Even I'll Admit, Some Golf Rules Are Stupid

In case you missed it, Martin Laird and Bart Bryant were in a little bit of a rule fiasco yesterday at the BMW Championship. Because I don't feel like typing it all, here is the situation.

Laird's tee shot on the par 3 landed on the fringe and rolled to 3 feet. Bryant's shot came up just short in the rough, some 50 feet from the flag. As they approached the green, Laird noticed the pitch mark left by his tee shot and went to tamp it down. ``I said, 'Is this in your line?''' Laird said after a long and troublesome day. As the rookie from Scotland punched down the grass with his club, Bryant told him that indeed, it was in his line between the ball and the flag. It did not affect the shot because Bryant's play was to chip well over the mark.

No matter.

Slugger White, the PGA Tour's vice president of rules and competition, said a decision related to Rule 1-2 does not allow Laird to improve a competitor's line. That ordinarily would be a two-shot penalty — disqualification in this case, because Laird already had signed his card — but he was not penalized because the USGA deemed that he did not intend to help Bryant. Bryant did not get off so easily. He was guilty of Rule 13-2, which covers improve the lie, area of intended swing or stance or line of play. The rules says a player cannot improve the line ``or allow'' it to be improved.

By agreeing that the mark was in his line — a simple ``Yes'' was all it took — Bryant was assessed two shots. That turned a bogey into a triple bogey, turning a 66 into a 68.

This is why golf rules are so ridiculous. The improvement didn't even help out the other player!!! It would be like in baseball, if a player bunted, go thrown out and then as he walked to the dugout the catcher ran over and tagged him a second time just to make sure.

Bryant answered in class that defines who he is, but you can tell he wasn't really excited about it.

Asked if he should have been penalized, he replied, ``Yes, because I broke the rules.''

``I didn't knowingly break the rule,'' he said with a gentle smile. ``I didn't even know that rule.''

Anytime I hear something about the rules of golf affecting someone for no particular reason, I'm taken back to the Rick Reilly article about the golfer that got disqualified for having one of his son's golf clubs in his bag. I actually met Doc Graves, the culprit to this ridiculousness, at a golf tournament in Tucson and rode around with the man for a few holes. When he told me he was the famous official known as a "fool" by most, it appeared to me that some really do live by the mantra "rules are rules."

I guess sometimes that USGA rule book is too thick to see over all the bullshit.

The LPGA Has Finally Lost It, Forcing Foreign Players to Learn the English

In maybe the craziest story you'll read all week, the Ladies Professional Golf Tour, focused almost entirely in these here United States, will be forcing all women to pass an oral evaluation starting in 2009.

If you fail the English test, your membership will be suspended until you can properly use "Shit, that was a horrible shot" in a sentence. Golfweek has the scoop...

At a mandatory South Korean player meeting Aug. 20 at the Safeway Classic, the tour informed its largest international contingent that beginning in 2009, all players who have been on tour for two years must pass an oral evaluation of their English skills. Failure would result in a suspended membership.

“Hopefully what we’re talking about is something that will not happen,” said Libba Galloway, the tour’s deputy commissioner, of possible suspensions. “If it does, we wouldn’t just say, ‘Come back next year.’ What we would do is work with them on where they fell short, provide them the resources they need, the tutoring . . . and when we feel like they need to be evaluated again, we would evaluate.”

Galloway said the policy takes effect immediately, but the “measurement time will be at the end of 2009.” There are 121 international players from 26 countries on tour; 45 are South Koreans.

The point of this, they say, is to allow all the golfers to communicate better with everyone. The LPGA is "losing sponsors" and they want everyone to be able to communicate with the media, their pro-am partners and even fans. Also, it's absolutely fuck crazy.

Making someone learn English? Our country is compiled of people that couldn't muster a single Japanese phrase besides "Sake Bomb" and now we're forcing people to learn our jacked up language? "Well, their is more of an ownership thing, while they're is short for "they are." How can you not get that?"

I hope this policy is tossed out. The United States does enough stupid stuff, no reason to further that trend with this idea.

Your Daily Racist Comment Brought To You by Dan O'Neill

Honestly, you can't really lead into this story. Dan O'Neill is either a racist prick or ignorant beyond belief and will probably be looking for a blogger domain name here in the next couple of days.

That's 41 down, one more to go for Sergio Garcia.

You remember the No. 42. That was the number of majors Phil Mickelson played in before he won the 2004 Masters. That's the amount of frustration, heartbreak and second-guessing “Lefty” endured before he got that Jackie Robinson off his back.

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaa?!?!?!?!

Did he really just say that?

See, here is what our boy O'Neill was going for. Jackie Robinson was number 42. The reason I know this (and probably why he knows it) is because his number is retired in every ballpark in America. The reason is because he was the first BLACK baseball player ever to cross the racial barrier of baseball. Do you get that -- Robinson was black.

So, maybe using the Jackie Robinson card works when replacing the number "42" but probably not the best move when replacing "monkey."

Here, I'll help you out Dan.

"Dude, how many beers did you have last?!?!?!"

"Bro, I must have like Jackie Robinson'd it."

See. Dude and Bro are talking about how many alcoholic beverages they drank the previous night and instead of saying "42" they used the famous baseball player.

That would have worked. Replacing "monkey off the back" probably isn't going to go over well over the next 24 hours. This should get interesting.

A Gatorade A Day Makes The Knee Pain Go Away

Like death and taxes, when I become a tad ill, I bypass the doctor, never am stumbling up and down aisles at Walgreens and absolutely will not swallow a pill. Nope, I'm on a strict Gatorade Diet, and will feel like George Clooney on a day that ends in "Y" by morning.

This is Tiger Woods, on the Scott Van Pelt show, explaining why sponsors really, really, really like having him on their team.

"(Gatorade is) helping me find things that will enable me to heal faster – soft tissue and different types of flavors and drinks that I should be drinking to help speed up recovery after my workouts and pre-workouts. ... Before it was just all on-course stuff with the three flavors I was playing, but now it’s different. Now we’re into recovery drinks, so I think it’s helped me a lot."

Roll your eyes all you want, but I think he's got something here. Like Nyquil to Lewis Black, this stuff will do it for you. My potion is a little of the blue mixed with a little of tha yella.

Women Are Really Good At Letting Things Go

Nothing defines a woman better than a person that has the great ability to let things go. They never nag, they never hold on to things and they definitely never make a bigger deal out of something than it really is.

Right on cue, Laura Diaz showed exactly what I'm talking about today at the Women's British Open.

A member of the British press asked if she ever “tackled” Dottie Pepper about her comments at the Solheim Cup.

“No, do you want me to?” Diaz said with a laugh. “It would be my pleasure.”

The row between Pepper, Diaz and the rest of Team USA started during last year’s Solheim Cup when Pepper referred to U.S. players as “chokin’ freakin’ dogs” on air Saturday afternoon when she thought the broadcast had gone to commercial break.

“To be honest, I don’t think to this day I will ever in my life do an interview with her,” said Diaz. “It really affected me, and Solheim wasn’t a time to talk about it.”

“Dottie was a family member to me,” Diaz said, “and I don’t even see her as a friend anymore.”

See, allow the comment to sink in, talk about it and then let it go. That's how most women resolve situations. Never have I know a female friend of mine to break off friendships and such because of things like "I heard her talking about me" or "I don't approve of her life decisions." Nope, it's always just forgive and forget.