CBS
Gollan, Scotland – Different country, different track, different turf, different formation… a dugout configuration. Just about everything we see this week on the PGA Tour is different from the American golf standard, and never was that more evident than with the referee Sam Burns took on the 10th hole on Saturday morning.
Burns was cruising his third outing, eight-under and tied for tenth, when he pulled off the fifth-place tee to deep cellar. At that moment, the tenth moved from a bird’s hole to a real gun with three bullets, as long as Burns could escape the sandy lie with the second.
He did… sort of.
Burns grabbed the second bit of sand, sending a whoop to the top of the bunker’s face. This was reminiscent of what happened to Victor Hovland on the 70th hole of the PGA Championship at Oak Hill two months earlier. Only Burns’ ball hit the dirt edge of the dugout and then bounced back slightly.
The ball slipped back from a guaranteed inline position to sort of hang on the edge of one of the pins in the face of the bunker. It seemed to defy gravity, caught on just enough grass to sit on the edge of the dugout face. What now?
That’s when the third round of the Genesis Scottish Open hit its first hurdle. Burns wanted a ruling on how to proceed. Could he take a break for inline ball? An official arrived and quickly started using his walkie-talkie. This will not be an easy decision either way. Another official arrived on the scene and began discussing with Burns, imitating with his arms what kind of swing a player might take from that position. A crowd of 10 gathered around the bunker to hear how it might shake.
Soon after, longtime head of DP World Tour Rules Andy McPhee joined the CBS broadcast to break down what viewers were watching at home.
“In all the years I’ve been involved with it, I’ve never seen that,” McPhee said. That was a relief, considering a full 10 minutes had elapsed since Burns’ initial hit from the bunker.
“The top layer of grass, that edge… is that seam?” McVeigh said. That was what had to be decided.
Many of the vault faces in links courses are created by layers of flesh to create a pinned-up look. The result is a collection of seams between the layers, looking like little grassy steps on the way out of the trap. This allows the faces to remain firm and strong and maintains its structure over time against the brutal elements that can occur in the UK, even grass growing between the overlays.
Well, those seams could be Burns’ saving grace in his search for relief.
“The gist of the seam is that it’s between two pieces of turf,” McPhee said on the radio broadcast. If Burns’ ball had been designed to be in a position where it could hit the seam after the intended hit, according to McPhee, he would have been given the relief.
The only problem was where Burns’ ball hung – it wasn’t obvious that it was on seam. Much grass has grown on the top of the dugout face, and it appears that the only part of the dugout that might interfere with Burns’ swing is edge From the cellar, after calling. Since it wasn’t clear, Burns was denied a rest and had to play the ball from where it sat…or hover. He wasn’t pleased but accepted the verdict and started to take a stand.
Burns’ right foot began to wear away in the face of the dugout as he tried to get some balance.
“The division is between the player and the official,” Frank Nobilo said breathlessly in the broadcast. “I love him.”
We are, Frank. We just feel like Sam didn’t quite love her. He swung the ball, pushed it in the face further, and put it back in the sand again. He went on to make a triple bogey.