PGA Tour: Aussie Rules???: Notes from the Ballwasher

First topic message reminder :

1).It seems only a few weeks ago we were talking about this 20/30-year-old generation of Aussie Golf not pulling its weight on the PGA Tour and now look what's happened! Jason Day at the Match Play, Sendo (OK, he's 40-something) at Innisbrook, and now Bowditch in San Antonio. Three wins in six weeks and another thrown away by Adam Scott. Whatever next!
 
2).Steven Bowditch's win seemed a popular one among the Aussies in San Antone, with Senden, Baddeley and Scott Gardiner among those surrounding the 18th green to greet him. And good for him. I shared this link on last week's thread when Bowditch won but I'll offer it again as a rare insight into one of the sporting life's rarely discussed (Trescothick excepted) illnesses, depression:
 
http://www.golfdigest.com/golf-tours-news/2009-04/gw20090427_moriarty
 
Don't want to characterize it any more, make your own mind up. Some of the stuff makes Bowditch sound like a golfing savant, almost Moe Norman-like. Let's hope the demons stay away and he can enjoy the success his sheer talent may earn.
 
3).So, halfway through the FedEx Cup season, pre-play-offs, and we have three Aussie wins and the rest is American domination. But, having said that, it's a very regional domination. Of the 17 tournaments American golfers have won so far, the split by State/Region where the golfer grew up, is as follows:
 
Texas/Oklahoma: 5 (Walker (3), Reed (2)
Carolinas: 3
Georgia: 3
Florida: 2
Washington: 1
Mid-West: 1
North-East: 1
California: 1
 
4).The big surprise recently has been the dearth of top golfers from California. The State that just a few generations ago gave us Casper, Littler, Geiberger and Venturi, and followed up with Stockton, Miller, Stadler, O'Meara, Cook, Pavin, Simpson, Loren Roberts etc, now only offers Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson among the game's best, although Fowler, Mahan and Watney may yet get there.
 
5).Of America's best, only Stricker still lives in the Northern States, whilejust Furyk, Bradley and Dufner of the 2012 Ryder Cup Team hailed originally, like Stricker, from Northern States - and they all now live in the South.
This trend will surely continue, the days when three PGA Tour and Ryder Cup Team contemporaries from a tiny village settled by Polish emigres in Central New York could each gain Tour success simultaneously are seemingly gone for ever.
 
6).So! It's not just Europe who's having a dry spell on Tour!! Most of the Americas is too.
 
7).That Woods bloke won't be playing The Masters and the tournament may well be all the poorer for that. Many of our other favourites are also crocked going in to next week's Billy Payne Invitational. To name but a handful:
Phil: We still don't know whether he'll play this week, let alone next.
Day: Very quiet from Camp Jason, apparently rehabbing his injury by practicing at Augusta.
Justin Rose: Is his shoulder still hurting, or is that healed and it's just his putter to worry about?
Oosthuizen: Who knows with King Louis? Who ever knows with him??
Mahan: Withdrew during Bay Hill - is he fully fit?
Schwartzel, Watney: Returning from paternity leave - will they have their heads back in the game? Watney has also been injured and hasn't played since leaving a 6-figure pay cheque behind by w/d'ing from Doral.
Lots of caveats emptor going down Magnolia Lane.
 
8).With Mickelson and Woods both with their backs to the wall, how does the US Ryder Cup Team look now?
 
With the very real prospect that at least Tiger, and possibly Phil also, will be on the shelf for much of the summer, Tom Watson must be wondering about having to (or being press-ganged into) use two of his three picks on his two biggest stars. Right now, the top nine on the qualifying points list looks like this:
~Walker, Dustin, Reed, Bubba, Dufner, English, Zach, Phil, Simpson. With more potential rookies Moore, Kirk and Matt Every to follow.
 
So, Tom, that could be one Captain's Choice to share among Spieth, Bradley, Furyk, Kuchar, Mahan, Bill Haas, Snedeker and Stricker to name just candidates from the most recent two Presidents and Ryder Cup squads.
 
