The Golf Blog: Tiger Woods given 2 stroke penalty, no DQ, for improper ball drop and signing wrong scorecard
The Golf Blog says: Wow, Tiger Woods escaped a disqualification for signing the wrong scorecard (by not taking a penalty for an improper ball drop). The Rules Officials invoked the PGA Tour’s new “high definition TV” rule that minimizes the penalty from the use of the high definition TV to question a stroke, acccordingly to Golf Channel. The rule doesn’t seem to apply here. Tiger Woods admitted in his interview that he took a drop 2 yards behind the spot of his original shot. It wasn’t HDTV that raised the issue. The other explanation from Golf Channel is that the Rules Official exercised discretion under Rule 33-7, which allows the Official to impose a penalty instead of the normal DQ.
The Rule is not supposed to be applied for mere ignorance of the golfer (commentary):
“A Committee would not be justified under Rule 33-7 in waiving or modifying the disqualification penalty prescribed in Rule 6-6d if the player’s failure to include the penalty stroke(s) was a result of either ignorance of the Rules or of facts that the player could have reasonably discovered prior to signing and returning his score card.”
Brandel Chamblee says this incident will mar Tiger Woods’ career and believes Tiger should have declared the infraction and DQd himself.
Nick Faldo agrees with Brandel.
Both Chamblee, Faldo, and Steve Flesch think that Tiger Woods should do the right thing and disqualify himself.
Here’s the official ruling:
TweetHere’s the official statement on Tiger Woods’ drop at 15 and the penalty. twitter.com/AUG_Masters/st…
— Augusta.com (@AUG_Masters) April 13, 2013
