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It's nuts because not signing a card isn't cheating. It's a mistake - one that happens after the final putt is made. Most of the rules of golf are created to prevent cheating, to provide a uniform means of dealing with the myriad of things that can happen to a golf ball during a round.

Such a simple mistake should be dealt with by penalizing players with additional strokes, not sending them home.

Zma, simple mistakes result in people going home all the time. The Stewark Cink bunker incident earlier this year resulted in him going home -- all that happened there was his caddy raked the fairway trap before Cink hit his greenside bunker shot -- what most everyone considered good curteous behavior -- but it was still against the rules of the game. He should have given himself a penalty stroke, didn't, signed an incorrect scorecard, and was DQ'd. No intention of cheating, no intent to do anything wrong at all, just a mistake that sent him home.

There is no wiggle room in the rules for the intention of the player. Many rules actually explicitly state that. Such as the rule for taking your address -- if you have taken your address, stance and grounding the club in most circumstances, and the ball moves it shall be deemed that the player moved the ball. It doesn't matter one lick whether the player intended to move the ball or not -- whether the wind moved it, or an earthquake moved it, or an orangutan falling out of a tree caused the ball to move -- it is deemed the player made the ball move. The rules make no provisions for intent -- the rules have certain actions that have to be performed and the consequences if those actions aren't performed. Period.

I did not mean they should bend the rules for anyone, I meant I think it is a stupid rule, and the punishment does not come even close to meeting the crime. As far as scoring the TV announcers my get it wrong, but if you have ever been to a tournament you know the scorers that follow each group don't. And in the PGA they shoot each shot with lasers both mobile and fixed. They can tell you withing 3ft where evry shot during a round was hit. Golfers may make a mistake, scorers may make a mistake, but I doubt the lasers will. so you have 5 forms of keeping score.

1. The Golfer
2. The other golfer in his group
3. The scorer that travels with each group
4. The Computer in the sky that the scorer zaps info to from their handheld
5. Oh yeah and the lasers

How many backups do you need, if they have all that information they should not penalize a pro for making a mistake. They know what the score was, let alone whose card it is. If they want the golfers solely resposible then they need to fire all those other people and save some money.

It is the players responsisbility to check there card,its not much to ask,they have all the help in the world this is the one thing that they need to do themselves,surely its not beyond ther ability is it? If they cant even manage that then maybe they should look for somrthing else they can do.

It might not seem like too much to ask to have the pro's responible for signing their card when they come off the course, but just look at the hassle a player has to go through between the 18th & the score hut frm various media, public & all the hangers on.

Now although I really can't find myself feeling too bothered about the woes of Ms Wie, it must be really stressful &disorientating for players that have played as few regular events as Ms Wie has done this season.

As regards the other insident with the bunker, which btw isn't the first event that to happen to someone. it does seem unfare, though the reaons are understandable for the rule, its one of those odd ones where perhapse for the sake of manners should be altered.

The original idea of the Rules of golf was to play the ball as it lies & be fare & in the spirit of the game. Thing is as the game has changed, so in some ways has what is fare & not. Of course this is part of the reason why rules change or new decissions on the rules are made,

That is the Wie's problem. They put themselves in that position by refusing to go pro the proper way. They refused to join, so they're out. Except for a few invitations, she has to earn her way in.

Nothing should be altered for anyone, any time any where... the rules are black and white.. there is no grey area. She blew it... again.

Again, this is a waste of time and breath.



And she went Wie Wie Wie, all the way home.

lol, you'reabout as bothered about her as I am. Yeah no exceptions can or should be made on the day, but I'm sure the powers that be take all these incidents on board where players have either made an honest mistake or have done something daft, that her hangers on & the organisers could have prevented an accidental infringement like that happening.

What Wie does or doesn't do, doesn't really fuss me one way or another, but what can happen to one person can happen to another & that actually does, every week we hear about people signing wrong cards or for whong scores. If you were to go & play your monthy medal & then have half a dozen people trying to talk to you & ask you questions all at once while you were swapping cards back & signing a card. I know I've been DQ'd before for signing my card that's been returned to me, not realising that although I've told my playing partner what score I've had on each hole they've put down something different or added up the score wrong, something that If I hadn't been in such a hurry or prepared to take someone elses arithmatic at face value without checking wouldn't have happened. But what remains is that It had been added up wrong & I didn't check, but just signed... as y'do. Thing is its an infringement. So if everyday players can make mistakes without hassle, then imagine what its like for experienced & inexperienced pro's who have all unsundry going on round them, its understandable.

So there may come a time when scoring will be totally taking out of the hands of the pro's it could be tomorrow without any fuss at all & the cards thet the pro's mark down will simply be a way of double checking the stats the organisers have put together for the official result.

But those card signing woes are really just the tip of a very wide iceberg of adressing other more important issues within the modern game relating to a rule book initially put together to play the ball as it lies yet remaining fare. thing is what was or wasn't fare in the original game, bears little relation with the modern game.

However, & this is a big however, until any rule is changed we have to abide by it in competition of any sort. Simple as that.

The Rules are there for everyone, from the guy who plays on a 9hole Muni to Tiger Woods.
You play a Comp, complete your Scorecard and "POST" it. If you fail to complete your Scorecard correctly before you "POST" it, you are DQ'd. Simple Rule really.