9).Don't panic! The season's only halfway through, and here we are at Houston. There'll be 144 golfers teeing off but this is one tournament where it's tough to tell whether all the talent will have thier competitive motors running at 100%. This is an event where Americans have had to yield a few wins in recent years, with Aussies Appleby, Allenby and Scott, Paul Casey and Vijay being among the winners. Henrik Stenson has played well and, if he's going to carry my money in to Augusta, he'd better have another decent week.
Westwood seems to like the place also with good finishes, but his traditionally excellent ball-striking stats are downright horrible for 2014 - is this the place to rediscover his competitive mojo?
 
10).One guy who won't be in Houston is my fave Will MacKenzie, but what a year he's having!
There was chat on here a few weeks ago about the number of young Americans going straight from school to university. Willie Mac is one guy whose college scholarship offer was as a kicker on the East Carolina football team, which he declined, and took a path less well travelled to the mini-tours and wherever that took him.
 
To get an insight into Tour life through the eyes of a real live character, I recommend this excellent interview on pgatour.com:
 
http://www.pgatour.com/video/2014/03/31/will-mackenzie-talks-with-john-swantek-on-march-31st--2014.html
 
Will is probably never going to win a Green Jacket, but one might feel that every Tour Pro could use a healthy dose of the lifestyle he chose as an early 20-something.

"Hello kettle , you're black" said the pot!!

Yeah but no 8 flipping paragraphs combative Davie .... Jesus I give in, I clearly need to go back to specsavers, reread the rules of golf and brush up on my debating skills. Call the the PGA and tell them they got it wrong then.

Oh FFS I give up. Come join us at GolfchatUK where all we ever talk about is the weekly fantasy golf. Is it so wrong of me to write 8 paragraphs on my thoughts? I still haven't heard your definitive statement on how you think this was a totally valid drop BTW .. just arguments against.

C'mon buddy .. write even two paragraphs on exactly how you think this could be explained! Everyone else who has commented here has explained lucidly their opinions. Are you a Kuch fanboi perhaps?

Lol no I'm no Kuch fanboi..shouting "golleeeey" when he hits a bad shot ??? seriously needs to have a word with himself.

In my my view Davie and I don't think it's the first time I've said it is that he has come back on the line with the flag from the point of entry. Remember he hit an overdraw/hook from the middle of the fairway. The camera behind that shot was therefore at a different angle/position from the camera that covered where he hit the drop from. No way he treated it as a red as he dropped waaaay back from the supposed crossing point.

To judge from the discussion one could once again argue that the rules of golf are tooooo complicated...

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tHCeotsuujg

Davie...

Here's 3 more images... sometimes looking things at a different view adds more perspective



If images doesn't show here is the link: https://i.servimg.com/u/f56/18/25/95/53/pin0210.jpg

Image to the left is an attempt to recreate the attempted shot line, middle image is a blow up of the left image, and the right image is a screen shot of Shot Tracker that has been reorientated to somewhat match the angle of the other two.

*In the center image the yellow dot at top of the yellow line represents about where I think the ball splashed,
*the blue dot about the position of the microphone you can see on land,
*and the orange dot the appox location of the hazard stake
*the lower yellow dot is kuchar's drop point.

*The red line represents an exactly straight shot to the pin from where kuch played his 2nd
*The yellow line represents an exactly straight shot to where it splashed

IF these are near correct positions (and i freely admit I have no way of know just how close or far off I might be, but i've tried to put them in the WORST case position)... I believe it entirely plausible the ball crossed the hazard very near the stake and down through the magenta line of dots. And I believe anywhere in that area would have meant that kuchar's drop "could have" been OK.

Remember... Kuchar's 2nd shot started RIGHT of target and HOOKED. IMO looking at the center image and the "straight ball flights" I inserted with the red and yellow lines... a ball hooking and passing over the magenta area is very plausible... and it doesn't even take anything near a snap hook either... just a reasonable draw would be enough to do the trick.

