With the U.S. Open Golf Tournament gearing up this week at Pinehurst, S.I.com has this interesting roundtable discussion on the state of golf between golf writer Geoff Shackelford, PGA Tour player Brad Faxon, USGA Executive Director David Fay and Callaway Golf spokesman Larry Dorman.
While the entire discussion is interesting and worth reading, the following comment indicates that Mr. Faxon and Jack Nicklaus probably aren’t playing many practice rounds together:
SI: Why is everybody talking about the ball? Deane Beman, Jack Nicklaus, Greg Norman, Arnold Palmer, Gary Player — they all say the ball needs to be rolled back in the pro game.
FAXON: If Jack Nicklaus had a successful ball, he would never say another word. But he’s never sold a ball that’s made a dime. There are so many other, more important things to worry about. Like allowing the putter to touch a part of your body other than your hands. . . .
By the way, an interesting incident occurred yesterday during the final round of the Booz Allen Classic at Congressional Country Club in Bethesda, MD. On the 17th hole, Rory Sabbatini, who is a fast player, got tired of waiting for his playing partner Ben Crane, who is a slow player. So, Sabbatini hit his second short on 17, walked up to the green ahead of Crane, chipped up and putted out of turn, and then left for the 18th green and teed off out of turn before Crane putted out on 17. Subsequently, on the 18th green, Sabbatini barely acknowledged Crane during the traditional post-round handshake and then walked to the scoring tent spewing expletives. In short, over the course of about fifteen minutes, Sabbatini established himself as a first-class jerk.
Then, ABC on-course reporter Judy Rankin interviewed Crane after the incident. In a truly remarkable moment in this day of self-absorbed professional athletes, Crane exhibited grace and depth by refusing to criticize Sabbatini, acknowledging that he is a slow player, admitting that he is working on getting faster, and essentially downplaying Sabbatini’s infantile reaction.
Thus, in less than a one minute interview, Ben Crane became one of my favorite PGA Tour golfers.
By the way, ABC commentator Paul Azinger appropriately proceeded to do what Crane would not, which was to hammer Sabbatini on the air for his conduct. Good for you, Zinger.
Yeah, that was quite an interesting interchange between Crane and Sabbatini.
I think that Rory was not in violation of the rules by finishing out the 17th hole after chipping up and then rushing to putt out as Ben approached the 17th green, through the “continuous play” aspect of order of play.
But, I do think he was out of order when he got to 18 tee. He bogeyed the 17th to Crane’s par, and still hit his tee shot on 18 first. If Ben had wanted to be a stickler about it, he could have made Sabbitini hit his tee shot over (with no penalty). Of course, that could have lead to a fight much more interesting than the Tyson bout Sat night…..
jrb