Anyone else have friends that don’t understand new OB rule?

[sethdavidsdad]

One of the new rules I really don’t like is the drop from out of bounds rule, mainly because people don’t know the correct way to score it. Most play it as a lateral thinking that’s correct. Now I don’t mind people using this rule just think most don’t understand it.

today a friend of mine hits his tee shot out. Drops by where the ball was. Hits it up into the fairway. Then hits his next shot OB. Again drops by the line up near the green. Once at the green he says he is chipping for double. I laughed

Now it is a par five but best I could figure he would be chipping for a 9. Anyone else have people that don’t understand this rule?

[596]

Yep. They play it as a lateral hazard. Not! They don't take the penalty stroke. Besides, is it not supposed to be a locally adopted rule? If the course does not state that rule, you play it as stroke and distance. So back to the original spot you go.

[Mr. Bean]

'Now it is a par five but best I could figure he would be chipping for a 9.'

I believe 13 is much closer... played twice from a wrong place.

And as 596 stated, it is a Local Rule and not automatically in force.

[rogolf]

player is bipli. (ball in pocket, lost interest)

or bipsic. (ball in pocket, sitting in cart)

[antip]

C'mon Mr B, that's cruel - the first one cited was not a wrong place (coming round and dropping on a lateral no nearer the hole is within the available relief area). Not enough information to call on the second drop.

More generally (against a background that I've never played a course or refereed on a course with this MLR in play), if a player makes a little stuff up using this MLR and plays from outside the relief area are you imposing 4SP (2+2)?

[596]

1 tee shot ob

2 penalty

3 drop

4 chip in to fairway

5 shot ob

6 penalty

7 drop

8 shot toward green

9 chipping

He gets a 9 if he chips in. He's doing what most people do in this case and that's not taking the actual penalty stroke.

[sethdavidsdad]

haha ?

yeah either way no where close to double even if he did chip in.

[Mr. Bean]

Not IMO. He is playing twice from a wrong place so he gets 2+2 PS more.

[antip]

If you can presume that the ball crossed OOB and kept going closer to the hole on the wrong side of the fence, I can presume the ball has just crossed over and come to rest no closer to the hole than the point of crossing. Without more info or input, we'll never know.

Interesting that it is probably the easiest possible way to score a total 4SP on the golf course, probably not quite what the architects of the measure had in mind.

[Mr. Bean]

'If you can presume that the ball crossed OOB and kept going closer to the hole on the wrong side of the fence, I can presume the ball has just crossed over and come to rest no closer to the hole than the point of crossing. Without more info or input, we'll never know.'

Don't know what you mean. As E-5 requires the ball to be dropped on the fairway it is rather clear the player dropped his ball in a wrong place. Two different times.

[davep043]

The Local Rule allows a relief area extending from the Ball Reference Point to two clublengths into the fairway from the Fairway Reference Point, and no closer to the hole. It doesn't require a drop in the fairway. Consequently, those drops could have been acceptable under E-5, although the description isn't accurate enough to know.

Those details aside, this particular guy probably played OB the same way as he always has, as a lateral hazard. He didn't know the rule before, and doesn't know the (model local) rule now.

[Mr. Bean]

Thanks, Dave. Took the E-5 by memory and that was a mistake. As always...

[HatsForBats]

Committee - The person or group in charge of the competition *or* the course

 

Usually it would be the group or person in charge of the competition making that decision. Like me and my Buddy playing a competition would decide for ourselves if that was a local rule. The course would decide it if they were in charge of the competition we were in.

.

 

[Mr. Bean]

I have said this before but I want to say it again. This is the huge difference between the USA way of playing golf and the European way. We tend to follow the Local Rules set by the course management or the Committee while you guys on the other side of the pond tend to choose your own LR's. The problem I see in your way is that once people are playing handicap rounds they are not necessarily playing that same course in same conditions with same rules but still post their results as if they had.

