New Rules for Video Call-Ins

[Hardluckster]

Just now, Phil McGleno said:

In other words-More than ever before, the honest/knowledgeable golfer is getting hosed. He already writes the correct scores down, but now his dishonest cheating fellow competitors are either getting away with stuff or only getting the penalty they actually got.

No more additional penalty for their dishonesty OR their lack of knowledge.

The honest/knowledgeable golfer is getting screwed @Golfingdad-How do you not see that? He is getting screwed two ways-by the ignorant AND the dishonest.

This is it.  This is my biggest problem with this new rule.  It actually rewards players who are dishonest or lack the knowledge necessary to correctly penalize themselves or their playing partners.

It doesn't get any simpler than this.

Thanks, Phil. 

[iacas]

17 minutes ago, Golfingdad said:

Are you going to instruct your incoming players to not study the rules in depth and when questioned, plead ignorance?

No. Because I'm an honest guy who believes in playing by the rules. I am both knowledgeable and honest.

Within our conference, though, we have players and teams who cheat, sometimes due to ignorance, sometimes due to dishonesty. We usually beat them anyway, but not always.

Us usually beating them doesn't mean it's right. That doesn't mean it's "fair." We've lost individual honors when players have likely cheated. We've lost tournaments when other teams have likely cheated.

Being the honest/knowledgeable team, we're now going to get screwed by players and teams who are dishonest AND/OR ignorant. Before, we had a little incentive to be the knowledgeable and honest team. We couldn't ever really get the DQ or two strokes. The other teams had an incentive to record the scores properly. Now our incentive is gone, and they only stand to gain by being dishonest/ignorant.

The honest/knowledgeable golfers is getting screwed two ways over now.

1 hour ago, Phil McGleno said:

The honest/knowledgeable golfer is getting screwed @Golfingdad-How do you not see that? He is getting screwed two ways-by the ignorant AND the dishonest.

This.

1 hour ago, iacas said:

There's no advantage to being honest/knowledgeable now, and in fact, there are advantages to being the opposite of either/both of those with no added downsides.

And this.

[Hardluckster]

To be blunt, this is all in response to events on the professional tours over the past several years.  The ruling bodies have seen fit to change the rules for everyone in response to public outcry over the perceived injustices done to Lexi, DJ, and others.  The scorecard penalty change was brought about, in my view, based almost solely on the Lexi Thompson situation.  They have done this under the auspice of fairness.

What they have done, however, it to pollute the system in favor of players who do not deserve to be protected - players who knew, or should have known, that their actions were violations.  They have chosen to protect players who are either dishonest, ignorant, or both. Even worse, in my opinion, some of the rule changes affect not only those "poor, innocent" professionals but all golfers who compete in tournaments from the local level all the way to the international level. 

I can live with the call-in ruling as it really only affects the professional tours, except for a very few rare cases such as the US Amateur.  So that I'm not misunderstood, I don't agree with ever ignoring a known violation - regardless of how it is discovered - but it will not affect 99% of the other competitions in golf around the world.

If the PGA or other professional tours wish to play under rules such as these, I say more power to them.  It is their product and they have the right to use any rule set that they see fit.  They could very well afford to write their own rules. There is no need for the USGA and R&A to change rules which were not broken in order to accommodate the desires of these professional entertainment corporations, because that is indeed what they really are.

I see this as a major mistake by the ruling bodies.

[MuniGrit]

On 12/11/2017 at 7:36 AM, Jack Watson said:

Great to see that the USGA and RA came to their senses!

 

Yeah it was crap that people could call in. They got this one right.

[iacas]

13 minutes ago, Hardluckster said:

To be blunt, this is all in response to events on the professional tours over the past several years.  The ruling bodies have seen fit to change the rules for everyone in response to public outcry over the perceived injustices done to Lexi, DJ, and others.  The scorecard penalty change was brought about, in my view, based almost solely on the Lexi Thompson situation.  They have done this under the auspice of fairness.

It very much feels that way.

13 minutes ago, Hardluckster said:

What they have done, however, it to pollute the system in favor of players who do not deserve to be protected - players who knew, or should have known, that their actions were violations.

Agreed.

