Gary Player on the Senior Open earlier this 12 months.
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The Rules of Golf are a perpetual work in progress; in truth, the USGA and R&A not too long ago introduced a slew of guidelines modifications that can be enacted on Jan. 1. Still, irrespective of what number of tweaks the governing our bodies make, the principles ebook won’t ever be good in each golfer’s eyes. What edits would one of the best gamers on the earth make to the legal guidelines of the sport? We polled a few of them. Next up on this sequence: Gary Player.
Among the 2019 guidelines modifications that each golfer encounters in each spherical: the choice, when placing, as to whether or not to take away the flagstick from the outlet — or preserve it in. Before this elective was carried out, golfers had no selection however to pull the stick. But beneath the newly drafted Rule 13.2a(2): “There is no longer a penalty if a ball played from the putting green hits a flagstick left in the hole.”
The rule was amended largely to preserve rounds shifting.
This golf rule is unfair, according to Bernhard Langer
Alan Bastable
As the USGA famous when explaining the change: “Allowing a participant to putt with the flagstick within the gap with out concern of penalty ought to usually assist velocity up play. When the gamers didn’t have caddies, the earlier Rule may lead to appreciable delay.
“On steadiness it’s anticipated that there is no such thing as a benefit in having the ability to putt with the unattended flagstick within the gap:
-In some instances, the ball might strike the flagstick and bounce out of the outlet when it’d in any other case have been holed, and
-In different instances, the ball might hit the flagstick and end within the gap when it’d in any other case have missed.”
Nine-time main winner Gary Player has lengthy been a proponent of rushing up play and customarily welcomes ways that assist that trigger. But permitting golfers to preserve the flagstick within the gap, he stated, just isn’t the reply.
“I think the worst rule ever invented is leaving the pin, the flag in the hole,” he stated. “You get these guys with their big hands, and they go to take the ball out of the cup, and they squeeze their hand in between the cup and the flag. They pull the cup up, and every cup you play now is raised.”
Player was exaggerating, however he’s not alone in his gripe.
In March 2019, lower than three months after the brand new flagstick rule had been enacted, the Florida State Golf Association wrote in a blog post, “The main complaint we receive regarding players leaving the flagstick in the hole is that players reaching their hand into the hole to remove a ball, or using a suction cup on the end of their grip into the hole, are damaging the hole.”
The Villages, a sprawling retirement neighborhood in South Florida with greater than 40 golf programs, has additionally expressed issues about gap harm. Soon after the brand new rule went reside, the local newspaper ran an article with the headline, “New rule regarding flagsticks an issue at golf courses in The Villages.”
The story cited the identical points because the FSGA piece and referred to as on residents who use ball-removing instruments to “simply pull the flag stick out gently and remove the golf ball with your device. This will ensure the integrity of the cup edges and allow players to enjoy the same crisp quality of the cups as the players before them.”
With issues come options. One fast-thinking entrepreneur invented a pliable flagstick attachment that stops cup harm by prying fingers ($180 for a pack of 21!), and different treatments have sprung up on social media, together with the “two-finger” ball-retrieval technique demonstrated right here by Shane Rice, the superintendent at Southern Dunes Golf and Country Club Haines City, Fla.:
Whether leaving the flagstick within the gap presents any placing benefit is up for debate. Short-game whiz Dave Pelz’s analysis says, “You will hole a higher percentage of putts when you leave the flagstick in,” whereas different research advocate that you simply’re higher off pulling the stick. Player is squarely within the latter camp.
“They tell you you’ll hole more putts hitting the flag,” he stated. “That’s hogwash. The greatest putters in the world never ever left a flag in a hole. And they were as good as putters as you’ll ever find today. The whole idea is to save time. It doesn’t save time. I’m all in favor of everything you can do to save time, but get the flag out. That’s my opinion.”
When requested about Player’s critique, a USGA spokesperson stated, “While not addressed [in the rules], players should use caution when removing the ball or flagstick to avoid damaging the hole. However, players can repair damage to the putting green, which includes the hole, so if damage occurs [while] removing the ball or flagstick, it can be fixed, under Rule 13.1c.”