I find that utterly strange despite of the usual explanations that there are all these public courses where nobody takes care of stuff. Well, tough life! If there is nobody saying this LR is in force then that LR is NOT in force! Just play golf as it has been played for hundreds of years: play the course as you find it!

[antip]

Is it really possible in the US to make up your own local rules as you go along and yet still post a score for handicap purposes?

Is it really possible in the US to do things like gimmes and breakfast balls and yet still post a score for handicap purposes?

[Shilgy]

While I do not agree with it you can post with gimmes. What really is the difference between posting match play scores and a round with gimmes? A matter of semantics isn’t it? Who gave the putt. The rules of handicapping have guidelines for most likely score. In my opinion the breakfast ball idea is a crutch. The same as any mulligan I would gladly play a match with anyone that is used to using either. https://www.usga.org/handicapping/roh/2020-rules-of-handicapping.html

[Augster]

Yes. In casual play, each group is it’s own committee.

Every local rule that is used will theoretically lower your posted score. Thus lowering your cap. Nobody cares if you have a vanity cap and can’t play to it in real comps.

When I play with my friends, we always have E-5 in place. We like to play stroke play, so with E-5 in place, you can continue to shoot a real stroke play score. On the surprise lost ball, without E-5 in place, your options are to go back and rehit, or just lose your bets.

Other groups I know say on the first tee they are playing all white as red and all unmown areas as red. Plus E-5. And LCP in your own fairway. Every single one of those “local rules” they use will only give them lower scores over time. It won’t help their caps when they play net comps with “real rules” in place. But it keeps their games moving and they have more “fun”, so they aren’t hurting anyone but themselves.

Back to this thread.....what was with all the “playing from wrong place” BS? When using E5, the player has a gigantic arc from the edge of OB where he estimates where his ball lies all the way to 2CL’s into the fairway or nearest closely mown area and everywhere in between that isn’t closer to the hole. In other words, a player can LEGALLY drop in a ton of spots and fulfill the legal requirements of E5 and avoid the “wrong place” penalty.

[antip]

Back to this thread.....what was with all the “playing from wrong place” BS? When using E5, the player has a gigantic arc from the edge of OB where he estimates where his ball lies all the way to 2CL’s into the fairway or nearest closely mown area and everywhere in between that isn’t closer to the hole. In other words, a player can LEGALLY drop in a ton of spots and fulfill the legal requirements of E5 and avoid the “wrong place” penalty.

 

It was basically Mr B misremembering the detail of E5. It is certainly possible to do wrong place though - for example, you find your ball OOB and you go to the nearest point of relief on the course and play - that is wrong place if that is closer than where the ball crossed OOB.

[nsxguy]

Don't you guyz just HATE when a guy poses the question and NEVER comes back ?!?!?! LMAOOne of the new rules I really don’t like is the drop from out of bounds rule, mainly because people don’t know the correct way to score it. Most play it as a lateral thinking that’s correct. Now I don’t mind people using this rule just think most don’t understand it.today a friend of mine hits his tee shot out. Drops by where the ball was. Hits it up into the fairway. Then hits his next shot OB. Again drops by the line up near the green. Once at the green he says he is chipping for double. I laughedNow it is a par five but best I could figure he would be chipping for a 9. Anyone else have people that don’t understand this rule?

I'm not sure you understand it either - nor know how to explain it.

 

OK, I'm assuming the drops are in a proper place.

1 - Tee shot OB

2 - Drop back in play

3 - 1 stroke penalty

4 - Hits it up the fairway.

5 - OB

6 - Drop back in play

7 - 1 stroke penalty

8 ? - another shot to get "at the green"

Now here it's a little vague. He says "Again drops by the line up near the green" - so he lies 7 here. "Once at the green he says he is chipping for double" So I'm not sure whether the drop "up near the green" is where he's chipping from OR he hit another shot to be "Once at the green".

So if he didn't hit another shot to be "Once at the green" he lies 7, chipping 8 (chipping for Triple bogey (Par 5)). If he DID hit that other shot he lies 8, chipping 9.