13 minutes ago, Hardluckster said:

I can live with the call-in ruling as it really only affects the professional tours, except for a very few rare cases such as the US Amateur.  So that I'm not misunderstood, I don't agree with ever ignoring a known violation - regardless of how it is discovered - but it will not affect 99% of the other competitions in golf around the world.

Right. And most likely, as most of the "calls-in" came from other officials, players, or caddies… they'll likely still continue. We just won't hear about them as "calls-in."

13 minutes ago, Hardluckster said:

I see this as a major mistake by the ruling bodies.

I do as well.

2 minutes ago, MuniGrit said:

Yeah it was crap that people could call in. They got this one right.

Yeah, such crap that someone who breached a rule would be held to that and the proper, appropriate penalty would be handed out. Man, that sucked!</sarcasm>

[David in FL]

19 minutes ago, MuniGrit said:

Yeah it was crap that people could call in. They got this one right.

So, what do you think will now happen when soneone calls in to inform of a breach of the rules that was apparent on television?

It's not a trick question.  What do you think will happen?

[MuniGrit]

19 minutes ago, iacas said:

 

Yeah, such crap that someone who breached a rule would be held to that and the proper, appropriate penalty would be handed out. Man, that sucked!</sarcasm>

Hey I feel Lexi intentionally did it but it is stupid that there is how much golf on TV and only a handful of players get all the airtime. It isn't a fair deal to every player. What other sport has so called fans on TV calling in violations? Then toss in the scorecard penalty and it's even worse. They got it right.

1 minute ago, David in FL said:

So, what do you think will now happen when soneone calls in to inform of a breach of the rules that was apparent on television?

It's not a trick question.  What do you think will happen?

Nothing because so few players are actually on TV.

[iacas]

Just now, MuniGrit said:

Hey I feel Lexi intentionally did it but it is stupid that there is how much golf on TV and only a handful of players get all the airtime. It isn't a fair deal to every player. What other sport has so called fans on TV calling in violations? Then toss in the scorecard penalty and it's even worse. They got it right.

It's not fair to EVERYONE ELSE in the field when a player known to have committed a penalty is not penalized.

For frick's sake, seriously, enough of the "other sport" bull. They're not comparable.

[Hardluckster]

Just now, MuniGrit said:

Hey I feel Lexi intentionally did it but it is stupid that there is how much golf on TV and only a handful of players get all the airtime. It isn't a fair deal to every player. What other sport has so called fans on TV calling in violations? Then toss in the scorecard penalty and it's even worse. They got it right.

So, you think she cheated but you don't think that she deserved the additional two strokes for cheating?  Wow!  Where is the logic in that?

*Edit: I am not proposing that Lexi cheated.  You did in your post, however.

Responding to some of these posts in support of the new ruling, I'm feeling sort of like a billy goat.

Edited December 22, 2017 by Hardluckster

[David in FL]

6 minutes ago, MuniGrit said:

Hey I feel Lexi intentionally did it but it is stupid that there is how much golf on TV and only a handful of players get all the airtime. It isn't a fair deal to every player. What other sport has so called fans on TV calling in violations? Then toss in the scorecard penalty and it's even worse. They got it right.

Nothing because so few players are actually on TV.

Wrong.

What will happen is that the Rules Official designated to be watching the telecast will immediately review that portion to see if there was a breach that he missed.  If there was, it'll be called.  If there wasn't, it will be ignored...

...exactly what happened before.  Except there won't be any report that someone called in from the outside.

Having said that they will be reviewing the telecast themselves for rules violations, the Tour(s) will never ignore a call lest it subsequently comes to light that they missed an obvious breach that they should have caught.

[iacas]

Just now, David in FL said:

Wrong.

What will happen is that the Rules Official designated to be watching the telecast will immediately review that portion to see if there was a breach that he missed.  If there was, it'll be called.  If there wasn't, it will be ignored...

...exactly what happened before.  Except there won't be any report that someone called in from the outside.

Having said that they will be reviewing the telecast themselves for rules violations, the Tour(s) will never ignore a call lest it subsequently comes to light that they missed an obvious breach that they should have caught.

Additionally, they've not said they'll only watch the LIVE broadcast.

[David in FL]

3 minutes ago, iacas said:

Additionally, they've not said they'll only watch the LIVE broadcast.

A good point.  

