2018 PGA and Golf in General

The USGA just never learns. It's always too busy puffing its chest out and preening itself at the sight of making the best players in the world look like fools.

The Championship should be renamed "The Lottery Open".
 
Carolina Red said:
At some point they need to put down a market for what a “serious breach” is.

What happened today should be that marker.

As for the course... hell, I’m glad to see the pros look human every once in awhile.
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I know what you mean and I'm on the same page that what he did was DQ worthy, but I think you're reading the rule wrong. Even in cases of serious breach, there's no obligation to DQ, it's still discretionary. DQ is the right answer, but it then leaves someone else playing on their own tomorrow which is unfair too.

Besides, no way a US player gets DQ'ed at this. Stenson and Rose were put on the clock for slow play today, but DJ playing behind them and who had lost a full hole on them had nothing. Just generally shite from the USGA.

Those saying 'it's good to see them struggle like us for a change are missing the point. We struggle because we hit bad shots, while they are hitting good shots and getting punished. The greens are like crazy golf, leave it 6 inches short and it could come back to you, go 6 inches past and it could go off the green.
 
lsd said:
I doubt he was trying to gain an advantage over anyone else he knew where he was going in the tourney

He was just totally fecked off with the course at that point and reacted .

He knew he would get the 2 shot pen which is the rule why give him any other punishment?

Most people want to watch the best golfers play in the best conditions on the best courses .

They don't want to watch what is basically a lottery which will be won by the person who played the least badly and who was lucky to get the best tee times etc.

It's the same for the players too playing in what is a joke course how else can they react ?
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Do you think it should be allowed? That we should see golfers doing that sort of thing more often?

I know the course was a joke. And if he'd come out and said that was why he did it, he'd have got more sympathy from me, but, the USGA has bottled it because of who he is, and has now made a rod for its own back.
 
StuCol said:
Do you think it should be allowed? That we should see golfers doing that sort of thing more often?

I know the course was a joke. And if he'd come out and said that was why he did it, he'd have got more sympathy from me, but, the USGA has bottled it because of who he is, and has now made a rod for its own back.
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It's not allowed. That's why it was a 2 shot penalty.
 
I think it's good for golfers to be tested especially as courses are easy for pros nowadays. But I don't think it's fair that those who went off early had a playable course and have managed to make up 11 shots on leader and be level for the lead. Berger and Fiau would never have shot 66 if they went out later on.
 
While I don’t think there was a concerted move by the USGA to drastically toughen the course today (they were not expecting the wind to blow as it did later in the day), they did acknowledge they made a mistake in not watering the greens yesterday morning, anticipating less wind.

One issue that I don’t hear enough and needs to be addressed is the desire to reconstruct green complexes to the original designs of Ross, Alison, MacDonald, Tillinghast, etc., designers of courses in the early part of the 20th. century. The modern golf ball is too hot and not soft enough to be able to have the control into and around these reconstructed greens as was evidenced yesterday. The prevalent ball design that most professionals played for virtually all of the 1900s was wounded rubber bands around a core, the cover continually made softer until balata was used for ultimate softness and control. The current iteration of the golf ball used by professionals is geared to limit side spin with longer clubs and, while offering good spin rates on approach shots and decent control around the green, its workability and feel is nothing compared to balata three piece balls.

Couple the hot ball era with incredible advancements in turf science creating pristine, tight fairway and fringe conditions which pros demand, something has to give and when a championship track is set up to major standards, there’s only so much a ball can do. The trade off is 300+ yard carry average off the tee for the other tournaments each year with more fairways hit. Nothing wrong seeing a course not yield 16 under par like last year at Erin Hills, good to see it more in line with Merion in 2013.
 
Gee Male said:
It's not allowed. That's why it was a 2 shot penalty.
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Think it should have been a DQ as such an extreme example, and poor sportsmanship rolled into it as well.

I like Mickleson as a rule to be fair. Just don't think we should be seeing that sort of thing on the course from our top pro's
 
StuCol said:
Think it should have been a DQ as such an extreme example, and poor sportsmanship rolled into it as well.

I like Mickleson as a rule to be fair. Just don't think we should be seeing that sort of thing on the course from our top pro's
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So you want to ignore the rules that have been set and make up new ones on the spot ?
 
lsd said:
So you want to ignore the rules that have been set and make up new ones on the spot ?
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I think the rule is not fit for purpose, for the reason that I said above (the temptation of rolling in a missed tiddler before it stops). Do you really want to see players running after shots and hitting them again rather than going into a hazard?
 
lsd said:
So you want to ignore the rules that have been set and make up new ones on the spot ?
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The rule already exists to allow for DQ, people are simply saying that this case should have been deemed to be serious enough that the DQ was applied .
 
