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TOURNAMENT GOLF - Not Played on a Level Playing Field
The majority of sports are played by all contestants on the same plying field with all conditions equal. Not so in golf.
We will assume that you have entered this tournament and have the first starting time. (It used to be called “dew sweepers”) It is in the winter and thirty degrees. The forecast is for the temperature to climb to sixty by eleven. Therefore the mid day players have an advantage. On the other hand let us assume that it is in the summer, and the weather is fine for the early players, but a storm is forecast for the afternoon. The early players now have an advantage. They will have completed their rounds before the storm hit.
I was playing in a PGA sectional tournament in Florida one year, and one of my rivals was Otey Chrisman. Otey was known for his great putter manufacturing company, and his temper tantrums. He broke so many putters in his day, that I believe he went into the business so he could get putters at cost. My tee time was just ahead of Otey’s. This game is hard enough, but playing in bad weather is not my idea of having a good time. I told my playing partners that even though we would not play our best by playing fast, we still would be ahead of the game if we beat the storm. We were sitting in the clubhouse when the storm hit . Otey was only on the fourteenth tee, and had the rest of the field backed up behind him.
The first time the PGA was played at Shoal Creek in Birmingham, AL., all of the PGA pros from the Dixie PGA helped with the tournament . I was a spotter on a par five hole on the back nine. The green had a body of water in front, and around the right side. It required coming in by air. The green was double tiered sloping from back to front, and the flag was on the front portion.
In the early rounds the majority of players were hitting the green with their second shots and staying on the lower level. The greens started to firm up later in the day, and the players were unable to keep the ball on the lower level, and had to putt down hill on a much faster green. In mid afternoon a summer storm hit and stopped play. After the storm left, they had to sweep the water off of the greens. The traps were all holding water, and it was an entirely different hole. Mist started forming in the valleys, and the air had gotten much heavier, and the remaining players all had to lay up on their second shots. This was just one hole, and the same applied to all of the holes that had to be played by those still out there.
This can work against the leaders in the field on the last day in the final groups. They can run into weather problems, while the earlier ones may have escaped the weather and have moved into contention. There are so any variables that do not allow the same conditions for all players.
THE GALLERY
“Couldn’t you have kicked it a better lie?”
You can wipe many tournaments out of the win column for Tiger, Palmer, Snead, Hogan, and other gallery favorites if they hadn’t had help from the galleries. One that should be fresh in your mind is the removing the Rock of Gibraltar out of Tiger’s way. Without the gallery he would not have birdied that hole.
In the Masters one year Palmer was paired with Player. Palmer hit one that was going into a creek, but a man ran out and stopped the ball, and Palmer ended up with a birdie on the hoe. In another tournament Palmer hit his second shot on the 18th hole and it lodged under the lip of a trap. There was no way that the ball could be hit, except dislodging it to the bottom of the trap. Television coverage was not that great then, and the cameras went to another player.
Palmer won the tournament with a par on that hole, but no explanation. The following week they had to explain what had happened. A spectator had dislodged the ball and it was impossible to replace it, so Palmer got his two attempts, and the ball ended down in the bottom of the trap, but no nearer the hole, and he got it down in two. Sam Snead was playing with Frank Stranahan, the millionaire amateur, in North Carolina. Both hit shots at the edge of a deep trap. A guy ran out of the gallery and kicked Snead’s ball on to the green, and then kicked Stranahan’s into the trap and said,” Get out of there you rich S.O.B.”(They replaced both balls.) Back in the 30’s and 40’s the galleries crowded the greens, and if there was trouble in front of the green the players would play long, figuring that a seven deep gallery would stop the ball. It was amazing when a person , who they did not like, would hit one long. The gallery would open up like the parting of the Red Sea, and the ball would end up in trouble.
THE PAIN IN THE BUTT
These are the people who are mad at the world and sits in front of the TV with a rule book, looking for some rules violation. Such as Craig Stadler laying a towel down to protect his pant. or the caddie taking the flag out after the ball had passed the hole. (this stupid rule has been changed) I guess people like that get a charge out of doing that and probably makes them feel important. To each his own.
A playing partner of Bob Murphy hit his ball into a baby carriage. When he asked for a ruling, Murphy told him to check the diapers. If they were wet he would get relief from casual water.”