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Drop and Grounding - Two rules I'd like to see changed - tell me why not.


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Just now, Abh159 said:

 

There are so many things wrong with this I'm starting to wonder if you're just f****** with us.... 

 

First, what benefits are you talking about? Saving 10-15 seconds once every few rounds? I would hardly call that a groundbreaking benefit.

 

Second, how do you not see that allowing a player to place a ball instead of being required to drop it is a huge advantage?

 

Example - Reachable Par 5

 

  • Player A bombs one down the middle of the fairway, but gets a so so lie and can't comfortably get a fairway wood on the ball forcing him to lay up.
  • Player B hooks one way left and onto the cart path, but gets to "place" his ball with a perfect lie in the rough where he can smash a 3 wood and go for the green. 

 

You see no issue with the above scenario??? Come on dude....

Sure, it could happen from time to time, but so can a drive that is right down the middle of the fairway and lands in a divot as opposed to one that doesn't.  Not trying to make it so everyone gets to play out of the exact same conditions.  Breaks are breaks.  Again, to me, 'placing' vice dropping just makes the rules less complex and does not give anyone a consistent advantage - unless people are now so good that they actually try to hit it into free relief situations so they can place their ball.

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21 minutes ago, 2bGood said:

Interesting that the USGA discourages preferred lies in part as it creates an unfair advantage to less skilled players. They also claim(not sure I fully buy this one) that it causes more damage to the course as players are targeting specific area to hit off of. 

 

Hahaha....protect what grass we have, boys!

 

IDK, I'm just a softy on rules outside of Tournament play. I think outside of Tournaments, we should always err on the side of helping players and improving the overall experience so long as we do it uniformly. 

 

So long as we're paying for golf I will never force my buds to play out of a divot for example, even with money on the line. That's just not my style. 

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36 minutes ago, Mr. Bean said:

 

I doubt you will. You would have done it already if you had the will to do it.

I meant I'll let them know you find it pathetic.  I have pointed it out in a joking-but-serious manner to two or three guys I play, but I figure when you are playing recreationally, you can do whatever makes you enjoy it, so if it makes them feel good to fluff, fluff-away.  If we were in a meaningful competition, there'd be no fluffing allowed - except for the 90-year-old I play with.  His age has earned him fluffing privileges.

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38 minutes ago, Socrates said:

All you have to do is watch the Tour players and nearly every time they drop it, they try to drop it so close the the edge of the zone so that they get it to place it eventually.  It's not every time, but very close to it.  YMMV, but that's what I see when I watch TV.

Yep, and I've seen some even put a little wrist action into it to try to get it to roll out of the drop area.

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1 hour ago, jordan2240 said:

Again, to me, 'placing' vice dropping just makes the rules less complex and does not give anyone a consistent advantage - unless people are now so good that they actually try to hit it into free relief situations so they can place their ball.

It would be nice if you’d acknowledge that your previous claim of your new rules providing “no significant advantage” as been altered to not giving anyone a “consistent advantage.”  (Whatever that means.)

 

Pretty low bar there!  No consistent advantage . . whoopee!  

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18 minutes ago, jordan2240 said:

Yep, and I've seen some even put a little wrist action into it to try to get it to roll out of the drop area.

 

I don't think you've seen that on TV.

 

It's not permitted and everyone playing golf on TV knows it as do the referees. 

 

https://www.usga.org/content/usga/home-page/rules/rules-2019/rules-of-golf/rules-and-interpretations.html#!ruletype=fr&section=rule&rulenum=14&subrulenum=3

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26 minutes ago, Sawgrass said:

It would be nice if you’d acknowledge that your previous claim of your new rules providing “no significant advantage” as been altered to not giving anyone a “consistent advantage.”  (Whatever that means.)

 

Pretty low bar there!  No consistent advantage . . whoopee!  

I don't see it as either significant or consistent, when you consider how many drops a player has in a round.

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25 minutes ago, sui generis said:

 

I don't think you've seen that on TV.

 

It's not permitted and everyone playing golf on TV knows it as do the referees. 

 

https://www.usga.org/content/usga/home-page/rules/rules-2019/rules-of-golf/rules-and-interpretations.html#!ruletype=fr&section=rule&rulenum=14&subrulenum=3

Last time I saw Rahm drop, looked to me like he was putting a little force behind it to get it to roll out of the drop area (which it did) - but see it as you will.

Edited by jordan2240
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I’m all for grounding everywhere. To the people saying players will dig trenches in the sand before the shot, you still can’t improve your lie. Watching a player dig a trench is a little different than just setting his club behind the ball in a bunker. Please, stop the hyperbole. 
 

