Pro Golfers Don’t Cheat, They “Infringe”
Lawrence Donegan, columnist for The Age, files his commentary on cheating in golf… from the future: October 21, 2005!
Otherwise known as anywhere West of the International Date Line, or in this case Australia. Cue Theremin music!
To the non-golfer, opening the Rules of Golf must be a disorienting experience, another universe with its own moral code and Byzantine language. Still, if it is any consolation, golfers are pretty clueless about the rules as well: from addicted amateurs to journeymen professionals and even, it seems, to the most famous golfer in the world whose initials are not TW… But to dismiss last Sunday’s events as a freak would be to miss the chance to ask a question seldom broached in polite golfing circles: exactly how much cheating goes on?
What is remarkable is not how many cheats have been exposed but how few. Is this a fair reflection of the level of cheating in the pro game? To be fair, the word “cheat” does not appear anywhere in the Rules of Golf. You don’t cheat, you “infringe the rules”.
Famous golfer… initials TW? Oh, I see! Donegan made a smart choice by including Tom Watson.
I think the last person who accused Tom of not knowing the Rules of Golf was found in a dumpster beaten to death with a 7-iron.
The Age: Drop the honour, golfers cheat, if only a Wie bit
Del.icio.us
|
Digg
|
October 20th, 2005 at 11:00 am
Well, Wie didn’t “infringe” by much. According to Curtis Murayama, Sports Editor at the Honolulu Advertiser, Mark Rolfing’s sketch of the 7th hole layout placed the Gold Lantana bush at 40 yards from the cup. So Wie’s drop, made without benefit of illegal laser rangefinder or “plumber’s string” (whatever that is), was a miniscule 0.2 percent of the total distance in error.