Current evidence apparently suggests those officials were wrong and Tiger was right about the location of the drop.
I’m having trouble finding evidence of this.
The closest I’ve come is this article, in which his agent says “He in effect called it on himself.” But this refers to his post-round press statement, not to anything that happened in a meeting with officials.
This is not the first year they’ve held a tournament at Augusta. They have a rules committee to investigate possible violations. One person could not lie about reviewing the tape without the rest of the committee knowing he is lying. And frankly, I don’t think the comparison I gave suffers a bit, even if it’s just one ANGC official lying versus one anti-Tiger viewer calling in a violation based on little or no evidence.
Nor do I think that PR, or ratings, or anything else along those lines influenced their decision. This is the club that could sell tickets for ten times the price they charge; that could easily get twice as many hours of TV coverage as they currently allow; that actually went without any sponsors, rather than give in to public opinion. And it’s the club that more than any other has gone out of its way to bother Tiger, both on (Tiger-proofing) and off (the 2010 Chairman’s Address) the course.
Besides, if they wanted to avoid controversy, they would have DQd him. That’s what everybody, including me, would have expected before the nuances of the decision were made clear(er) by Ridley’s press conference.
Then why was he penalized? According to Ridley, there were only two people who said Tiger dropped it in the wrong spot: some viewer, and Tiger himself. Whoever called in from the network (Nantz?) was just reporting what Tiger said.
They reviewed the tape after the viewer called in, and they rejected his claim. The video tape did not change overnight, and the still photos from the Augusta Chronicle made the drop look even better than the video did. So the only thing that could possibly have made them impose the penalty was Tiger’s insistence that he dropped it in the wrong place.
They don’t need to get the same attention, they just need to have the same risk:
Don’t accept tattling from home viewers calling in. Assign an official to each group. If they miss it, then live with it.
Done.
Or assign an official or two for each hole.
I was confusing the explanation of 33-7 with the rule itself.
As written, the new rule allowed them not to disqualify Tiger. It allows them to wave a DQ whenever they want.
The explanation given of how 33-7 should be used, however, would not support waving the DQ.
So they went against what they said the rule was for, but since the rule allows them to do whatever they want they didn’t go against the rule.
It could have been like this:
Tiger to officials: “Hey, you looked at it and thought the drop was okay, but I’m telling you I was deliberately trying to play from 2 yards further, and you have to give me the penalty.”
It also could have been along these lines:
Officials: “In your press conference yesterday, you’re reported to have said you were trying to play from two yards further back. If that’s accurate, you’ve misapplied rule 26-1, and a 2-stroke penalty must be assessed.”
Tiger: “Well, that’s what I did - sounds like I was wrong.”
The first of these would be “insistence”; the second isn’t really. And, given that the officials summoned Tiger (apparently because they’d heard of his post-round interview comments), it seems as if the second is fully plausible.
OK, I withdraw “insistence.” But it’s still the case, even in your second scenario, that they relying solely on Tiger’s recollection to impose the penalty, and IMO that constitutes him calling the penalty on himself, just as soon as he realized that he had gotten the rule wrong.
I’m not saying he deserves a medal. He did what he’s supposed to do, and what other golfers do every day. But some people, including a very prominent commentator on the Golf Channel, were essentially calling him a cheater, and there are simply no grounds for that.
You favorably compared to him to Bobby Jones, in not one post, not two posts, but three different posts.
He may not deserve a medal, but you sure sound like you want to nominate him for the Bob Jones award
Emphasis Mine.
That’s the hidden story here: if that shot sticks near the pin, and he makes the putt, he gets a 4 on that hole, and not an 8-and is in the playoff.
It’s not all that hidden. Nobody cares. Anyone getting themselves in a twist about this is just an angry tiger-hating golf wank. The guy who called in… What if he asked right after he told on Tiger, “Do you like Howard Stern’s butt cheese?”, would thsy have taken him seriously?
I hate these assholes that call the PGA (I wouldn’t even know HOW to contact the PGA if I saw something so outrageous) and tattle-tell on the golfers. Get a life, losers!
Whew. I feel better now. Golf is one of, if not the only sport, in which players are not only supposed to police themselves, but they do it. Even on this drop, Tiger supposedly asked before signing his card. And he “told on himself” in an interview, indicating to me, that he didn’t think there was anything wrong with what he did after getting the blessing from whoever from the PGA and/or Masters told him to sign his card.
