Alex White of BYU Plays Sunday's Round Thursday

[Hardspoon]

9 minutes ago, iacas said:

It's not just Mormons, either. AFAIK almost any religion can claim this type of thing… depending on how strictly they interpret their holy book. I think (I'm definitely NOT a religion expert, so correct me if I'm wrong and it's relevant to the discussion).

Correct:

31.1.4.1 Institutional Policy. If a participating institution has a written policy against competition on a particular day for religious reasons, it shall submit its written policy to the governing sports committee on or before September 1 of each academic year in order for it or one of its student-athletes to be excused from competing on that day. The championship schedule shall be adjusted to accommodate that institution. (Adopted: 4/22/98, Revised: 8/11/98, 10/28/99, 5/2/13)

[Buckeyebowman]

If I remember correctly Sandy Koufax would not pitch on the Sabbath, and the Dodgers massaged their rotation to accommodate that as much as possible.

And I don't honestly know how the player in this instance felt about it. All I've seen is that it's the school's policy and they're the one handing out the scholarships. She might have hated being out there all by herself. Any info along that line?

[Rulesman]

9 hours ago, iacas said:

Yet because on Thursday Alex Smith played the ball down (no lift, clean, and place), the entire field had to play the ball down on Sunday.

 

Could this not be accommodated by 33-1/1 ?

[iacas]

45 minutes ago, Rulesman said:

Could this not be accommodated by 33-1/1 ?

No. How? In that Decision they didn't even allow a deadline to be extended by a few minutes.

[Rulesman]

"Once a competition has started, the conditions should be altered only in very exceptional circumstances"

Maybe this is exceptional?

[krupa]

I voted yes.  I have no problem making reasonable accommodations for other people's beliefs.  The policy is on the books and it sounds like it was enacted correctly.  If the question was, "should the NCAA change their policy", I would change my answer to "I don't know."

13 hours ago, iacas said:

They probably would have played LCP on Sunday, but because the round was "begun" under the conditions they determined on Thursday, they couldn't change it.

Why don't they determine life-clean-place based on the day's weather?  Ignoring the exception, if the tournament was Thursday to Sunday and Thursday was idyllic but Sunday was a shit-show, they still wouldn't do LCP!?  That seems ridiculous to me.

[Jeremie Boop]

17 minutes ago, krupa said:

I voted yes.  I have no problem making reasonable accommodations for other people's beliefs.  The policy is on the books and it sounds like it was enacted correctly.  If the question was, "should the NCAA change their policy", I would change my answer to "I don't know."

Why don't they determine life-clean-place based on the day's weather?  Ignoring the exception, if the tournament was Thursday to Sunday and Thursday was idyllic but Sunday was a shit-show, they still wouldn't do LCP!?  That seems ridiculous to me.

The reason I said no is because I don't find it reasonable to allow someone to play their "final round" days in advance. I feel that way almost exactly for the reason of what actually happened here, with extreme changes in the weather. I'm not even saying it because the athlete would necessarily have an advantage, because it was be just as unfortunate if that person had to play in horrible weather while everyone else had perfect weather. 

Edited May 23, 2017 by Jeremie Boop

[jamo]

10 hours ago, Buckeyebowman said:

If I remember correctly Sandy Koufax would not pitch on the Sabbath, and the Dodgers massaged their rotation to accommodate that as much as possible.

I'm pretty sure that was just Yom Kippur. Just looking at his game logs, he pitched on plenty of Saturdays.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/gl.fcgi?id=koufasa01&t=p&year=1959

[onthehunt526]

I agree with Matt, the whole thing did turn out unfairly. Like I said, before they need to figure out something more equitable in fairness to everyone. 

I get that the Mormons don't work, shop or do anything that causes others to work on Sundays.  That's their right.

But be equitable, NCAA come on.

[iacas]

3 hours ago, Rulesman said:

Maybe this is exceptional?

I don't think so. And obviously they didn't either.

1 hour ago, krupa said:

Why don't they determine life-clean-place based on the day's weather?  Ignoring the exception, if the tournament was Thursday to Sunday and Thursday was idyllic but Sunday was a shit-show, they still wouldn't do LCP!?  That seems ridiculous to me.

Because that would be against the Rules of Golf. The round itself is what matters, not the "day."

[krupa]

17 minutes ago, iacas said:

Because that would be against the Rules of Golf. The round itself is what matters, not the "day."

So if everyone played Sunday's round on Sunday, they could start the round with LCP and that would be fine, correct?  

[iacas]

1 hour ago, krupa said:

So if everyone played Sunday's round on Sunday, they could start the round with LCP and that would be fine, correct?  

Yes. They can't change the rules for the round in the middle of the round (except in super extreme cases).

[Golfingdad]

2 hours ago, jamo said:

I'm pretty sure that was just Yom Kippur. Just looking at his game logs, he pitched on plenty of Saturdays.

Correct.  Sounds like he also avoided pitching during Rosh Hashanah and Passover as well, but those wouldn't fall during the postseason, so they likely weren't big issues.  This was only a big deal once because it fell during game 1 of the 1965 World Series.

(Fun facts I just learned;   He pitched in games 2, 5, and 7 AND threw complete game shutouts in games 5 and 7, so it's a safe bet he was quickly "forgiven" by fans.  Also, on a humorous note, Don Drysdale, who pitched in his place in Game 1 gave up 7 runs in 2 2/3 innings and when the manager came to yank him out of the game he apparently told him "I bet right now you wish I was Jewish too.")

Same thing happened with Shawn Green once or twice in his career.

[Tecwesty]

22 hours ago, drmevo said:

I mean, if we're trying to look at this logically, there's absolutely no question.  There's no logical reason to not play on Sundays. Letting one (small) group's belief in the supernatural possibly affect the outcome of a major collegiate sporting event is not logical. 

This. 

I am a sucker for this line of reasoning because I happen to believe that we, as a society, need a whole lot more respect for logic. 

[bkuehn1952]

The current NCCA rules permit an attempt to accommodate a member school's restrictions.  I like the idea of giving all competitors the option to play Thursday or Sunday.  The chosen accommodation of allowing a single player to play Thursday is very flawed.

[drmevo]

1 minute ago, bkuehn1952 said:

The current NCCA rules permit an attempt to accommodate a member school's restrictions.  I like the idea of giving all competitors the option to play Thursday or Sunday.  The chosen accommodation of allowing a single player to play Thursday is very flawed.

That would sort of ruin the excitement of the final round, wouldn't it? Is all the trouble really worth it over a belief that probably more than 99% of the field doesn't share? I find all of this kind of bizarre to be honest. 

[krupa]

4 minutes ago, drmevo said:

That would sort of ruin the excitement of the final round, wouldn't it? Is all the trouble really worth it over a belief that probably more than 99% of the field doesn't share? I find all of this kind of bizarre to be honest. 

The final round is on Monday, not Sunday. 

[drmevo]

18 minutes ago, krupa said:

The final round is on Monday, not Sunday. 

Oops, didn't catch that in the OP. Still think it's ridiculous, though.