Integrity in professional golf...

[jbrown413]

as my sons, wife, and friends would testify, i have a keen interest in integrity in professional sports.  baseball drives me crazy when a perfect game is pitched and not recognized even tho the umpire admits his error.  football used to drive me crazy when i'd invest hours watching a game only to have it decided by an obviously bad call.  luckily instant replay fixed most of that.  until this masters i did not question the integrity of professional golf.  now i see that it is very very thin indeed.

not rehash the whole story, but tiger admitted breaking a rule for his own benefit, tho he didnt realize he was breaking it at the time.  the rules committee of the tourney penalized him, but did not disqualify him, as the rules would have called for.  instead they cited a new revision of rule 33 meant to address situations where players broke the rules and would not know of it.  but tiger should have known of it.  why was he not disqualified? i suspect the rules committee did not want to dq the most known player and have their tourneys tv ranking tank.  maybe relatedly they did not mind penalizing a 14 year old 8th grader from china, perhaps because they did not like him treating their world class course as if it were a municipal link?

tourney's need to be not only run by usga rules, but supervised by the usga. leaving it in the hands of a local committee is just asking for trouble like  this, and leads me to question the integrity of professional golf.

[Ernest Jones]

WELCOME TO THE FORUM.

[turtleback]

Originally Posted by jbrown413

as my sons, wife, and friends would testify, i have a keen interest in integrity in professional sports.  baseball drives me crazy when a perfect game is pitched and not recognized even tho the umpire admits his error.  football used to drive me crazy when i'd invest hours watching a game only to have it decided by an obviously bad call.  luckily instant replay fixed most of that.  until this masters i did not question the integrity of professional golf.  now i see that it is very very thin indeed.

not rehash the whole story, but tiger admitted breaking a rule for his own benefit, tho he didnt realize he was breaking it at the time.  the rules committee of the tourney penalized him, but did not disqualify him, as the rules would have called for.  instead they cited a new revision of rule 33 meant to address situations where players broke the rules and would not know of it.  but tiger should have known of it.  why was he not disqualified? i suspect the rules committee did not want to dq the most known player and have their tourneys tv ranking tank.  maybe relatedly they did not mind penalizing a 14 year old 8th grader from china, perhaps because they did not like him treating their world class course as if it were a municipal link?

tourney's need to be not only run by usga rules, but supervised by the usga. leaving it in the hands of a local committee is just asking for trouble like  this, and leads me to question the integrity of professional golf.

The first step in integrity is knowing what happened, what the rule was, what the actual basis for the ruling was.  And it helps to know something about the people making the ruling and what their reputation in the sport is for integrity.  None of which is evident in your post/rant.

[jbrown413]

as i said, i had no intent to rehash the entire controversy.  if you need to know more details check out the post with over 1000 replies about this incident.  i do not know the integrity of the people on augusta national's rules committee personally, nor in any other way, tho i must admit being perhaps swayed by the fact that this private golf club that hosts a classic pga major tourney just recently admitted women and for years excluded african americans.  i would suggest that by itself speaks to their integrity overall, if not spefically to golf.

[Golfingdad]

Originally Posted by jbrown413

as i said, i had no intent to rehash the entire controversy.  if you need to know more details check out the post with over 1000 replies about this incident.

What Turtleback is (correctly, in my opinion) saying is that you are the one who needs to go read the 1000 posts, because you are the one who is misinformed.  I don't even think the word "controversy" is even accurate.  There was a rules violation, a ruling, and a penalty.  End of story.

[jbrown413]

well i certainly disagree with your down grading this to even less than a controversy.  i have read much about this topic, but i will wait till i review more before replying to your message.  but i have to say applying 33-7 here certainly sounds kinda wrong.

[boogielicious]

Originally Posted by jbrown413

well i certainly disagree with your down grading this to even less than a controversy.  i have read much about this topic, but i will wait till i review more before replying to your message.  but i have to say applying 33-7 here certainly sounds kinda wrong.

No, it is you who are upgrading it.  It is not wrong, it is a rule.  You don't like it, and perhaps the player involved, but it is still a rule.  Therefore, it is a controversy to you and the others who don't like the player.  If it had happened to Fred Couples or any of the other 92 players at the Masters, it would have been a non-story.  Get over it already.

[David in FL]

No, it is you who are upgrading it.  It is not wrong, it is a rule.  You don't like it, and perhaps the player involved, but it is still a rule.  Therefore, it is a controversy to you and the others who don't like the player.  If it had happened to Fred Couples or any of the other 92 players at the Masters, it would have been a non-story.  Get over it already.