Look, he dropped his ball NO NEARER THE HOLE. He hit from virtually the same spot that a couple of minutes before, his tee shot clanged off the freaking flag stick and went into the water! What POSSIBLE benefit did he garner? A better lie? As long as he didn’t “Judge Smails” the damn thing with his foot (winter rules!) I say, he’s fine. The fact that he ate a 2 stroke penalty was punishment enough. For people to expect him to DQ himself? They are crazy.
And this is coming from a not-so-big Tiger fan. The truth is, I don’t really root for any golfers, I just like seeing good golf, because I suck at the game. Woods got screwed twice on that hole and it cost him 4 strokes. I’d say that is penalty enough.
The evidence clearly says the incorrect drop was based on a failure to understand the rule, and not on a desire to gain an unfair advantage.
But it’s a fundamental aspect of golf that every player is responsible for knowing the rules and enforcing them on himself. There is definitely room in this case to question the decision by the officials to waive the normal penalty for signing for an incorrectly low score, and for Tiger’s decision to accept this. It would have been entirely within normal practice for him, on learning that he was wrong about the drop rule, to say “Sorry for the trouble - I’ll plan to be back next year.”
I don’t think this happened. He never asked for, nor received, official advice before signing his card.
“Even if he didn’t follow the rules, what he did was okay by me” isn’t a strong argument here.
That’s because I was posting after listening to the rantings of Brandel Chamblee of the Golf Channel, as he repeatedly talked about how Bobby Jones had called a penalty on himself, and how Tiger was doing the opposite, and was a disgrace to the game. The same kind of crap has been posted on various MBs dedicated to golf that I read, often by posters who clearly know nothing about Jones except what they heard from Chamblee.
Jones famously said that he should not be praised for what he did. I have no control over what the USGA does.
I, for one, think this point has not been stressed enough in the discussions on the Golf Channel.
Chamblee clearly has an agenda against Tiger. No doubt about it. But it is more than offset by rest of Tiger Sycophants at Golf Channel like Begay, Rosaforte, Nobilo, Tilghman, Rashad, Cook and many others.
And there were other golfers, including a former #1 player in the World and British Open champion (and sponsored by Nike) that was saying that TW should be DQed. Chamblee was not a lone wolf.
Yeah! If Bobby Jones was still around, that fucking nigger Tiger wouldn’t even be allowed to play at Augusta!
Seriously, Bobby Jones was a great golfer, but he ain’t an example that should be upheld. Frankly, it’s a damn shame they still have the award named after him. Most sports are now embarrassed about their racist pasts. Golf still seems to be struggling with the idea…
Well, I think it DID happen, and that was the story both Saturday and Sunday morning. It was also the story on Monday morning, so that’s good enough for me. If you have knowledge or proof that this didn’t happen, please share it. Because EVERY story I have heard about this was that Tiger looked for and received permission to sign his card from either PGA or Master’s officials. I’m not sure which one, but the impression given was that whoever ok’ed Tiger to sign was the person who had the power to tell him to sign. If this is made up by the folks who just want to see Tiger in the weekend field, and this is just a conspiracy, fine. Prove it.
Quite right. If I was actually arguing. I think anyone actually arguing about this needs their head examined. I listened to Curtis Strange talk about this and he said the book that explains the rules in the rule book is over three inches thick. He said no golfer knows all the rules and they can’t possibly know all the rules. Top it off with the rule in play here was changed three years ago, and Tiger (allegedly) sought out an official opinion, and the case is closed.
I would say the same thing about Phil Mickelson, and I’m on record as HATING Phil. It’s simply too nitpicky. And correct me if I’m wrong, but if he dropped it and it landed in a divot, he would get relief from that divot, correct? Wasn’t he dropping it so he wouldn’t be landing in a bunch of divots?
Feh. This thing isn’t worth the energy. It’s over and it will not be changed. He took a ball all the way back to where he originally struck it, moved back a yard or two, and hit it again. Four strokes off on that hole. 2 in you just call his first shot tough luck, which it was.
I think the best part was seeing Tigers old caddy jumping around with the winner!
Here’s a link to a GolfChannel article that explains the sequence of events. The essential part:
They did not talk to him until they heard of his post-round remarks about the drop - which were obviously made after he signed his card.
I’d be interested in reading one or more of those stories that say he looked for and received advice from officials before signing - I haven’t yet seen that in print, and it obviously conflicts with this description of events.
He wanted to hit exactly the same shot hit hit a moment before, but have it hit the green 2 yards shorter.