Quick 9: How the pros reacted to the new Rules of Golf
4. In or out?
Bryson DeChambeau made it no secret that he is very much in the leave-it-in camp when it comes to the flagstick, and he proved this at the Tournament of Champions.
And it worked. After the first two rounds in Hawaii, DeChambeau led the field in Strokes Gained: Putting.
He did give us a little insight into his thinking:
I feel like I maximised my potential. When it’s blowing downwind, 5% slope, straight downhill, you want the pin to help. So that’s what I did and utilised it to my advantage.
But he isn’t on board with everything just yet:
That you have to drop it from knee height is a bit absurd, unfortunately
Quite.
5. Get shorty
Rory McIlroy was in good spirits ahead of the Tournament of Champions, as shown when he joked about the knee-height drop:
We’re saying that Brian Harman has got a big advantage, he can basically place it. Where you got someone like Tony Finau who is dropping it probably from like waist height for me.
As Alan Partridge would say: It’s great banter, it really is.
For the record, Harman, at 5-foot-7, is only two inches short of 5-foot-9 McIlroy.
6. Let it be
Back to the flagstick debate and Justin Thomas has no interest in leaving it in when he’s within range.
If I have an eight-footer to win a golf tournament, I can’t, I mean no offence, I can’t really take myself seriously if I kept the pin in.
He added:
I mean it just would be such a weird picture, me on TV celebrating and like the pin is in and my ball’s like up against it.
Which is a long way of saying if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
JT’s best mate Jordan Spieth has sounded off about the Rules of Golf ahead of the Sony Open. See what he has to say on the next page…
Joe Hughes
Tour editor covering men's golf, women's golf and anything else that involves the word golf, really. The talk is far better than the game, but the work has begun to change that.
