"G" (in this case) is not.... good....
- Todd Morris
- Jun 9
- 6 min read
Updated: Jun 14
Editor’s Note: The thoughts and comments of the author are simply that…. A word of warning, the author holds a VERY dim view of the rule to be discussed in this blog entry. The soapbox will be employed, and you may not like what you read.
“Most golf courses spend between 15 and 25 percent of their labor budget maintaining bunkers annually”. I don’t know that that’s true at Ruggles, but wouldn’t you rather see lusher tee boxes, fairways and greens instead? Before getting to a discussion of the rule in question, I would ask each of you to check out the following article, which I heartily endorse…
Sand traps (Bunkers). We’ll dive in here to Local Rule g in the REGL Rule Book….
“Due to the condition of the bunkers typical during league play, the decision was made to allow players to lift, rake, and place, whenever a player’s ball is in a bunker. The objective of this rule is to provide the player a suitable lie and is not intended to give the player an advantage by raking and creating a “tee”. If the ball is plugged in the bunker, the player may lift, rake and place, but if the ball will not remain in its original resting place, the player may need to press the ball into the sand, so it stays in place. Once placed, the ball is “in play” and no further adjustments are permitted. This rule is a local rule and all other USGA rules concerning bunker play remain in effect (e.g. casual water in bunkers, etc.).”
“Due to condition of the bunkers typical during league play…” Personally, I don’t think the bunker conditions at Ruggles are that horrible that it becomes necessary to create this rule and the allowance to lift, rake and place your ball in any bunker, but I’m in the minority amongst captains here. The genie has been unleashed, and I don’t foresee any way to get that sucker stuffed back in its bottle. Golf course design has always featured areas that the player should avoid – they are part of the inherent challenge of playing the course and create consternation for the player in his attempt to complete the hole in as few strokes as possible. They tend to identify the men and the boys.
Case in point – Oakmont. You’ll see it in its restored glory this week as the USGA has decided to host yet another (the record 10thfor any venue) U.S. Open there in western PA. The course has no true water hazards (they have some drainage ditches which almost always are completely dry). Most of the trees have been removed. Oakmont’s defenses are its lightning-fast greens, its length and the placement of its bunkers. The original architect has a penchant for adding bunkers where bad shots ended up, and the bunkers were MEANT to be penal. Find one and you can probably add at least a stroke to your card. There’s probably no better example than the church pew bunkers on the 5th and 6th holes where a shot played into them can only really be played sideways back into the adjacent fairway. If the past is any indication, the winning score will NOT be below par. If someone does finish below par the membership WILL NOT be amused.
The club also famously endured a protest by the players of the Open in 1953 due to the method used to rake all their bunkers. The staff used 50-lb rakes with deep and wide furrows that were deliberately raked perpendicular to the direction of the fairway. Players had very little recourse on long shots from them to pitch out sideways. Eventually the protest ended when the fairway bunkers were raked parallel to the fairways, although the greenside bunkers retained their perpendicular rake patterns for that championship.
I’ve said it before, and I will continue to say that the game of golf does NOT demand that bunkers on any course be groomed to any sort of standard. There is no REQUIREMENT that they be maintained at all! In Scotland over links land the earliest bunkers were nothing more than areas in which grass or gorse just didn’t grow. We are spoiled to watch professional golf with very high expectations for each and every bunker each week, but as we all know, that expectation isn’t reality when it comes time to play at your local muni or even Ruggles Golf Course. It is a challenge for every single golfer to figure out how to get out of any bunker in any condition you encounter. If you don’t like it, under the 2019 Rules of Golf, for the penalty of 2 strokes you can drop outside the bunker. Otherwise, man up and figure out how to play the shot required, UNLESS you’re playing in REGL. You MAY (this is not a requirement) lift, rake and place your ball in any bunker in league play. You MAY also man up and play the ball as it lies and retain your dignity.
A look at terms in this rule:
“lift” – the very inclusion of this word in the rule is a problem, since in order to lift a ball anywhere on the course, you are supposed to (under the Rules of Golf) mark it. Well, now we’re going to rake through the mark and the player will have to estimate the original location in the bunker. Since the original spot has been violated by the raking, the requirement to be place back as close to the original spot really is moot due to the regrading.
“creating a tee…” I don’t know why this sentence is in this rule – by placing the ball on the approximate original location, you’re not likely going to do that in the furrow created by the rake, the ball’s going to be supported by nice fluffy sand between the furrows. Raking the bunker aerates the area in question and loosens the soil. The refreshed sand is probably better than placing a tee under the ball. “Placing” is in direct violation of the rules of physics which push that into the sand at impact.
“plugged in the bunker”… This is another one that galls me. If the conditions of the bunkers are so horrible at Ruggles, I don’t think balls would plug. If they did, they would have been groomed or the sand would have been fluffy enough to push the ball down into the sand. A “fried egg” or a ball plugged in the face of a bunker are conditions that will happen in golf. A golfer is expected to learn how to deal with those – not whine and cry and ask for relief from a legitimate design feature of the course, or the fact that they sent that ball in there with their last stroke.
“press the ball into the sand (to get it to stay in place)” If we’re lifting and raking, the bunker face will have to be really steep for this aspect of the rule to be needed, but it’s there if you need it.
“all other USGA rules concerning bunker play remain in effect”…. What other rules for bunker play HAVEN’T already been violated by this local rule? I suppose you still can’t ground your club in the bunker, but….the reason you aren’t supposed to ground your club in a bunker is that you receive information on the sand or soil directly underneath the ball. By raking it, you’ve gained that knowledge.
There are several REGL rules that create conditions in which our league handicap diverges from a “real” USGA handicap – potential strokes are nullified by our rules and our handicaps are set artificially LOW. Two of those rules that immediately come to mind are the allowed “gimmies” inside the length of the flagstick and the “Canton Rule” in which balls that are lost or O.B. can be dropped for a penalty. The “rationale” behind both of those rules was to increase the speed of play and it’s hard to argue that those rules don’t speed up play. The “Lift, Rake and Place” rule in a bunker? It seems to me the rationale behind this rule is that people would rather spend more time (marking, raking and placing) AND cheat to boot rather than learn how to extricate themselves from a place where they shouldn’t be anyway.