Charley Hoffman Didn't Break A Rule At Liberty National

Yesterday, we ran a post wondering if Charley Hoffman had broken the rules at The Barclays due to a situation described by an attendee at The Hacker's Paradise:

Hoffman hit a bad second shot that came up short of the green in one of those tightly mowed bowls below the green.  He tried to hit a wedge up to the hole but stubbed it short onto the green's false front.  Hoffman was furious and whacked the ground with his wedge which sent a big divot flying in two pieces into the air.  One of the divots landed behind his ball which by this time was already rolling backward towards Hoffman - back down into the bowl...except the ball hit the divot and stopped.  The Tour was playing lift, clean and place so Hoffman just marked his ball where it was - jammed up against this divot he had hit there - and then threw the divot away.  His caddy cleaned the ball and he replaced it.

Sorry, Charley!

Were that true, he would have violated rule 19-2 and been subject to a one stroke penalty.  The folks at the PGA Tour contacted me today to let me know that had looked into the incident and found that Charley did not break the rules of golf.

From Joel Schuchmann at the Tour:

[T]he reported incident in your article is incorrect with respect to the fact that the divot did not actually hit or stop his ball. There is no penalty.  PGA TOUR Rules Officials have confirmed this after speaking with Charley and getting his account of the story.

That being said, the fan that witnessed the incident may insist his or her account is accurate. However, speaking from experience, sometimes angles and distance and slopes and shadows can create illusions, and that is certainly a possiblity in this instance. Unless PGA TOUR Rules Officials have conclusive evidence (ie, fellow competitor, television replay) about a violation, the Rules of Golf side with the player, given honesty is an integral part of the game.

Works for me.  These guys do great work on the competition side, led by Slugger White - even if the pace of play on Tour is just horrendous at times.

For as much as someone might not like a player getting a penalty called on them because of what a viewer saw on TV, it would be equally lousy to penalize a player for something they didn't do.  The Tour investigates these things well, but this was a good exercise on ole Rule 19-2.