I’d also be for placing instead of a drop after a penalty. You’ve already paid your price. Place that ball and smack that 3wood on the green and stop holding up play. 
 

For free relief, keep the drop rule as it is or drop over your shoulder down your back for true randomness which is what the ruling bodies seem to want. 
 

“Pay a fee, place for free.”


“Get a free drop, self explanatory.”

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1 hour ago, Augster said:

I’m all for grounding everywhere. To the people saying players will dig trenches in the sand before the shot, you still can’t improve your lie. Watching a player dig a trench is a little different than just setting his club behind the ball in a bunker. Please, stop the hyperbole. 
 

I’d also be for placing instead of a drop after a penalty. You’ve already paid your price. Place that ball and smack that 3wood on the green and stop holding up play. 
 

For free relief, keep the drop rule as it is or drop over your shoulder down your back for true randomness which is what the ruling bodies seem to want. 
 

“Pay a fee, place for free.”


“Get a free drop, self explanatory.”

Sounds like a good compromise.

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3 hours ago, Sawgrass said:

You asked, “tell me why not.”  You’ve been told why not.  But you can’t seem to see it.  Okay, no big surprise. 

You've told me why not, and I've disagreed with your reasoning.  If a rash of champions resulted from the advantage of placing their ball or being allowed to ground their club in a sand trap, I'll reconsider. 

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1 hour ago, Hawkeye77 said:

Which means . . . not a big time saver.

 

Why start basically the same thread over and over and go round and round?

Not just a matter of saving time, but of simplifying the game and eliminating the need to review every sand shot to see if someone touched a grain of sand.  Of course, that might mean someone losing a job, which would be unfortunate.  

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3 minutes ago, jordan2240 said:

Not just a matter of saving time, but of simplifying the game and eliminating the need to review every sand shot to see if someone touched a grain of sand.  Of course, that might mean someone losing a job, which would be unfortunate.  

And you're doing that with your own groups?  Or just worrying about the professionals (who don't lose their job, just a few $$ if they make a mistake)?

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15 minutes ago, jordan2240 said:

You've told me why not, and I've disagreed with your reasoning.  If a rash of champions resulted from the advantage of placing their ball or being allowed to ground their club in a sand trap, I'll reconsider. 

Don’t bother reconsidering. Your stance is absurd.
 

Any rule you can dream up, applied to all players evenly, is “fair” since it’s available to all.  Which has zero to do with any advantage which is gained vs. the current rules.  
 

And I don’t believe you actually disagree with my reasoning, it’s simply inconvenient for you.  The advantages based on your tweaks, presented by me and others, are self evident. 

Edited by Sawgrass
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3 minutes ago, rogolf said:

And you're doing that with your own groups?  Or just worrying about the professionals (who don't lose their job, just a few $$ if they make a mistake)?

I always play by the current rules, as far as I know them, whether I agree with them or not.  The current grounding and drop rules apply, and as for grounding, I always error on not grounding if I'm not sure whether I can or not.  Some of the guys I play with are pretty bad golfers (which makes me look way better), and they  ground their clubs anywhere, but it does them no good anyway.  One guy I played with a few times is an ex AA baseball player, and he's damn good, but he fluffs his lies.  For rec golf, I don't care what you do, but for those who want to try to play by the rules, at any level, I feel these changes would remove some of the complexity, even if it's just a small amount.

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10 hours ago, Sawgrass said:

There would be significant advantages gained. 
 

Two players near each other in very thick rough. One is standing on a sprinkler head, so he lifts his ball from the depths of the rough, and gingerly places it in the relief area, befitting from almost teeing it up instead of the low lie he’d get by dropping.

 

Another has a burried lie n a bunker, and with your idea decides to drop his club behind his ball, twice, and clear the sand so he has an unobstructed shot at the back of the ball. 
 

Bad ideas. 

Ok, to respond to this directly.  First example, so what.  People get breaks in golf all the time.  How 'bout if both guys require relief, and one drops and it buries, and the other drops and it fluffs up?  Placing vice dropping eliminates the re-drops and the attempts to drop and roll so you get to place anyway.

 

As for digging a trench behind your ball, that's not  what I consider grounding, so perhaps that is my misunderstanding.  To me, grounding is simply putting the club in contact with the ground behind the ball before you hit the shot.  'Trenching' would most definitely not be allowed.

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The drop rule should stay, it is a benefit that you get that drop because of some uncontrollable or penalized benefit so why should you be able to place it perfectly while the others in your group continue to play it as it lies when it landed and settled where it is. Drop the ball and let the ball take some sort of uncontrolled bounce and settle where it does. Leaves some level of fairness to your playing group. 