People forget that a great deal of what is captured on camera never actually makes it on the air....

[MuniGrit]

18 minutes ago, David in FL said:

Wrong.

What will happen is that the Rules Official designated to be watching the telecast will immediately review that portion to see if there was a breach that he missed.  If there was, it'll be called.  If there wasn't, it will be ignored...

...exactly what happened before.  Except there won't be any report that someone called in from the outside.

Having said that they will be reviewing the telecast themselves for rules violations, the Tour(s) will never ignore a call lest it subsequently comes to light that they missed an obvious breach that they should have caught.

They aren't going to penalize them for the scorecard too.

[iacas]

2 minutes ago, MuniGrit said:

They aren't going to penalize them for the scorecard too.

We know. Which is, likewise, bullshit.

[Missouri Swede]

1 hour ago, MuniGrit said:

Yeah it was crap that people could call in. They got this one right.

 

43 minutes ago, David in FL said:

So, what do you think will now happen when soneone calls in to inform of a breach of the rules that was apparent on television?

It's not a trick question.  What do you think will happen?

And "calling in" isn't the only way of communicating.  I don't see anything to prevent someone from posting a tweet with the same info about a potential rules breech.  The Tour isn't obligated to be watching Twitter or Instagram or whatever real time, as far as I know.  But once the info is out there, other people will see it even if the Tour ignores it.

[Golfingdad]

52 minutes ago, iacas said:

It's not fair to EVERYONE ELSE in the field when a player known to have committed a penalty is not penalized.

For frick's sake, seriously, enough of the "other sport" bull. They're not comparable.

Uh uh. You don’t get to compare golf to people robbing banks for Christ sake and then insult them for comparing two sports.

That is BS.

[iacas]

Just now, Golfingdad said:

Uh uh. You don’t get to compare golf to people robbing banks for Christ sake and then insult them for comparing two sports.

Bullshit to you, Drew.

Other sports aren't self-officiated. They're referee-officiated. Players in other sports are reliant on the refs to make the calls. They can't even call a penalty on themselves. Golf is reliant on the players to call the penalties on themselves. Penalties in other sports directly affect the opponent of the team. Penalties in golf affect the player's score alone - they don't take away two strokes from everyone else's score. It's an entirely different situation.

The "criminals caught on camera" was in response to the "it's not fair" whining about how some people are on camera and others aren't.

Completely different situations. Just because one doesn't apply (other sports) doesn't mean all don't apply.

[Vinsk]

45 minutes ago, iacas said:

Bullshit to you, Drew.

Other sports aren't self-officiated. They're referee-officiated. Players in other sports are reliant on the refs to make the calls. They can't even call a penalty on themselves. Golf is reliant on the players to call the penalties on themselves. Penalties in other sports directly affect the opponent of the team. Penalties in golf affect the player's score alone - they don't take away two strokes from everyone else's score. It's an entirely different situation.

The "criminals caught on camera" was in response to the "it's not fair" whining about how some people are on camera and others aren't.

Completely different situations. Just because one doesn't apply (other sports) doesn't mean all don't apply.

Absolutely. @iacas and others changed my opinion on this matter. @Golfingdad there was a time, I'm sure you remember when football, for example, didn't even have instant replay. So why now? To improve the refereeing of the game. Any method (considering cost, pace of play) that can improve in keeping the game of golf honest and accurate should be utilized. Whether it be an accident or direct violation, or lying (Matsuyama), it is only for the better of the game if it is penalized and/or corrected appropriately. Lexi was not a victim in any way whatsoever and it's ridiculous how she was portrayed as 'a fighter' after her incident. Every player on the field has the same responsibility to play by the rules, therefore how much a player is on camera makes no difference. Some players get an 8am tee time when it's sunny and calm only to have a nasty storm set in at 1pm. When Tiger had a nice crowd of people around to move a large rock out of his way...would this have happened for Brian Davis sitting at #77 in the tournament? Hey, that's not fair right? Players not marking their balls in a 'I got your back you get mine' fashion, the rules committee completely pu##### out over Matsuyama clearly lying? Garbage. Now they want to soothe the little softies who screwed up by not assessing a wrong scorecard? Gimmie a break.

Edited December 22, 2017 by Vinsk
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