Adam Scott Begs For Slow Play Penalty

[ncates00]

28 minutes ago, colin007 said:

Maria Fassi furious after receiving slow-play penalty that cost her making Women's PGA cut | Golf News and Tour Information | GolfDigest.com

 

While I’m glad it was enforced, the problem is it won’t be consistently enforced. It’s like speeding tickets—sometimes you don’t even get pulled over, sometimes you get pulled over and a warning, and sometimes you get a ticket. 

[Shindig]

I had not heard of this until the thread popped up this morning.  Good for Adam Scott, who, for reasons that escape me, I don't think I like.  This certainly puts something in the plus column for him in my book.

My home club used to be famous for long rounds.  Muni rounds on weekends are bad, but our tournaments were looking at six hour rounds.  We got a new tournament director a few years ago, and he said he'd start enforcing our pace of play policy.  He gave out a few warnings at one tournament, then a few penalties at a second, and before you know it, we had four hour tournament rounds going.  

So I think I agree with the others saying that the tour could have reasonably paced rounds if they wanted.  Certainly, penalizing fast play isn't the way to go -- I think in the 90s or so, John Daly and  Mark Calcavecchia  were given a fine for fast play (they successfully appealed):  I hadn't read the following article when it first came out, but it looks like someone brought it up recently in Golf Digest (which I, admittedly, don't read anymore).  

Mark Calcavecchia clears up story of he and John Daly getting fined for playing too fast (yep, too fast) | Golf News and Tour Information | GolfDigest.com

 There's the story for anyone interested, but at this point, I'm getting off topic so I'll stop and hit "submit reply." 

[Billy Z]

Yes, there should be a penalty for slow play, but after you have been warned once.

[iacas]

9 hours ago, ncates00 said:

While I’m glad it was enforced, the problem is it won’t be consistently enforced. It’s like speeding tickets—sometimes you don’t even get pulled over, sometimes you get pulled over and a warning, and sometimes you get a ticket. 

It can and often is enforced pretty uniformly.

I’ve measured and timed people at national championships. The formula is pretty easy, and it’s automated on tablets.

You tap a button when the last player puts the flag back in the hole or holes out or whenever. It notes their time par. It notes the time difference between the previous group and this group. It prompts you with a warning to read to the players, and notifies all other officials. It even gives you a thing to say to the group or two AFTER that slow group, so that they know the slow group is likely to speed up, so they’ll not then get left behind, too.

That’s basically what happened here.

3 hours ago, Billy Z said:

Yes, there should be a penalty for slow play, but after you have been warned once.

They were warned on the 13th after missing the first checkpoint. Then they failed to make up any time and were put on the clock.

[ncates00]

1 hour ago, iacas said:

often is enforced pretty uniformly.

I'm not sure I agree. Reasons to follow.

1 hour ago, iacas said:

I’ve measured and timed people at national championships. The formula is pretty easy, and it’s automated on tablets.

You tap a button when the last player puts the flag back in the hole or holes out or whenever. It notes their time par. It notes the time difference between the previous group and this group. It prompts you with a warning to read to the players, and notifies all other officials. It even gives you a thing to say to the group or two AFTER that slow group, so that they know the slow group is likely to speed up, so they’ll not then get left behind, too.

(emphasis added). I should have been more clear: I am referring to individual golfers and the lack of enforcement for time limits. The Maria Fassi penalty was an individual penalty. Indeed, the Tour penalized her specifically for "breach of Rule 5.6 while being timed by a member of the Rules Committee. She exceeded the average amount of allotted time for the total strokes taken on Hole 18." Apparently, at least according to Fassi's account of the rules official's statement to her, she was 20 seconds over her allotted time. Golf Digest confirmed Fassi's statement by indicating that she took 50 seconds, 20 more than the 30 allowed for the shot. Moreover, I don't believe any one else in her group was penalized. 

So, when I made the previous statement about the inconsistent application of the rules, I'm referring to it in the individual sense, as seen with Fassi. I have seen many instances where Ciganda (ugh) and other LPGA pros did not make their strokes within the time allotted, and yet they are not penalized, while Fassi was. This inconsistent application on an individual level is what I'm getting at.

[iacas]

5 minutes ago, ncates00 said:

I'm not sure I agree. Reasons to follow.

Can’t really disagree with facts, man.

5 minutes ago, ncates00 said:

The Maria Fassi penalty was an individual penalty.

When on the clock, she’s the only one who violated the rules.

5 minutes ago, ncates00 said:

Moreover, I don't believe any one else in her group was penalized.

They did not breach the rules (by taking too long).

5 minutes ago, ncates00 said:

So, when I made the previous statement about the inconsistent application of the rules, I'm referring to it in the individual sense, as seen with Fassi. I have seen many instances where Ciganda (ugh) and other LPGA pros did not make their strokes within the time allotted, and yet they are not penalized, while Fassi was. This inconsistent application on an individual level is what I'm getting at.

They weren’t on the clock.

