JANUARY 14, 1920
PAGE THIRTEEN
NOTES ON THE LOST-BALL
RULE
NOTES ON THE STYMIE AND
OTHER MOOT POINTS OF
GOLF
By Larry Paton ,
Golf governing bodies, such as the U.
S. G. A. and the Royal and Ancient,
certainly take their time in the matter
of changing existing rules. For years
there has been a demand that the stymie
be abolished. Now and again up crops
the question of removing mud from the
ball and its companion, the privilege of
loosening an embedded ball. Some day,
mayhap, the powers that be will come to
the point of actual legislation in these
important matters, but, truth to tell,
that day does not seem any nearer than
it ever ha3.
But, important as these questions are,
it seems to me, and I find countless play
ers who agree with me, that there are
more vital rules on the books crying for
attention. I allude especially to the
rules relating to a ball lost on the course
and to a ball hit out of bounds.
As the game is played now, both here
and across the pond, a man often is
severely penalized for a perfectly good
shot, straight down the middle of the
course. If such ball be lost in match
play, except in water, casual water or
out of bounds, the player loses the hole.
If the ball is lost in medal play the
player must return to the place from
which he hit the balh whether he
played from "through the green' ' or
from a hazard, and there tee a ball
under penalty of one stroke, which
means that the player lost stroke and
distance.
On the other hand if a ball be hit -out
of bound the player shall play his next
stroke as nearly as possibly at the spot
from which the ball which is out of
bound was played. If the ball was
played out of bounds from the teeing
ground, the player may tee a ball for
his next stroke; in every other case the
ball shall be dropped. There is no
stroke penalty for the poor shot; the
player simply loses the distance his ball
would have carried had it been in
bounds.
Surely it is ridiculous to put a prem
ium on thd poor shot as compared with
the good shot. What the original
framers of the rules were thinking
about I do not know. Why should the
player who plays a well executed shot
good both in direction and distance,
have to suffer a worse penalty than the
player, oftentimes the opponent of the
first named, who hits his ball so poorly,
so far off the line that it goes out of
the playing space? It is all wrong.
Why not just reverse the proposition?
Make the man who hits out of bounds re
turn to the spot from which he played
and lost stroke and distance and allow
the player who has lost his ball in the
course return to the place from where he
hit his ball, drop another and lose simp
ly the distance. This seems to me the
only sensible, the only fair method of
dealing with two plays.
The ball player who fouls to the
stands has a strike called on him.
By A. Linde Fowler
With the wind whistling around the
house, the mercury sagging toward the
lower readings in the thermometer and
the Weather Bureau forecasting snow,
is it any wonder that a man who has
booked up a four-ball match on a Bos
ton course for to-morrow afternoon
should put his thoughts on the South,
and Pinehurst, and wish that he were
there? Such is the writer's state of
mind, helped along by the fact that in
the day's travels he has met no fewer
than a half dozen Boston golfers who.
confided that they shortly would be
packing up for the South and didn't
care "if they never came back." Of
course they'll want to come back some
day, but no one could blame them if
that day is well along in next spring.
The Southern-golf -fever is a recurring
malady which no doctor can cure be
cause no patient seeks or wishes a rem
edy. I met a golfer today and inquired
as to his health. "Very bad, very. bad,"
said he. "My doctor tells me that
the best medicine he can recommend is
that I quit work temporarily and go
South." Then he winked one eye and
remarked that he almost always fol
lowed the advise of this particular doc
tor, and never failed to do so when the
prescription read "go South." He
has been getting the same prescription
steadily for several jveaxs and newer
fails to fully "recover his health." A
lot of doctors would strengthen their
friendly relations with their ' patients if
they followed suit in the same prescrip
tion, though in the end they might go to
the poorhouse if they treated only those
men who play golf in the South all
winter and in the North all summer.
The man who puts in all his spare time
playing golf is somewhat inclined to be
abnormally healjtpiy. No other proof
really is needed than a visit to Apawa
mis during one of the Senior tourna
ments. Some go South merely to escape the
rigors of a northern winter. Golfers do
not, or at least those who do are in the
exceedingly small class minority. Most
of them go for three reasons, I might
say four. One is climate, one is golf,
one is companionship and one is golf
discussion, the last being far from least.
