take a mulligan: PGA needs rules on bunker rakes at Memorial
OK, I think Jack Nicklaus may be taking things too far — at least on his own initiative — to combat the improvement of technology. He’s called upon the Amish in Ohio to make him special rakes that leave furrows in the bunkers, in order to make the ball fall within them and reduce the ability of the players to put spin on the ball out of the bunkers. More from TGC here.
I’m not necessarily against the idea of making bunkers more of a penalty, but Jack’s approach with these furrow-producing rakes should be examined and decided uniformly for all PGA tournaments. That way, players won’t have to learn a new raking system at each venue, and the tournaments can’t go over the edge to “trick up” the golf course. In the end, Jack’s approach may be what the PGA needs, but shouldn’t the “new” rakes be examined and tested just as any other equipment?
UPDATE: The PGA official on site at the Memorial just admitted that it may have made a mistake in not prepping the players earlier about the new rakes being experimented with this week. He basically admitted that the decision to switch the rakes were made this past week. This admission by the PGA only further confirms my criticism of the process in which the new rakes were implemented.
UPDATE 2: Wow. Here’s even more ammunition in support of my view. Shaun Micheel reported that Davis Love, who is a member of the PGA Tour policy board, says the board approved a standardized rake for all PGA tournaments. Nick Price echoed this view. (More here) As I said before, I don’t care if the PGA wants to make the bunkers really hard — I’d even support them using quicksand.
But I think it’s really unfair on the players to surprise them at a big tournament with new rakes that had not ever been available for them to practice with. As Micheel stated, “We showed up Monday, and they were furrowed and raked sideways. Today, every trap is raked parallel to the fairway. So they changed the conditions.” It’s even more unfair if the PGA did this all in contravention to an accepted agreement with the PGA Tour policy board of the players, as Davis Love apparently claims.
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