The "POST" it bit differs all over the World of Golf. For many years the PGA (British) used to have a wooden box with a slit in the top and no back placed on the desk in the Scorers Hut. When you pushed your Card through the slit you were "POSTING" it and couldn't change anything on it from then on. If it wasn't signed and you remembered it wasn't, tough, you were DQ'd.

In fact, a new decision was made a week or two after this happened where it is no longer considered a penalty to rake a fairway bunker before you hit out of a greenside bunker. Nevertheless, the rule was in place at the time of the tournament, and Cink should have given himself the penalty. He didn't, signed an incorrect score with too low of a score, and hence DQ.

As an aside, the way players got around the rule before the decision was that they would ask one of caddies for one of the other guys in the group to rake the fairway bunker -- assuming of course that the player that that caddy was working for isn't also in a bunker. Because the rule is written that a player cannot test the condition of the bunkers, and a player's caddy is just an extension of himself, so the player cannot rake the bunker. But, anyone else (or again by extension anyone else's caddy) can rake a bunker at any time that that player is not themselves in a bunker.

The decision only allows you to rake fairway bunkers in you end up in a greenside bunker. If you hit from one greenside bunker to another (or the same greenside bunker) you have to get the ball out of the bunker before you can rake.

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Back to Wie's case. Discussion on whether the rule should be changed or not is completely fine. But, in my mind there is no discussion on as to what should have been the result of breaking the rule. The book tells us what the consequences of breaking the rule is, and those consequences should be enforced.

Which is proof, if proof were neede that the R&A & the USGA etc do take notice to issues, a gratifying result, one of many that I'm sure will be addressed over the coming years

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NO argument there for club comps, & until the powers that be decide there is a need to alter the pro game rules regarding signing cards etc, then that's up to them I suppose. On one hand you feel for players that have done something incorrectly as regards a score card, but most pro's seem quite unpeturbed about the rules regarding score cards. It seems to be mostly the commentators & a fare percentage of the viewing public see an injustice in a player having made a good score or even in some cases winning a comp & then because they forget to do something or add up or sign for the wrong score seems somewhat unjust.

So also no argument on what is currently happening as its currently the rules.

No argument that the current rule should be enforced whilst the current rules exist.

I really am in trwo minds as to whether or not the rule needs changing in the future or that there is another answer.


But of course as far as I'm concerned is as far as it goes. Perhaps the answer is more to do with allowing the Pro's more space & time to check & sign cards, also a change in when the media are allowed access to the players should be restricted to after all the signing is sorted out.

& sorted out properly.

They make enough money to play a game - they can remember to sign a card - its nothing new.. she should of knwon better - i feel bad but she did it..

I have been a official scorer at the pga senior championship last season. Yes you keep scoring on a computer but also on paper. computers systems can and do go down. Paper is a must for a backup. Also as soon as your round is completed you proceed to scorers room and wait for the players you scored for usually 2 to 3 players you have the entire group. The players will come in and verify there scores with you and then SIGN THERE CARD. not a half hour or a interview later but imediately. Its not the official scorers fault or anyone elses except hers. She shouldn't need a babysitter

I think if you check the Rules, you can rake a Bunker you have played from where ever your ball has ends up. But at the time of Cink's DQ he hadn't played out of the fairway bunker but stood in it, hence the DQ.

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Originally created 061007


Wie must learn to play by rules

Except from the Jackonsville Florida Times Union (I don't know either...just found it on the net...)

In her first tournament as a pro, the Samsung World Championship, Wie was disqualified for signing an incorrect scorecard after making a drop closer to the hole. In last year's Women's British Open, she brushed a tuft of grass on her backswing from a bunker (you can't touch loose impediments in a hazard or bunker) and was penalized two strokes before signing her card.

After the latter incident, Wie tried to joke that the rulebook was "boring." She also didn't call any of the rules violations on herself, a basic tenet of golf.

But in pro golf, the rules are never a joking matter. Wie must learn more respect for the rules than she has shown so far.

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Seems like she isn' t learning from her mistakes yet...no reason to believe that this will make an impression either...

Actually, while the rule about signing your card IS a USGA requirement, the "proximity" issue is a Tour policy, and is probably written in the tour hard card as a condition of all LPGA competitions. That doesn't change the status of the infraction.... .it's still the player's responsibility to know the conditions of the competition as well as the Rules of Golf and adhere to both.

If I walk out of the scoring area (an alcove off the club restaurant in our case) at my course without signing my card, I do not get penalized under 6-6b. If I fail to return my card in a timely manner as determined by the committee, I might just have a problem, but we don't have any actual "proximity" or "promptness" policy, so leaving the scoring area with the card yet unsigned, or delaying the action for an hour, would not be a penalty infraction unless it was found that I had deliberately done so to somehow impact the field or delay a potential playoff.

I have been in tournaments in which the field was composed of golfers from outside of my club, and I have been suspicious of some of the happenings with scorecards. For instance, a situation where all players in a flight have finished play, and all except one 2-man team has returned their cards. Then almost an hour later the missing pair finally turns in their card, and low and behold, they win the flight by 1 stroke. The team who had been their markers had left the course, so there was nobody around to dispute the card they returned. I find such action to be contrary to the intent of 6-6b (and suspicious in the extreme), and such an occurrence could never happen if the committee had set specific time and proximity limits for players to return their cards.

BTW, my partner and I were the innocent victims of this incident this year... sitting there for an hour as the probable winners, only to be shot down in the tenth hour. I am bringing this issue up with the pro shop staff and suggesting that they implement such a policy for next year's Invitational.