Rory McIlroy was penalised this Thursday with two penalty strokes on the first day of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro Am. It happened on hole 7 of Spyglass Hill, ending his round. The punishment occurred for incorrectly dropping a ball that he had declared unplayable. McIlroy lost two strokes due to ignorance of the rule and, more specifically, for applying the ‘Tiger Woods rule’ that came into effect in 2019 and was corrected in 2023.
What happened? McIlroy, after declaring the ball unplayable, decided to drop back in line with the flag. When he found the point where he wanted to make the drop, he marked it and from there he took a club, without gaining distance to the flag, to find the best possible angle for his shot. This is how it was done between 2019 and 2023, specifically after Tiger Woods dropped in this way on the second day of the Masters of Augusta after going into the water. This caused a lot of controversy, as although Tiger did it wrong and should have been penalised with two strokes or withdrawal for signing the card incorrectly (he would have missed the cut), he was forgiven because the referees did not notice the error and it was not discovered until a spectator called Augusta to report that Woods had done it wrong. When that call was received, Tiger had already signed his card. It was assumed as a referee’s error for not communicating it in time and not the player’s.
So, between 2019 and 2023, a player who dropped back in line with the flag, could then use a club to the left or right, without gaining distance to the hole, to improve their angle. However, in 2023 it was reversed and it was decided to return to the old system, that is, without a club, the drop back must always be made at a point that is in line with the flag.
McIlroy stayed in 2019. He was not aware that this rule had changed and, therefore, received two penalty strokes for playing his ball from an incorrect place. “I was not aware that the rule changed in 2023 and I accept the penalty of the two strokes,” he declared after his round of golf. McIlroy finished that hole with a triple bogey and fell many places in the ranking.
One of the referees of the PGA Tour tournament, Stephen Cox, explained that “what happened came to light through our video review group. It seemed that Rory had not proceeded correctly with the club relief. The current rule was rewritten in 2023 and requires the player to step back from the point where his ball was in line with the flag and then drop the ball on that same line. The ball, once dropped, can roll up to a club in any direction. If it exceeds the roll of a club, it must drop again and then place it if it happens again. That is the current rule. Unfortunately, Rory proceeded under the rules prior to 2023, which consisted of drawing back the line and then measuring a club outside the line in any direction as long as it was not closer to the hole. In other words, there was the possibility of playing from outside the imaginary line drawn between the ball and the flag. All of us, including the governing bodies of golf, were very uncomfortable with the 2019 rule, so it was rewritten in January 2023. As soon as I mentioned it to Rory, he realised and accepted what had happened. He played from the wrong place and was penalised two strokes.”
The moral for some might be that you should never do anything on a golf course without consulting the referees. Mistake. It causes slow play. The moral is: if you know the rules, you save strokes.
