker ... please. Just a brain fade under the pressure of a bad drive on the 72nd hole of a major championship with no support from his pro caddie.

[TheGeekGolfer]

I feel the need to jump in here, but to bring up another point. First...yes, he was in a bunker and should've known he was in a bunker and he should be penalized. Yes...it sucks that the spectators were in there and I'm sure he would have realized it was a bunker if he walked up to it from behind with no spectators around (he had to come in from in front of his ball, due to the crowd). That's not my point. There's a bigger issue here.

The bigger issue is, if the rules official thought there was an issue as he was making his way up to his ball to hit his '3rd' shot, then they should've said something RIGHT AWAY!

I'm sure they suspected there might be a problem, I was sitting at home watching and said to my wife, "oh cr#p, he just grounded his club in a bunker, that's a 2-stroke penalty". The announcers said that none of them noticed it was a bunker, I doubt that. The official came up to him right after he finished and told him there was an issue. I'm sure he knew about it before he took his 3rd stroke.

If they had brought it to his attention before he hit his '3rd' shot onto the green, then he could've tried to HOLE IT, thus getting into the playoff. I think the #1 stupid thing in golf is calling a penalty on a player AFTER the round is over! This especially is true in major tournaments like this, where there is a rules official with each group. It should be up to the rules official with the group to either a) call the penalty or b) alert the player that there may have been an infraction and then look at it for clarification. The main thing is...this should happen RIGHT AWAY, BEFORE THE PLAYER FINISHES THE ROUND. That way...the player has the possibility to recover from the penalty and possibly still win.

Think about it this way....you're playing a game of basketball and you just made a 3-pointer to take the lead by one. You steal the ball and run out the clock. Great...you just won the game. Oh wait...AFTER THE GAME IS OVER, someone called in or the refs decided that your foot 'might' have been on the line. That look at it again and call it a 2-pointer and declare the game a tie and then you lose in OT. Well, that's just STUPID, that would never happen in any other game. If you knew it was only a 2-pointer, you could've tried another shot to win the game and played the last part of the game differently.

The main point is that they should've told DJ IMMEDIATELY that there may have been a rules infraction. He then would've have played his '3rd' (now his 5th) shot differently and who knows...might have holed out for an incredible shot to get in the playoff. Heck, Bubba almost holed out from the bunker to force another extra hole. He knew he had to try and make it and almost did. These are the best golfers in the world, I think he had a chance. But...due to golf's stupid way they handle rules infractions, we'll never know.

Heck, I saw a tournament (Harbor Town, I think) a few years ago, Ernie knew he had to hole out from the fairway to tie. Took dead aim and missed by about a foot from over 150yds away. Point is...put the deciding shot into the players hand by calling the penalty right away. To do it after the fact is unfair to the player.

And forget the 'maybe' stuff and that they wanted to 'check with DJ' about grounding his club. Even if DJ said he didn't ground his club, the replay clearly showed he did and they would've penalized him, anyway.

OK...RANT OVER (for now )

[Zeph]

Comparing the first picture of this video with the Golftrak animation clearly shows what the problem is. With all the people crowded around (and it was even worse initially), it is much less clear that the area is a bunker. There are no people on the golf track animation which "clearly" shows it to be a bunker.

It doesn't matter. The player is still responsible for whatever he does, he can't blame anyone else. You can't hit the ball inside the lines of a water hazard, go in there and move some pine cones, then complain then hazard was not marked well enough. When you didn't spend enough time in the first place to really investigate if you were in a hazard. Whenever the ball is lying on sand, somethink should pop in your head that this might be a bunker. Hardpan lies are not the same thing, this was clearly sand.

[colin007]

I feel the need to jump in here, but to bring up another point. First...yes, he was in a bunker and should've known he was in a bunker and he should be penalized. Yes...it sucks that the spectators were in there and I'm sure he would have realized it was a bunker if he walked up to it from behind with no spectators around (he had to come in from in front of his ball, due to the crowd). That's not my point. There's a bigger issue here.

those are good points. i agree.

[albatross]

I feel the need to jump in here, but to bring up another point. First...yes, he was in a bunker and should've known he was in a bunker and he should be penalized. Yes...it sucks that the spectators were in there and I'm sure he would have realized it was a bunker if he walked up to it from behind with no spectators around (he had to come in from in front of his ball, due to the crowd). That's not my point. There's a bigger issue here.

Very good point. It shows that they definitely used replay to call the infraction. So in reality, Dustin Johnson was the "victim" of instant replay. Otherwise, as you've pointed out the official should have called it immediately because it could have impacted his next shot. Why wasn't it called? Back to the point that if you don't have 600 spectators standing there, the official would have seen that it was a bunker.

[albatross]

A few PGA officials and a few volunteers are not going to be able to control a huge crowd. Ever. Did you see the little girl building a sand castle in a bunker during Saturday's round?

This is true but then you shouldn't host a major championship there. You need to be able to control the crowd on the golf course.

[Jay-Bird]

This is true but then you shouldn't host a major championship there. You need to be able to control the crowd on the golf course.

Control the crowd? Impossible. Watch any of the British Opens that Nicklaus or Watson played in. The crowds are mobs. You can't control a mob mentality without tear gas or rubber bullets... I'm just sayin'...

The tickets letting people into the events clearly state the rules to be followed by ticket holders. Individuals follow rules, but once a mob decides on a course of action - nobody's going to stop it.