I'll disagree slightly. Rule 33-7 allows the committee to apply discretion. As such, it's not as black and white as most rules. In this case, I believe that there will continue to be a lot of controversy over whether their decision to apply the rule was correct or not. There is no controversy as to whether they had the authority to do so. They clearly did.

[zipazoid]

The integrity of the game was not compromised in any way. Tiger got a 2-shot penalty for taking an improper drop. It ended up costing him any chance of winning the tournament.

If your argument is he willingly admitted he was trying to create an advantage & therefore should be DQ'd, as stated there is a rule in place to address that. Rules are rules. And none were compromised in this incident. He broke Rule 26 and got a 2-shot penalty. Rule 33-7 gave the committee discretion on what to do about it. Now, had they rescinded the 2-shot penalty, then maybe you have a point about integrity (and favoritism). But they didn't.

Honestly, this is looking for controversy where none exists.

[newtogolf]

It's pretty simple,

1. the committee claims they reviewed the drop prior to Tiger ending his round and deemed it to be okay.  If it wasn't acceptable, they would have notified him before he signed his score card, assessed him the penalty and the controversy would have ended there.
2. Tiger states in an interview he intentionally dropped 2 yards back and forced the committee to review the drop again.
3. In reviewing the drop and Tigers comments they deemed the drop improper and penalized him two strokes.  33-7 was applied because the committee acknowledged they had the ability to assess the penalty before he signed the scorecard and didn't.

What if Tiger didn't give that interview until after the tournament was over?  Based on my interpretation of the rules he would not have been penalized at all for the drop.

[Wansteadimp]

Originally Posted by newtogolf

It's pretty simple,

the committee claims they reviewed the drop prior to Tiger ending his round and deemed it to be okay.  If it wasn't acceptable, they would have notified him before he signed his score card, assessed him the penalty and the controversy would have ended there.

Tiger states in an interview he intentionally dropped 2 yards back and forced the committee to review the drop again.

In reviewing the drop and Tigers comments they deemed the drop improper and penalized him two strokes.  33-7 was applied because the committee acknowledged they had the ability to assess the penalty before he signed the scorecard and didn't.

What if Tiger didn't give that interview until after the tournament was over?  Based on my interpretation of the rules he would not have been penalized at all for the drop.

I suppose the integrity would come into it at point 1. Is this what actually happened or is it a convenient story that was thought up to keep Tiger in the comp? Until someone comes up with something concrete that they are not being honest its pretty much over as a discussion.

[zipazoid]

One thing everyone, especially the OP needs to understand -

The worst thing you can call a professional golfer is a cheater.

In another thread about this subject, someone implied that Tiger willfully and knowingly broke the rule to gain an advantage. My reply was, say that to his face. Chances are good your fac e will be altered if you do.

And therein lies the ultimate integrity of the game. It doesn't rest with the rules officials or committees. It's with the players. And there is no doubt in my mind - at all - that Tiger totally thought he was playing within the rules doing what he did. If even for a nanosecond he thought otherwise he would not have done it.

[Chas]

What Turtleback is (correctly, in my opinion) saying is that you are the one who needs to go read the 1000 posts, because you are the one who is misinformed.  I don't even think the word "controversy" is even accurate.  There was a rules violation, a ruling, and a penalty.  End of story.

You don't see this as a controversy??? That is hilarious.

[newtogolf]

Originally Posted by Chas

You don't see this as a controversy??? That is hilarious.

Controversy only exists if you're a conspiracy theorist, otherwise the rules committee did a good job explaining why he wasn't DQ'ed.

[iacas]

Originally Posted by newtogolf

Controversy only exists if you're a conspiracy theorist, otherwise the rules committee did a good job explaining why he wasn't DQ'ed.

Yup.

Or "controversy only exists if you hate Tiger Woods and want to use this as an opportunity to express that hate while pretending that you're simply concerned about 'integrity.'"

[Ernest Jones]

I guess this will, sadly, be a hot topic around here for the next year or so.

[Chas]

What? You guys are nuts if that's how you define the word 'controversy'. This really is most entertaining ..... lol

[Chas]

Controversy only exists if you're a conspiracy theorist, otherwise the rules committee did a good job explaining why he wasn't DQ'ed.

The rules committee was incoherent on the matter - not good.