Rangefinders on the PGA Tour

[boogielicious]

21 hours ago, iacas said:

That reminds me of another reason Finchem didn't like them: he didn't think that the guys who hit it far offline should be able to get a super-accurate yardage. If you're in the fairway, there's a marker within a few yards, so your yardage is accurate. If you're 25 yards left of the fairway, your yardage will not be as exact. Finchem liked that.

With a rangefinder it'd be accurate as a ball in the fairway.

Seems like a weak reason to me, because caddies can still step things off, it just takes longer, but… Yeah. Thanks for reminding me of that additional little reason.

 

Seems like double indemnity to me. You are already being punished for being off the fairway with lies and obstructions. So he wanted to add yardage accuracy to that too? No wonder the Tour is slow. 

[CCC]

PGA/USGA, please allow range finders on the course. There is absolutely no reason not to use a range finder.

My only concern would be that - the pro's caddie will use the range finder first - and then proceed to pace off the yardage from the pages of his pocket book of the course yardages for that hole. Just to be sure that he has the correct yardage.

[No Mulligans]

On 1/20/2017 at 7:01 AM, iacas said:

That reminds me of another reason Finchem didn't like them: he didn't think that the guys who hit it far offline should be able to get a super-accurate yardage. If you're in the fairway, there's a marker within a few yards, so your yardage is accurate. If you're 25 yards left of the fairway, your yardage will not be as exact. Finchem liked that.

With a rangefinder it'd be accurate as a ball in the fairway.

Seems like a weak reason to me, because caddies can still step things off, it just takes longer, but… Yeah. Thanks for reminding me of that additional little reason.

Yes, that seems to be a weak reason.  That just seems that he is being argumentative and grasping at straws to support his opinion.

I'd argue in that case a rangefinder could clearly speed up the pace of play.

[Lastpick]

I think there are pros and cons to using a rangefinder on the tour.  I tend to think that the pace of play on the pro tour is determined by the minority, not the majority.  Personal experience is that slow players never speed up, yet faster players will speed up to compensate for slower players in the group.  I wish we could get to the point in golf that it was appropriate to tell a slow player to hit the ****ing ball, we ain't got all day.