Re: why golf sucks
 

Golf is so stupid about keeping score. Why on Earth don't they understand that when you have a televised tournament with officials all over the place, you don't have to make players sign cards and all of this nonsense?

I also don't know why Michael Bamberger got involved in the first place.

Re: why golf sucks
 

Yeah, I feel way worse for Stadler than Wie. What a horrible situation. For all anyone knows his club could have bent making a swing.

Re: why golf sucks
 

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It is only a DQ if you sign for a score on a hole lower than what you made. Higher and the score stands. The player is responsible for checking that the score for each hole is correct. Not adding it. She signed for a wrong score because she didn't add the penalty for the drop. Sometimes the rule has a brutal application, but it has always been the rule and all the players know it. It is also a better rule because you have to get things right and not change them after the fact. IMO it is the only way it can work in practice. You can't go amending scores; it would be a mess.

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In every other sport, someone else keeps score.

In this situation, it seems that Wie didn't even know that she had incured a penalty. Someone should be required to inform her of this, so that she CAN fill out her scorecard correctly.

It would take all of about 30 seconds to ammend her score. What a mess indeed.

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Golf is not every other sport. The essence of golf is that the competitors compete with a proper sense of sportsmanship. Competitors must keep score honestly and call penalties on themselves. A higher standard of conduct exists in golf. If this ever goes away, golf will lose what has made it a great sport. Competitors are charged with knowing the rules and abiding by them. Period. And that means calling things on yourself. As Kevin Stadler did this weekend. That was the real rules decision. He called himself on a rule people forget about. The Tour did everything it could to prevent a DQ but the rules are clear that a DQ was in order. It will likely cost him his tour card. Golf is not about getting away with it.

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Wie was not trying to get away with it. If Golf was truly about sportsmanship, then someone (a toutnament official, a competitor, this guy from SI) should have pointed out that there was a penalty, instead of trying to get Wie DQed. That was much more unsportsmanlike than Wie's incorrect scorecard (which I don't think was unsportsmanlike in the least, and which any good sport would have allowed to be corrected). This rule is BS, and actually decreases sportsmanship in Golf.

Re: why golf sucks
 

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Golf is so stupid about keeping score. Why on Earth don't they understand that when you have a televised tournament with officials all over the place, you don't have to make players sign cards and all of this nonsense?

I also don't know why Michael Bamberger got involved in the first place.

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That's always been the dichotomy I've never been happy with at the PGA tour. They keep (rightfully so) to the maxim of each player keeping an honest score, calling their own penalties, etc. That is at the heart of the game.

Then, they let decisions like this, with an outside observer essentially calling a penalty on a player, stand. They did it a couple times in the past with TV viewers CALLING IN and having a player DQ'd. (If I remember properly, one was Craig Stadler kneeling on a towel and another was (maybe Davis Love?) wiping dew to improve lie (or stance)). Both are clearly rules violations, but having outsiders call them in, that's over the line.

It is up to players, competitors, and rules officials to officiate the game. Not Fat Harvey sitting on his couch drinking his PBR calling the CBS switchboard.

Re: why golf sucks
 

I don't think Michelle was trying to get away with it. My point was about other sports where that is exactly what people do. Lineman holding. Soccer player falling down. Whatever. Not that Michelle did that.

The conduct by the SI guy was weird. Not the way things should have gone. I agree with that.

If a fellow competitor tried to allow michelle to correct the card after the fact it would probably be an agreement to waive a rule, which carries a DQ. [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

Re: why golf sucks
 

How'd you like to be the SI intern making the next call to Wie's agent asking for a photo shoot or interview? If I was her, I'd be asking for an interview fee of approximately $56,000.

Re:Saw something else on this
 

Saw a pic of Michelle's drop. It it may have also been a bad drop because she had her arm too low. She will need to watch this in the future as well, because my guess is that others will be watching her, probably too closely really. Can't wait for the Morgan Pressel/Michelle US Open pairing.