That doesn’t make the thing inconsistent.

[ncates00]

1 minute ago, iacas said:

Can’t really disagree with facts, man.

What I said above are also facts. Your discussion about groups being on the clock is irrelevant to what I was talking about.

Edited June 27, 2021 by ncates00

[iacas]

4 minutes ago, ncates00 said:

What I said above are also facts. Your discussion about groups being on the clock is irrelevant to what I was talking about.

Ummmm, no it’s not. They don’t time players who aren’t on the clock. If you’re standing in the fairway waiting on the group in front of you, and get to the next tee and wait again, you’re probably not getting a penalty if youtake 50 seconds to hit a putt.

Time par matters. Where you are relative to the group in front matters.

Get on the wrong side of those, and you can still escape penalties if you play quickly.

[ncates00]

Just now, iacas said:

They don’t time players who aren’t on the clock.

But can't individual players be put on the clock? I thought that was a new rule where an individual player can be put on the clock, not the entire group (the old rule)?

[iacas]

1 minute ago, ncates00 said:

But can't individual players be put on the clock? I thought that was a new rule where an individual player can be put on the clock, not the entire group (the old rule)?

The group is what’s out of position.

If individuals could be put on the clock, Lizette would be over par by now instead of T1.

[ncates00]

Just now, iacas said:

The group is what’s out of position.

Ok, thank you. Let me see if I'm getting what you're saying: 

The tour won't time players until the group is on the clock. Then, if the group is on the clock, then the players within that group are timed. If a member of that group subsequently takes longer than the allotted time, then that player will be penalized.

?

[iacas]

2 minutes ago, ncates00 said:

Ok, thank you. Let me see if I'm getting what you're saying: 

The tour won't time players until the group is on the clock. Then, if the group is on the clock, then the players within that group are timed. If a member of that group subsequently takes longer than the allotted time, then that player will be penalized.

Pretty much. And this is pretty consistently applied, contrary to what you said before. The officials aren’t out there deciding to penalize or not penalize on a whim.

The LPGA Tour is much better about penalizing players for slow play than the PGA Tour.

[ncates00]

1 minute ago, iacas said:

Pretty much. And this is pretty consistently applied, contrary to what you said before. The officials aren’t out there deciding to penalize or not penalize on a whim.

The LPGA Tour is much better about penalizing players for slow play than the PGA Tour.

7 minutes ago, iacas said:

If individuals could be put on the clock, Lizette would be over par by now instead of T1.

You must've added the first block above when I typed post #83, and I didn't see it at first.

Gotcha. Thanks, bro. That makes a lot of sense. I appreciate you for clearing that up for me. And, lol, you're right about the co-leader!

I see how it is relevant after all! 🙂

[Billy Z]

It's sort of like nhl hockey, you start consistently imposing penalties for certain flagrant infractions and those infractions disappear. In golf, you penalized consistently for slow play all of a sudden the pace will remain appropriate.

[Bonvivant]

4 hours ago, iacas said:

Time par matters. Where you are relative to the group in front matters.

The RoG matters too. They will never enforce the 40 second rule clearly on the books. This group par time is a farce and can punish the wrong player.

I could have some sort of tournament strategy that involves getting my group on the clock and then playing absurdly fast, catching others off guard, making them incur penalties when it was my fault. It's silly.

[iacas]

4 hours ago, Bonvivant said:

The RoG matters too. They will never enforce the 40 second rule clearly on the books. This group par time is a farce and can punish the wrong player.

There’s nothing “clearly” on the books, except that the RoG say that a tournament can establish a pace of play policy. Fassi broke it.

And while it can punish players (duh), you’d have a hard time making the case that Fassi didn’t deserve it. They were warned. Didn’t make up time. Then put on the clock. Then she was over time for all of her shots on the hole. And she was the only one.

4 hours ago, Bonvivant said:

I could have some sort of tournament strategy that involves getting my group on the clock and then playing absurdly fast, catching others off guard, making them incur penalties when it was my fault. It's silly.

That’s not how that works. So no, you couldn’t.

[boogielicious]

6 hours ago, Bonvivant said:

They will never enforce the 40 second rule clearly on the books.

FWIW, it’s not a hard rule yet, but a guideline in the RoG unfortunately.

[DaveP043]

15 hours ago, Bonvivant said:

The RoG matters too. They will never enforce the 40 second rule clearly on the books. This group par time is a farce and can punish the wrong player.

You can see the Pace of Play Policy for the PGA Tour for 2019-2020 in the Player Handbook here:

https://qualifying.pgatourhq.com/static-assets/uploads/2019-2020-pga-tour-handbook--regs-09_10_19.pdf

The Rules don't define specific requirements, as has already been explained, but the Rules authorize the Committee to develop their own Pace of Play Policy.  I don't know for sure, but the policy that "caught" Ms. Facci is pretty similar to the one outlined in the Handbook.  Players get warnings, this shouldn't ever come as a complete surprise to anyone.