This is what happens when you set the golf course up tough but fair. Lots of players will still be over par for the day but the genuine form players (Fleetwood) are capable of producing a wonderful round.

The USGA should take note of this.
 
lsd said:
So you want to ignore the rules that have been set and make up new ones on the spot ?
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No. Just want the rules enforced properly and strictly no matter who the player involved is. There is no way in earth that Couldnt be described as a serious breach.

Here's a thought from Westy


 
Kag said:
This is what happens when you set the golf course up tough but fair. Lots of players will still be over par for the day but the genuine form players (Fleetwood) are capable of producing a wonderful round.

The USGA should take note of this.
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That’s what they did. The USGA admitted late Saturday that the course got away from them and started watering the greens immediately after the last group played through. They realized that their counting on the weather forecast for mild winds Saturday afternoon was faulty and tried to rectify it as much as possible.

They got the course conditions correct for 3.5 out of 4 tournament days. They try to test golfers, not coddle them like how the PGA sets up their courses which is the vast majority of the professional season.
 
I didn't see that much of it but a major winner at +1 doesn't seem too outrageous to me. I think close to par is a good winning score for a major, whether that's a little under or a little over. We see enough -15 an lower tournament winners as it is. Koepka winning it two years running, that's pretty impressive. I wanted Fleetwood to get it, I backed him to win one or get close at the start of this thread and he didn't let me down. He'll get more chances.
 
Ainu said:
I didn't see that much of it but a major winner at +1 doesn't seem too outrageous to me. I think close to par is a good winning score for a major, whether that's a little under or a little over. We see enough -15 an lower tournament winners as it is. Koepka winning it two years running, that's pretty impressive. I wanted Fleetwood to get it, I backed him to win one or get close at the start of this thread and he didn't let me down. He'll get more chances.
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That only happened because they changed the course the last two days.

This is why the Open was a joke this year . Every player should be able to play the same course all four days .

By the time they changed the course too many players were out through no fault of their own but because the organisers screwed the course
 
lsd said:
That only happened because they changed the course the last two days.

This is why the Open was a joke this year . Every player should be able to play the same course all four days .

By the time they changed the course too many players were out through no fault of their own but because the organisers screwed the course
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Exactly, it's the inconsistency that annoys people.

Koepka won because he took advantage of an early start on Saturday (Same as Finau who finished top 5) while people in the afternoon got destroyed by conditions. Fleetwood came second because of taking advantage of an early tee time yesterday.

When you have a course playing so different later in the day than it did early in the day, it just makes a mockery of it.

Roll on The Open, a proper major.
 
StuCol said:
No. Just want the rules enforced properly and strictly no matter who the player involved is. There is no way in earth that Couldnt be described as a serious breach.

Here's a thought from Westy


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The answer is obvious though, start planning for the Olympics since you're clearly the fastest man alive.
 
Rednotdead said:
The USGA just never learns. It's always too busy puffing its chest out and preening itself at the sight of making the best players in the world look like fools.

The Championship should be renamed "The Lottery Open".
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That's such bullshit. Koepka, Dustin, Patrick Reed, Henrik Stenson, Justin Rose, all in the hunt on Sunday morning. It read just like any other Sunday morning leaderboard in a major. Some big names struggled and missed the cut, just like any other major.

Yes, the course was badly set up on Saturday and it was unfair to some players. Not because it was too hard, but because it played like a different course in the afternoon to how it played in the morning. The USGA made a mistake.

But it's not unusual for weather to impact how a course plays. I was at an Open Championship a few years ago and the wind and rain On Thursday afternoon and Friday morning killed a lot of players' chances. Decent weather on Thursday morning and Friday afternoon meant the bulk of the players who made the cut were from that side of the draw. It happens.
 
cyberman said:
The answer is obvious though, start planning for the Olympics since you're clearly the fastest man alive.
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Exactly what I was thinking :lol: any player that manages that feat should get a shot taken off their score .

I don't see the worth of making up ludicrous scenarios which did not ocut
 
RexHamilton said:
That's such bullshit. Koepka, Dustin, Patrick Reed, Henrik Stenson, Justin Rose, all in the hunt on Sunday morning. It read just like any other Sunday morning leaderboard in a major. Some big names struggled and missed the cut, just like any other major.

Yes, the course was badly set up on Saturday and it was unfair to some players. Not because it was too hard, but because it played like a different course in the afternoon to how it played in the morning. The USGA made a mistake.

