Any time Tiger Woods is in the field there is an enormous gallery. Such was the case when he teed off at Quail Hollow for the Wells Fargo Championship–Spectators lined the fairways to get a glimpse of the former world’s number one ranked player. Tiger knows as well as anyone that this comes with advantages and disadvantages.
During the second round, Tiger’s errant second shot on the par-5 5th hole rattled around the trees well left of the green. When he arrived to the area his ball was nowhere to be found. PGA Tour official Mark Russell arrived and asked the group of spectators if they saw where the ball ended up, to which a few responded that they had seen his ball emerge from the trees and come to rest on a bare area where the gallery was located. However, the bare area was just that.
Bare.
And some morally-challenged spectator’s cargo shorts were 1.62 ounces heavier and the bottom right second layer Velcro pocket was bulging slightly.
Hmmm…
Rule 18-1 contemplates situations where a player’s ball has been moved (or in this case, stolen) by an outside agency. Here, the outside agency would be a greedy spectator. In these circumstances the player is required to replace the ball on the spot from which it was moved, and if the spot is not known the ball should be dropped. In this case Tiger’s ball could not be found, and because the spectators told Mark Russell approximately where the ball was last seen on the ground, he properly allowed Tiger to substitute a new ball by dropping it on the spot where the spectators last saw it without penalty.
There has been a lot of uproar about the “legality” and fairness with respect to this ruling. Many feel this should be looked at as a situation where it doesn’t benefit to have a gallery. However, if you were just playing a casual round of golf at Quail Hollow and hit the same exact shot, you would have been able to find and play your ball without a problem. Tiger, or any Tour player, should not be penalized for a spectator looking to bring home a souvenir.
Of course there are situations where players on the PGA Tour benefit from galleries, such as situations where a ball clearly would have ended up out of bounds, in a water hazard, or deeper in the trees if the spectators had not been there to stop it. And there have been occasions where a player’s ball “magically” ends up on the best tuft of grass around an area that has been trampled down by the gallery.
Like it or not, Tiger Woods didn’t receive special treatment. Although it may seemed that he received a generous ruling, Mr. Russell applied the Rules of Golf properly–just as he would have if you or I were playing that day.
