How to handle a cheater????

[ndsu84]

The most I would say to your dad is, "Some guys are complaining you can't keep an accurate score in competition, and next time they want someone to count your score for you."  

See where it goes from there.  

The retirees I play with, keep score like the guys above were saying about retirees.  It makes it more fun.  

My parents always told me you never lie, and never cheat.  I had some neighbors who told their kids to cheat, that cheating was a part of the game and that everyone cheats, just some are better at it.  Sad part about it is they're pretty successful.  

We were playing in a charity Tournement.  The prize for the longest drive was $450 plane ticket voucher.  Our group was the last to play the hole with the longest drive and hit the longest and best drive.  Somehow when the prizes were given out, they won.  

 

 

[Yukari]

8 hours ago, ndsu84 said:

The most I would say to your dad is, "Some guys are complaining you can't keep an accurate score in competition, and next time they want someone to count your score for you."  

See where it goes from there.  

The retirees I play with, keep score like the guys above were saying about retirees.  It makes it more fun.  

My parents always told me you never lie, and never cheat.  I had some neighbors who told their kids to cheat, that cheating was a part of the game and that everyone cheats, just some are better at it.  Sad part about it is they're pretty successful.  

We were playing in a charity Tournement.  The prize for the longest drive was $450 plane ticket voucher.  Our group was the last to play the hole with the longest drive and hit the longest and best drive.  Somehow when the prizes were given out, they won.  

 

 

You didn't call them out?  I would've called them out in front of everyone. 

[Gator Hazard]

14 minutes ago, Yukari said:

You didn't call them out?  I would've called them out in front of everyone. 

Yup. Me too

[Fourputt]

I'll be honest, but if the last group of a scramble came in saying that they hit the longest drive, and they had no impartial witness, I'd be suspicious.  It goes right along with the other forms of underhanded play in charity scrambles.  When they put up a big prize, then they need some way to verify the results.  A perfectly honest and innocent player could be under suspicion simply because of the the timing and lack of verification.

[Elmer]

10 hours ago, ndsu84 said:

The most I would say to your dad is, "Some guys are complaining you can't keep an accurate score in competition, and next time they want someone to count your score for you."  

See where it goes from there.  

The retirees I play with, keep score like the guys above were saying about retirees.  It makes it more fun.  

My parents always told me you never lie, and never cheat.  I had some neighbors who told their kids to cheat, that cheating was a part of the game and that everyone cheats, just some are better at it.  Sad part about it is they're pretty successful.  

We were playing in a charity Tournament.  The prize for the longest drive was $450 plane ticket voucher.  Our group was the last to play the hole with the longest drive and hit the longest and best drive.  Somehow when the prizes were given out, they won.  

 

 

I have to share a ride with him this weekend on the way to a scramble. I was going to say something similar.
realistically during league tournaments, he consistently shoots better than his handicap (-10). He also consistently shoots these low rounds on courses he has never played before, in horrific weather and has shot better than the 10 guys in the league with a lower handicap.
Golf is a game that rewards and punishes. There is no shame in being a -10 and shooting 15 over par. Somedays you dont have it. somedays the course doesnt allow it!
Some days you just dont get the breaks you need.

However with that being said, I dont know that learned behavior can be changed. Years ago I had to put a stop to my name being added to the closest to the pin at a scramble, when I did not earn it.
While I was told that "everyone cheats", I have always responded that " I dont".
I try to conduct myself as how I want my kids to see me. you put your time in with practice and get rewarded with good play. However everyone is capable of having an off/bad day. It happens!

However, now that my game is getting a little closer to his he is easing up on busting my chops. He realizes that I play once a week and a majority of my practice is in the backyard with nerf balls!

 

[Buckeyebowman]

12 hours ago, Fourputt said:

I'll be honest, but if the last group of a scramble came in saying that they hit the longest drive, and they had no impartial witness, I'd be suspicious.  It goes right along with the other forms of underhanded play in charity scrambles.  When they put up a big prize, then they need some way to verify the results.  A perfectly honest and innocent player could be under suspicion simply because of the the timing and lack of verification.

Who, in a scramble, has impartial witnesses? It's not like they have a marshall with you.

[Fourputt]

3 hours ago, Buckeyebowman said:

Who, in a scramble, has impartial witnesses? It's not like they have a marshall with you.

If I was running a random scramble tournament with a significant prize for longest drive or closest to the hole, I'd have a non participant posted on the holes involved to keep the contest fair.  I have played in a couple of scrambles where they did exactly that. When the prize is too large, it can attract an undesirable element which is participating solely for a chance to steal away with the goods.