But it's not unusual for weather to impact how a course plays. I was at an Open Championship a few years ago and the wind and rain On Thursday afternoon and Friday morning killed a lot of players' chances. Decent weather on Thursday morning and Friday afternoon meant the bulk of the players who made the cut were from that side of the draw. It happens.
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You have players like Spieth, McIroy Day, Watson etc miss out through no fault of their own ut because the organisers were pathetic

People come to golf to watch the big names and be entertained they didn't get that here

It really was a lottery
 
lsd said:
You have players like Spieth, McIroy Day, Watson etc miss out through no fault of their own ut because the organisers were pathetic

People come to golf to watch the big names and be entertained they didn't get that here

It really was a lottery
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Through no fault of their own? Saturday was the day the USGA messed up. not Thursday and Friday. Everyone played the same course.

McIlroy, Woods, Speith, Bubba, etc have missed cuts at major before and at plenty of other tournaments. Is that the organisers fault too? It was far from a lottery. The guys who played the best golf all week were in contention Sunday evening. The same as every other week.
 
In the end I'm just glad Reed didn't win it. Don't dislike him like others do, but just find him boring (both in terms of personality and playing style).
 
Gee Male said:
Exactly, it's the inconsistency that annoys people.

Koepka won because he took advantage of an early start on Saturday (Same as Finau who finished top 5) while people in the afternoon got destroyed by conditions. Fleetwood came second because of taking advantage of an early tee time yesterday.

When you have a course playing so different later in the day than it did early in the day, it just makes a mockery of it.

Roll on The Open, a proper major.
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How can you call The Open ‘a proper major’ when it is the major that most often creates courses playing different from day to day or hour to hour due to the weather? The effects of the weather aren’t just completely random, they are exacerbated by the USGA / R & A / PGA’s setting up of the course, just like what happened at Shinnecock Hills. The USGA made a decision to create very challenging course conditions last week but got it wrong one day. They came a good ways from 2004 where they had to make the unprecedented decision to alter the course condition during the final round itself, but still pushed the edge too much this past Saturday and the wind killed them. Saying that the Open Championship should get a pass on having such drastically different same round conditions because it is just the chance in the weather is a bit disingenuous. There’s always the element of chance, that’s why there are always inverted tee times on Thursday or Friday, the severity of such typically ameliorated by being the better players in the field.

Shinnecock Hills was initially set up easier and more player friendly going into the start of the week versus the last three Opens that were played there, fairway width being the biggest advantage. Last year’s US Open was an abortion due to the acres of fairway space at Erin Hills with absolutely no wind. It turned the event into another Phoenix Open or Houston Open, a nameless, faceless PGA Tour stop where over 15 under par won the event. A major should never be anything close to that.
 
A lot of people talk a lot without really understanding the beauty of the game. The course wasn't set up unfairly, the wind got up higher than forecast and there were a few regrettable pins and that was acknowledged by the USGA, but good golf was being rewarded in the main. If you put yourself in a bad spot you absolutely should be punished at these events, not just be able to pop it up in the air and get it to stop on soft heavily watered greens which is the norm.

The quality of the leaderboard was evidence that it wasn't a lottery and big players miss cuts all the time, deservedly so if they play badly.
 
Really think Tiger is back. He's past his peak, but there's no reason why he can't be competitive going forward, scrape a major etc.
 
The Open begins on Thursday at Carnoustie. Like much of the UK we haven’t had any rain in Scotland for what feels like forever, the course is completely baked so it’s going to play very firm and fast. The ball will run forever on the fairways but the greens will be reasonably receptive I think, the R&A never trick out greens like the USGA do.
 
BluesJr said:
The Open begins on Thursday at Carnoustie. Like much of the UK we haven’t had any rain in Scotland for what feels like forever, the course is completely baked so it’s going to play very firm and fast. The ball will run forever on the fairways but the greens will be reasonably receptive I think, the R&A never trick out greens like the USGA do.
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how wide are the fairways this year? hopefully wont have a repeat of "carnastie"
 
Long Ball said:
how wide are the fairways this year? hopefully wont have a repeat of "carnastie"
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Links courses aren’t really altered like USGA courses are. Carnastie was as much as to do with the weather than anything else. It’s the hardest course on the rotation, especially when the wind blows. The rough is quite thick in places where they’ve probably put some miracle grow on it but it’ll be a fair test of golf.
 
Bloody hell! Was that Koepka with that drive on the first? What a bloody shot!
 
Good first round with a lot of intriguing stories building very nicely. The course is playing so fast but the R&A protected the pins perfectly by tucking them away to take away the bomb and gouge tactic which is the right move. Very boring one dimensional golf.
 
Very solid look at an eagle on for the first for Speith here. Incredible drive to the front of the green!
 
Much tougher conditions today. Should be a great finish.
 
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