 

The grounding thing I agree with or turn all the bunkers into a "waste bunker" designation. Specially where a lot of the course around me do not offer rakes, might as well let me ground the club.

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1 hour ago, jordan2240 said:

As for digging a trench behind your ball, that's not  what I consider grounding, so perhaps that is my misunderstanding.  To me, grounding is simply putting the club in contact with the ground behind the ball before you hit the shot.  'Trenching' would most definitely not be allowed.

It really depends on the sand type. But simply putting a club down in some bunkers will produce a decent size depression behind the ball, it almost tees it up. When you teach bunker shots, drawing a line in the sand behind the ball is great tool to help hit good shots. This is not to mentions moves like Reed pulled at the Hero. If you can ground behind your ball it becomes really easy to improve your lie within the rules.

 

But what wrong with making things easier? It would be the same for everyone.

 

I would say that the current rule of no grounding the club in the bunker is way simpler and clear than the rule you would have to write (and enforce) to allow grounding that did not improve the lie. 

 

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7 hours ago, Augster said:

I’m all for grounding everywhere. To the people saying players will dig trenches in the sand before the shot, you still can’t improve your lie. Watching a player dig a trench is a little different than just setting his club behind the ball in a bunker. Please, stop the hyperbole. 

 

That may be true but the problem I see there is where to draw the line between touching the sand and improving the lie. Grounding a club makes a depression but starting your backswing without lifting your club up from that depression will automatically result in improving your lie. How would you distinguish grounding from improving your lie? And how would you even distinguish a trench from touching?

 

I believe it is far easier to draw the line the way as it is. Do not touch the sand behind your ball with your club before the stroke.

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Appreciate all the responses.  Yes, I can see your points.  Seems that no matter what rules you make, there will be those who try to push the boundaries, causing clarifications that continue to add to the rules complexity.  I'm sure they were developed and refined over time after conversations just like this.

 

But speaking of boundaries, can we talk about the need for different colors for penalty areas...???

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8 minutes ago, jordan2240 said:

But speaking of boundaries, can we talk about the need for different colors for penalty areas...???

 

It seems to me that there are a few traditional things like yellow stakes which are just too "sacred" to go away just yet. The bold and forward looking 2019 Rules Modernization effort killed off many of those old ideas, but a few remain.

 

The Hooties and Billys of the golf world would hate it, but if all yellows were replaced by red stakes, in my opinion, no harm would befall the game and some more good would be injected into the Rules.

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1 hour ago, sui generis said:

 

It seems to me that there are a few traditional things like yellow stakes which are just too "sacred" to go away just yet. The bold and forward looking 2019 Rules Modernization effort killed off many of those old ideas, but a few remain.

 

The Hooties and Billys of the golf world would hate it, but if all yellows were replaced by red stakes, in my opinion, no harm would befall the game and some more good would be injected into the Rules.

 

With the removal of opposite margin relief I would see nothing negative in dispensing with yellow stakes altogether. Would mean less complexity in marking, less items to purchase and store for the greenkeeping staff and especially no more mixtures of yellow and red stakes around one single pond laid out in the most imaginative manners...

 

Sui, what exactly do you mean by 'some more good would be injected into the Rules' ? You mean less text or what?

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3 hours ago, jordan2240 said:

Appreciate all the responses.  Yes, I can see your points.  Seems that no matter what rules you make, there will be those who try to push the boundaries, causing clarifications that continue to add to the rules complexity.  I'm sure they were developed and refined over time after conversations just like this.

 

But speaking of boundaries, can we talk about the need for different colors for penalty areas...???

 

I don't have issues with removing yellow penalty areas and we've done away with them at my home club. If the ball rolls back into the penalty area, you've shown you're capable of getting the ball over the hazardous area the course designer believes you should be able to carry.

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44 minutes ago, Mr. Bean said:

Sui, what exactly do you mean by 'some more good would be injected into the Rules' ? You mean less text or what?

 

Just what you wrote and one penalty area relief procedure instead of two. 

 

You must see it frequently, too. Players who don't play much competitive golf don't know yellow relief from red relief. 

Knowledge of the Rules is part of the applied skill set which a player must use to play competitive golf.

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4 minutes ago, sui generis said:

 

Just what you wrote and one penalty area relief procedure instead of two. 

 

You must see it frequently, too. Players who don't play much competitive golf don't know yellow relief from red relief. 

I looked it up, and still am not quite sure what the difference is.  I understand you have more options with red, but I'd be hard pressed to explain it.  If I'm interpreting them correctly, then what I understand is you cannot drop out of yellow at a point lateral to where the ball went in, but you can at red; otherwise, they are treated the same. 

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