[imsys0042]

30 minutes ago, Fourputt said:

If I was running a random scramble tournament with a significant prize for longest drive or closest to the hole, I'd have a non participant posted on the holes involved to keep the contest fair.  I have played in a couple of scrambles where they did exactly that. When the prize is too large, it can attract an undesirable element which is participating solely for a chance to steal away with the goods.

My club had to do this for a qualifying scramble for a larger tournament where the winning foresome from your club goes to the finals elsewhere with the winners from other clubs.  Someone had to go with every foursome because of cheating.   That is always the day you cannot find anyone at the club because they are monitoring the members on the course.

[HonestyPolicy]

OP, I have witnessed many cheaters and I sympathize with your dilemma.

I play at a club where the culture when I got there had been developed by a few who seemed to always be in control of the tournaments either running them or being controlling members of the committee, yet these same people were the worst offenders of the rules and they always won net. At the time there were no gross tournaments, all net. Eventually a culture spread among the rest of the members of (let's call it) creative accounting. If people aren't sand bagging their handicap, their rolling them in the rough, dropping balls, not counting strokes, etc, etc. Pretty soon almost everyone was cheating and all that did was evolved further into everyone cheating even more. For instance, today some people's index's change upward by 10 strokes or more in the revision just before a net tournament. The tournaments net winner typically shoots high 40's or low 50's, and no one in the tournament ever shoots anything higher than a net 70. If people are being honest everyone shooting under their handicap is statistically impossible! To say nothing of the 20+ handicappers shooting 30+ strokes under their handicap in tournaments and then not posting the scores or not posting them as T scores.

Over the years I got involved and slowly tried to change the culture, but let me tell you, there are no rewards for doing something like this. I worked hard to install local rules, install tournament conditions of competition, we marked the course properly, we got gross competition included in tournaments, we strictly followed little known USGA rules (like section 3-5 of the USGA handicap manual... and man was that painful......"I've never heard of such a thing!", they'd say. "You don't know what you're talking about!", they'd say.)

I've been called the rules Nazi, anal retentive, a know-it-all.... you name it. In all cases I site USGA rules and try to not take it personally. We've stopped short of manually changing a persons handicap which the committee is authorized to do, but it has not yet gotten better, it has actually gotten worse.

We've now evolved to the point where no one will sign up for tournaments anymore. Our club championship is this weekend and only 3 people are signed up which are the three best golfers who all will be competing for gross club champion and no one else wants to play. When I ask others why they won't sign up, most everyone responds are the same, "I can't win gross, so why play". When I follow up with the question "why not play for net", the response is "oh everyone cheats in net so I probably won't win that either and why play if I can't win". 

So this is how bad it can get when the cheaters are not confronted. I know it's your father, but you must do your part to protect the field, and to protect your club from becoming like mine. The easy way out is to join another club, stop playing, or ignore him. The higher road is to confront him and tell him you know he's a better man than his behavior shows. The best way I know how is to correct him when he isn't scoring properly in competition play, and then at some point, probably when you correct him the 2nd or 3rd time, he will explode. Let him vent and then just tell him you know he is a better man than that because he raised you that way.

I've lost good friends over things like this, so I guess it's possible you could lose him over it. But I figure if that's how they choose to react, then they never really were good friends to begin with. With family this makes it tougher, but I'm sure if you look deep enough and handle it mature enough you can prevent your father from over reacting at least permanently.

Good luck and let us know how it all comes out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Elmer]

On 8/18/2016 at 10:51 AM, HonestyPolicy said:

OP, I have witnessed many cheaters and I sympathize with your dilemma....

So this is how bad it can get when the cheaters are not confronted. I know it's your father, but you must do your part to protect the field, and to protect your club from becoming like mine. The easy way out is to join another club, stop playing, or ignore him. The higher road is to confront him and tell him you know he's a better man than his behavior shows. The best way I know how is to correct him when he isn't scoring properly in competition play, and then at some point, probably when you correct him the 2nd or 3rd time, he will explode. Let him vent and then just tell him you know he is a better man than that because he raised you that way.......

 

This weekend my league had out year end tournament. We played a very nice course in Lennox Mass, Cranwell.
I had all intentions about speaking to him on the drive up, but we ended up having a very nice father/son talk.
Then we played golf!
1st hole I duffed my drive, just about 100 yards off tee, hit my second to with in 50 yards.
My father hit his drive 230 to the right ride under a big pine tree. He leaves the cart in the fairway walks over, picks the ball up and tosses it about 10 yards to the left into the rough. He is now out from under the tree & hits up to the green. When he walks back I ask "what was that"? 
He responded in an angry tone " I am not hitting from under a ****ing tree"!
"really" was my response, it was far to early to challenge him!
I will say that there were 2 groups still behind us and at 240 yards out they clearly and ealisy saw him!
The rest of the round was fine, he played bogie golf on the front, par on the back, with a birdie thrown in.
Then came The 17th!!!!!!
The 17th is a lovely 296 yard par 4. I drove my ball about 265 leaving me a 40 yard chip over a bunker to a middle pin. I ended with a birdie!