Again... nothing proof positive either way... but enough that I think it fair to state again IT WAS VERY CLOSE.. but we really can't tell for sure if the drop was proper or not.

I'm not a rules expert in fact I haven't really got a clue on many of them. Is it that he can go back along the entrance to the hazard? If so then he has done that surely, as his ball was going left anyway. If not then I don't know but would probably go with the fact it was deemed ok and therefore no problems with it. You can't really judge when yout font have the facts though. Anyway Matt Kuchar has a big cartoon face.

This is like the Warren commission! IMO Kuchar's drop on the grassy knoll was above board. Have the PGA tour banned phone-in refereeing? Because I imagine there had to have been a few calls about this

Robo

Thanks for all the great diagrams.

Are we sure he hooked the ball, as it seemed like it went straight left rather than out right then hooking left at the end. If it was a pull rather than a hook I believe the ball crossed the line of the hazard well before the magenta line.

PS

Not sure why we are debating this as we know only a Chamblee article can condemn a player to cheat status.

McLaren wrote:PS

Not sure why we are debating this as we know only a Chamblee article can condemn a player to cheat status.

Yeah... Chamblee... I actually like a lot of the analysis he does, but his self appointed and self righteous "keeper of the integrity of golf" role he's assumed is a bit much for me, especially coming from him. {{cough, cough}}

Ha!
Been off the air for three days and my annual rules thread seems to have broken out!!

Hoping to see the Masters tee times soon. Hope they put the 2 x Stadlers together so that we can see their fatman mannerisms in duplicate - pity Jacobsen's not playing with the customary half a bucket of golf balls down his shirt, and he could mimic both of them. Talk about 3D.

Wow, heated debate! I can't believe I spent half an hour reading through these posts. I guess now I've gone to the trouble of reading it I better offer an irrelevant opinion...

Robo: Carefully thought through and illustrated. Legend.

Davie: The margin of the hazard is not the water's edge but the red line / stakes, which explains the drop. Don't take everything so personally.

JAS: Gentle and top quality needle, made me chuckle.

Mac: more posts in the middle of the night. What country are you in? If you're in the UK then I assume you are working as a security guard or night porter.

Ben: self-confessed uninformed and utterly pointless contribution... my favourite post on the thread!

http://www.pgatour.com/news/2014/04/08/masters-tee-times-rounds-1-2.html

Masters tee-times.

Some funny (peculiar) contrived times there, wish they wouldn't do that.

raycastleunited wrote:Wow, heated debate! I can't believe I spent half an hour reading through these posts. I guess now I've gone to the trouble of reading it I better offer an irrelevant opinion...

Robo: Carefully thought through and illustrated. Legend.

Davie: The margin of the hazard is not the water's edge but the red line / stakes, which explains the drop. Don't take everything so personally.

JAS: Gentle and top quality needle, made me chuckle.

Mac: more posts in the middle of the night. What country are you in? If you're in the UK then I assume you are working as a security guard or night porter.

Ben: self-confessed uninformed and utterly pointless contribution... my favourite post on the thread!

Ray .. if it really took you half an hour to read it ... well ...

Actually I don't take anything personally .. never have done and never well .. but people seem to think that so (as the youngsters these day say) Meh.

I do know about the red line and not the water's edge though ;-) .. still don't see any part of the hazard between his ball and the pin in any of the pictures that have been posted, but TBH don't really give a sh*t now .. it was a point for discussion that's all.

Actually .. the one thing I DID take personally was when someone mentioned the "cheat" word .. right from the start I have never suggested that .. all along I've been looking for an explanation but it was never a witch hunt. I'll leave that to others   

raycastleunited wrote:

Ben: self-confessed uninformed and utterly pointless contribution... my favourite post on the thread!

Anyway Matt Kuchar has a big cartoon face.

Clearly the best contribution in several weeks... well played to all involved.