The South is the golf Forum. When
the golfer is at home there are other
influences to partly distract him, such as
business, home or social duties. In the
South, generally speaking, he throws
everything else to the four winds. He
meets every class of golfer, from the
worst dub to the topnotcher, and he
hears every variety of opinion on every
variety of shot. He hears about every
freak shot or brilliant score made dur
ing the entire season in the north and
while the "other man is doing the tell
ing, his own mind is reverting back to
some similar incident that happened to
him, or somebody he saw do it, so that
there is one endless round of stories and
discussions.
Where so many golfers are gathered
together, from all corners of the land
and representing so many grades of
ability there is a wonderful opportunity
to gather a more or less concrete opinion
upon some of the chief problems of the
game, none more so than the stymie.
St. Andrew has decreed that the stymie
shall remain a part of the match play
game. Harry Vardon, holding no un
changeable personal views on the sub
ject, is authority for the statement that
twenty-four out of twenty-five English
golfers rule the stymie out in their pri
vate matches. There is good ground for
believing thajb certain of the United
State Golf officials oppose elimination
of the stymie for this side of the Atlan
tic as long as it is retained by the
Royal and Ancient Society. How do
the golfers at Pinehurst feel about it?
While in attendance at a number of na
tional amateur!, championships I have
sought the opinion of a great many
prominent players on the subject and,
with the exception of a few who have
held to the belief that where a golfer
lays himself a stymie he should suffer
the penalty, I have yet to find one who
upholds the stymie in its present form.
No one could reasonably gainsay that
the man who lays himself a stymie
merits whatever handicap it entails, but
should a man be deprived of his right
to an unobstructed lipe to the hole
when, through his skill, he has avoided
all natural or artificial troubles in his
path and has nothing to complete the
job except putting his ball in the cup.
There is advanced the counter argu
ment that the stymie call's for the high
est degree of skill in its successful ne
gotiation. In some instances, owing to
the slope of the green or other helpful
conditions, this may be true. But put'
one ball on the lip of the cup and
another a yard away and what percen
tage of chance has the man a yard
away? Or place one ball two or three
inches from the cup and another ten
feet away and where is there any fair
ness to the man who putts first? It
might be argued that the man ten feet
away has only a fifty percent chance to
hole it, anyway, stymie or no stymie;
but if one man on a hole measuring 450
or more yards puts his second shot ten
feet from the cup one might reasonably
contend that he not only is entitled to
a free opporunity to hole his put, but
even is deserving of having the cup en
larged for his particular benefit.
There aTe onljy ja few scattered
thoughts on a subject which could be
elaborated upon ad infinitum. It cer
tainly is something which, once started
in discussion after the day's play is
done, might occupy a group of golfers
into the wee sma' hours. They would
never retire if they switched from the
stymie to the lost ball rule and the
need of a rule concerning mud on the
ball. Concerning the lost ball, I never
can forget John G. Anderson's experi
ence at Apawamis in 1911, the year
that Harold Hilton won the national
amateur championship. Mr. Anderson
hit a beauty tee shot straight down the
middle of the course, for a carry of
200 yards or more and went ahead in
cheerful expectation of putting his
second on the green. No ball was to bi
found. The course was soggy from rain
and the ball dropped out of sight.
Back to the tee trudged John and laced
another equally as far. Again he went
forward, searched long, but unsuccessful
ly and had to drive from the tee a
third time. Each effort cost him stroke
and distance as well as something more,
for in the end he just failed to qualify.
Had he made two atrocious tee- shot
that landed each ball out of bounds lit
would have been two strokes better off
than actually was the case; but the men
tal effect of losing two balls on perfect
drives, in a championship may well be
imagined. As for the topic of mud on
the ball, while not applicable to Pine
hurst, it is a sore spot which nearly
every golfer during the season on a
northern course, especially after a rain
storm. Its worst features generally is
that the man who plays a mashie shot
with a pronounced backpin, straight for
the pin and well judged as for distance,
is far more apt to be the sufferer than
the player who plays a shot much less
scientifically. It would seem that at
least on the putting green golfers
should be privileged to t remove mud
from his ball.
It is through discussion and unified
opinions that changes are brought about
in rules of golf laws of the land and if
the majority of golfers hold to the be
lief that changes are necessary in the
rules of golf, eventually they will come.
That is why it might be worth while for
the golfing winter visitors at Pinehurst
to discuss such topics.
o
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