[Vindog]

Most of them do, because many had been playing "drop in the fairway for 2ps" for a while in casual play. What many didn't get was the relief area, which sounds confusing but when I presented it as a shape (basically a triangle) it was a lot easier to grasp.

[antip]

MLR E-5's wording is clearly designed for a ball lost/not found OFF the fairway. But if the MLR is in place and the estimated place of loss is precisely in the middle of the fairway (think damp ground and balls plugging), applying the formula in Diagram 1 (p469 of the Official Guide) is rather ugly. Presumably, the pragmatic way forward is to simply identify a line to the hole from the ball reference point and then a 2CL corridor on either side of that line, the relief area being that 4CL corridor behind the ball reference point and going back as far as desired. Does anyone know if the R&A or USGA has confirmed that is the case in this ball lost in fairway situation?

[davep043]

If I remember correctly, this was asked and answered as follows. The Ball Reference Point is the spot where you think the ball is, plugged in the fairway in this case. The Fairway Reference Point is the nearest edge of the fairway (no closer to the hole). The 2 clublength "extension" of the relief area extends into the fairway (towards from the Ball Reference Point, instead of away). This is all consistent with the Model Local Rule as written. Using that approach, you still end up with a similarly-shaped relief area.

[DaveLeeNC]

Where are all these references to MLR E-5 and ONE penalty stroke coming from? It is 2 penalty strokes (at least as documented by the USGA). What did I miss? dave

[Halebopp]

There's no mention of the edge of the fairway in the rule, so did the Ruling Bodies make an exception for this particular case? According to the MLR the Fairway Reference Point is the closest point on the fairway (or other area cut to same height or shorter) to the Ball Reference Point, which in this case would be the same as the FRP. Therefore it would be a straight line back with two club lengths on either side. (Assuming the two club lengths would be allowed even though there are no "outside" nor "fairway side", or there are two of the latter.)

[davep043]

Valid questions, I was dealing only with my memory, so I could be wrong.

[HatsForBats]

I don't know maybe it's a difference in the number of casual but still competition rounds played in Europe. Here I play maybe 20% of my rounds under competitions overseen by the course or a formal committee. The other 80% of my rounds are almost exclusively less formal competitions where the committee is one to many players from the group gathering for that individual round. It would make no sense to me for the course to implement or not implement this particular optional rule for those 80% of my rounds that they have nothing to do with. The optional rule should be flexible and not an all or nothing proposition IMO. I can only imagine a Ranger trying to tell a player, not in a club competition or formal competition, that they cannot drop using the optional rule and must go back to the tee when involved in a more casual competition not sponsored by the club or a more formal committee. That wouldn't go over well here in the states.

[cubanstogie]

too funny, a thread where you are deciding if a guy gets a 9 or 13 on a hole. I certainly would not want to play behind this kind of group. Take a 7x on card and move on. you're out of the hole, its not a tournament You cant post a 13 anyway. Unless you are playing stroke play for some serious cash there is no point. This is why I hate playing public courses, I usually play in team plus skin format with 16-24 guys and never see scenarios like that. I picture this guy plumb bobbing a 3 footer for a quadruple bogey. There is a reason for a max score to post. Pace of play important too.

[cubanstogie]

yep, grab another beer and go to next hole. Cheer for your partner if team game.

[Mr. Bean]

That is exactly what I meant. Dropping by the OB line is more than likely a wrong place to play from.

[Mr. Bean]

'Other groups I know say on the first tee they are playing all white as red and all unmown areas as red. Plus E-5. And LCP in your own fairway. Every single one of those “local rules” they use will only give them lower scores over time. It won’t help their caps when they play net comps with “real rules” in place. But it keeps their games moving and they have more “fun”, so they aren’t hurting anyone but themselves.'

So... all the efforts to create a uniform handicap system were in vain as people in US still use their own rules...