My father drives his ball about 200 yards and left into the trees. He flew into the trees, but we did not hear a "click".
We drive up and walk along the end of the trees headed toward the green. I find ball after ball.
"what are you playing"?
"Pro-v1 X".
I found a callaway, bridgestone and a PRO V.
As we walked well past the distance that he would have hit the ball I declared I did not find it.
Now he is on my right side as we walk back to the cart and he leans in the first inch of the brush & wood, I see him out the corner of my eye cupping a ball in his hand. He declared "found it" and picks up a ball he never fully put down.
He then tosses the ball 5 yards away from the woods.
(full disclosure my league play loss of stroke NOT distance and we play winter rules with preferred lies, due to poorly maintained home course).
His next shot (2) lands short of the green and then chips on (3) and 2 putts (4 & 5).
We walk off the green and I declare our cart to have a 3 & 6, his 5 plus a stroke for loss ball.
He maintains he had a 5, to which I told him he gets a stroke for the unplayable. At this point I did not bring up the "found ball" I just told him that pull a ball from the woods that is a stroke. 
So what does he do, he yells at me for moving my ball on 14! On 14 my drive came to rest on the surface of a rock which was protruding from the ground.
I asked my playing partners for relief, which was granted and took my ball 1 ft back on the rock.
(As I said my league allows for preferred lie & winter rules. I tend to do so at the discretion of my opponent or playing partners. everyone agreed that there was no need to damage my equipment by hitting off a rock!)
Anyway my father continues to argue with me that he was simply doing the same thing I had a few holes back.
the score keeper asked "what to I put down 5 or 6", my father answers "5".
I lean in to the cart and quietly tell him " I saw you place the ball on the ground".
He looks at me and says "bullshit".
"c'mon, I saw you, seriously I just saw you do that"!!!!!
"no I found my ball, the **** you taking about".
at this point I told the scorer "put down what ever you want" and I moved on!

I later explained to the scorer who is a friend of my father's and plays with him 2x a week, and knows how he plays and has been confronted by league members as I have, what I had viewed.
 He has complained in the past, but I guess when given a chance to confront the problem he does not want to ruin his weekly 4 some!

Nothing was said during our dinner or during the hour long ride home. Almost like he forgot it had happened or he is unaware of that moment.

But I decided that I can no longer play in any type of league tournament with him. I am supposed to be having fun, not spending the afternoon keeping any eye on him and the evening dodging the contempt of other golfers.
If there is a round of golf that is not tied to the league I will gladly go out and hit the ball around, because at that point he can "vanity cap" (vanity handicapping) all he wants.
In an every day round, I keep my own score, I keep it to my self and I play the game. You can write down what ever you want, but when we are playing for money and prizes, It has become to exhausting.

I just not have to figure out how to tell him and what to respond to league member when asked why I dont play with him.

I know this should be an easy solution however, league tournaments were 2 of the 4 times I play with him, but it has become apparent that nothing will change the way he wants to play the game!
 

Edited September 19, 2016 by Elmer

[newtogolf]

We play in an annual "friendly" tournament where there's a trophy and some money involved.  One guy is a decent golfer but is notorious for the ole "I found it" after dropping a ball out of his pocket.  

He was caught a few times walking off on his own after we'd all searched and miraculously he always was able to find the ball on his own.  What we also noticed was he always kept a provisional in his pocket but after a miraculous find, he'd end up reaching into his bag at some point for a new ball.  

He's a friend so we didn't want to make it uncomfortable but came up with the following rule.  Everyone in a group plays a different ball number (if they play the same ball - to avoid ball confusion) each day of the tournament and everyone in the foursome has to "mark" the ball in their own way before it is put in play at the tee box.  This eliminates the chance a ball accidentally falls out of his pocket when he hits into the woods.

This is the first year we're using the rule so it will be interesting to see how his score is affected.  

[Elmer]

10 minutes ago, newtogolf said:

We play in an annual "friendly" tournament where there's a trophy and some money involved.  One guy is a decent golfer but is notorious for the ole "I found it" after dropping a ball out of his pocket.  

He was caught a few times walking off on his own after we'd all searched and miraculously he always was able to find the ball on his own.  What we also noticed was he always kept a provisional in his pocket but after a miraculous find, he'd end up reaching into his bag at some point for a new ball.  

