I agree with you that rules in golf can get stretched to the breaking point, but I disagree that playing a mudball from the fairway should be considered a rub of the green (“Divot: Ground-rule trouble,” May 19, GGP). Why can’t the “lift clean and cheat” rule, as you put it, be adapted to lift, clean and drop? That way you’re playing a clean ball from a decent lie, not hitting a ball where you’re totally unsure how it will react.
There are enough variables in golf to make every shot a challenge, but to introduce the lottery of a mudball when the player has hit a fairway seems unnecessarily cruel to me.
Neil Forster
Manchester, England
I don’t find myself doing this often, but I have to disagree with you on this one (“Divot: Ground-rule trouble,” May 19, GGP). I consider myself largely a traditionalist, but I think skill, rather than luck, should decide major championships.
I understand the concept of “rub of the green.” However, it is one thing to have a ball hit a tree and bounce back into the fairway or bounce the other way out of bounds. Either way, you never should have hit the tree to begin with. It is a whole other thing to hit a perfect drive down the middle of the fairway only to find your ball with a big clump of mud on it. As shown by Scottie and Xander, with mud on the ball, you can hit a perfectly struck iron shot only to watch the ball fly in a completely unexpected direction. Why add that element of luck to the game when it can easily be avoided?
By the way, I feel the same way about divots. In my view, a divot in the fairway should be treated as ground under repair, especially given the fact that most golfers don’t take the time to fill their divots. The rules allow you to lift and clean your ball on the green, and the rules changed to allow repairs of spike marks and other imperfections on the greens. Why should the fairways be treated any differently?
Kenneth Shaw
Greenville, South Carolina
I think it is really sad that Rory McIlroy could not talk to the press at least one day out of the four tournament days at the PGA Championship (“McIlroy underwhelms in Masters follow-up,” May 19, GGP) .
Jon Rahm went double bogey, double bogey to end his Sunday but still talked to the press.
As one of the stars of the tour, Rory should know better.
John L. Kennedy
Midland, Texas
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