I often get asked why the Rules of Golf are so chunky. The Official Guide runs into 525 pages and while that makes a great draught excluder, it’s also a bit much for anyone who just wants to get out and enjoy the game.
The reason it’s so voluminous is because when you play a stick game with a ball in what’s basically a big field, weird and wonderful things can happen.
And this question I was asked to unpick on an episode of The NCG Golf Podcast is definitely up there in the category of wacky.
“My two playing partners teed off and they both hit it left. One was a much longer hitter than the other. We walked up, looked for the balls, and the shorter hitter gave up on went back to the tee – closely followed by the longer hitter.
“On arrival, the shorter hitter turned round and said to his playing partner, ‘I thought you’d found yours’. The longer hitter said he hadn’t, only for the other player to say, ‘are you playing this?’
“It was revealed he was and the shorter hitter said, ‘I’ve picked your ball up’. They went back to the spot where the shorter hitter had picked up the ball and proceeded from there. Is this correct?”
Wow, that’s quite a lot to unpack. But it is why I’m paid the big bucks (I wish). So let’s see if we can come to the right answer in this golfer picking up ball scenario…
Golfer picking up ball: Why can’t I just put it back?
I had to think a bit about this one, and there’s a small part of me that still wonders whether I’m correct. If I’m not, I’m sure you’ll be emailing me in your numbers.
But here goes.
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There are some things in golf you just think would be common sense, but don’t always turn out to be what you first thought.
Here, you may think you’ve got a simple case of a ball that’s been lifted or moved by an outside influence.
We know if that is known or virtually certain, there is no penalty, and the ball must be replaced on its original spot. If you don’t know, you estimate. It’s all laid out in Rule 9.6.
But and it is a big ‘but’, the problem comes when you look at the definition of lost.
Our questioner talked about two players searching for their balls. If three minutes has elapsed from the time they start the search to the time they have that conversation on the tee – when it is revealed that one player has the other’s ball – then the ball is lost.
That’s because it’s not until after the search time has expired that it becomes known or virtually certain an outside influence has lifted or moved the player’s ball.
During the search, it is not known what’s happened to the ball. The players only become aware once the sands of time have run out.
Does that make sense?
If not, there’s a Clarification to the definition of Known or Virtually Certain that might help. It gives the example of a player who can’t find their ball and thinks it might have been picked up by a spectator – but “there is not enough evidence to be virtually certain of this”.
After the three minutes runs out, it turns out a spectator has found the ball.
“The player must take stroke-and-distance relief for a lost ball (Rule 18.2b) since the movement by the outside influence only became known after the search time expired”.
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So, assuming that’s the case in our situation – and it wasn’t known until after the search that a player had another player’s ball – we then move onto another problem.
By going back to the spot of the original ball and playing on, our player has now played from a wrong place.
That’s a two-stroke penalty but, worse than that, the mistake must be corrected. If it isn’t by the time the player tees off on the next hole, or returns their scorecard if it was the final hole, then they get disqualified!
What happens if this is all revealed while the three-minute search is still ongoing? In that case, it’s known or virtually certain a ball has been moved by an outside influence and you carry on under Rule 9.6.
Just to complicate matters even further if you ever find yourselves in a situation like this, you may also need to consider when the respective searches began.
The rules say a search begins – naturally – after the “player or their caddie begins to search for it”.
Was the player concerned looking for their ball, or looking for their playing partner’s? It can make a difference. If they looked for their playing partner’s for three minutes, the clock wouldn’t then start until they began looking for theirs.
They could be on the scene for six minutes! But they can’t search by stealth – saying they’re looking for their partner’s while sneakily hoping they find theirs at the same time.
If that all sounds a bit complicated, welcome to the club! So what’s the moral here? Make sure that trophy you’re hoping to add to your bag doesn’t belong to someone else first!
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Got a question for our expert?
Despite the changes to the Rules of Golf in 2019 and 2023, there are still some that leave us scratching our heads. I’ll try to help by featuring the best of your queries in this column.
What do you make of this golfer picking up ball situation? Let me you what you think by emailing me at s.carroll@nationalclubgolfer.com or by leaving us a comment on X.
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