He's a friend so we didn't want to make it uncomfortable but came up with the following rule.  Everyone in a group plays a different ball number (if they play the same ball - to avoid ball confusion) each day of the tournament and everyone in the foursome has to "mark" the ball in their own way before it is put in play at the tee box.  This eliminates the chance a ball accidentally falls out of his pocket when he hits into the woods.

This is the first year we're using the rule so it will be interesting to see how his score is affected.  

Marking the ball is a great idea, however he does not and will not do this.
I have always marked my ball with my initials, bright and big in perm marker.
You find a titlest or bridgestone with "XYZ" on it, everyone knows it is mine! You go in my bag, every ball has "XYZ" on it.
The issue is, he will not mark his ball because it takes his option away of finding a "miracle ball".
I have asked time and time again, suggested more than once, "use my pen".

By not marking a ball, it always for any ball to be your ball.
Like I said this is becoming not just a case of simple cheating, but there is premeditation and some kind of vanity that will not allow him to shoot over an 80 or 85.
Like I said, as much as it pains me I guess it is best to move on!

Edited September 19, 2016 by Elmer

[jkelley9]

This is really freaking sad. I about gasped when you told me how he shot lowest gross score in your OP. 

I don't even know what to say man. This is messed up. No offense to you, but damn if your dad is a dirty cheater. That's pretty low behavior. 

Honestly, I would just tell him straight up I no longer want to play with you anymore. I play golf to the rules of golf and when others don't, it puts me in a bad situation. I'm sure he'll cry about it because he seems just that kind of guy. 

It doesn't sound like he'll respond maturely to any type of confrontation, and I don't believe he'll change his ways either. I think you have to accept that.

If I played like your dad, I would have shot ~75-80 tens of times in the last 20 rounds I've played now as my problems is mostly penalties. They're devastating to a score. I couldn't possibly say that I'm a 4-5 HC golfer. That would be mad! I would be embarrassed to play with ANYBODY. 

It really makes me sad that there are people out there where their self esteem is so low they have to cheat and lie about how good they are at golf to make themselves feel better about themselves. Not to mention the even lower folks that walk away with prizes in tournaments for cheating. Unbelievable. 

[Groucho Valentine]

2 hours ago, Elmer said:

Marking the ball is a great idea, however he does not and will not do this.
I have always marked my ball with my initials, bright and big in perm marker.
You find a titlest or bridgestone with "XYZ" on it, everyone knows it is mine! You go in my bag, every ball has "XYZ" on it.
The issue is, he will not mark his ball because it takes his option away of finding a "miracle ball".
I have asked time and time again, suggested more than once, "use my pen".

By not marking a ball, it always for any ball to be your ball.
Like I said this is becoming not just a case of simple cheating, but there is premeditation and some kind of vanity that will not allow him to shoot over an 80 or 85.
Like I said, as much as it pains me I guess it is best to move on!

A graduate of the Judge Smails school of golf, it seems.

[Buckeyebowman]

On 8/18/2016 at 9:06 AM, Fourputt said:

If I was running a random scramble tournament with a significant prize for longest drive or closest to the hole, I'd have a non participant posted on the holes involved to keep the contest fair.  I have played in a couple of scrambles where they did exactly that. When the prize is too large, it can attract an undesirable element which is participating solely for a chance to steal away with the goods.

Oh, you don't have to tell me, Fourputt! Around here there are guys who put together their teams in the Spring, and enter every scramble tourney in the area! The top team in the area last year had two members who were bound for Q School! What chance does the average group of guys have?

And I'm not saying they cheated. They probably didn't have to! But it does go on. To be fair, in most of the scrambles I've played in that offered a major prize on a par 3, there was a spotter at the green, though in some cases they were asleep in their lawn chair when we played through! I've never seen "spotters" on the long drive holes, however.

I, and my buddy, played in a "shamble" last year that points out just how ridiculous some of these things can get. It was at a local country club that I had never played, and was known to be a really tough course! I was about a 14 at the time, but figured I should adjust for the slope and course rating, so I claimed a 20. Nobody checked anything, it was a very casual affair.

At the dinner, when the winning score was announced, I nearly crapped my pants! We posted an honest score of 63, 9 under par. The winning team seemed to be populated by nothing but 36 handicappers, and posted a net of 48! HUH???!!!

It was only then that I found out that the "winning" team didn't win all that much since the organizing body expected cheating! The big money was won in the product raffle and the 50/50, which my buddy won and walked away with $850! As we were walking out, he gave me my entry fee back and said, "Free golf today!"

 

[CCC]

This thread. Really troubles me. Kinda glad I'm not playing in my club league.

I'll just keep playing by myself for a while....