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Two Players Miss Out On LPGA Tour Cards Becuase They Don’t Know The Rules

LPGA Rules Controversy Christina Kim Twitter/@GolfCentral

Without rules, there is chaos. Ironically in golf, the rules can create chaos. Look no further than what happened at the LPGA’s Q-Series this past weekend. Veteran LPGA Tour golfer Christina Kim fought hard to get her card back for the 2020 season and was successful, but it didn’t happen without some serious controversy.

Kim was playing with Dewi Weber and Kendall Dye when an unusual incident occurred during the first round on the par-3 17th hole (their 8th of the day) at Pinehurst No. 9, which ultimately led to a two-shot penalty for both of Kim’s playing partners because they don’t know the rules.

Golfweek’s Beth Ann Nichols has the details of what went down:

As Dye tells it, Christina Kim hit first on the par 3. Then Weber, runner-up at the 2016 NCAA Championship while a freshman at Miami, stepped up to the tee. As Weber prepared to hit, Dye motioned toward Weber’s caddie to ask if it was an 8-iron. Jacqueline Schram signaled back to confirm that it was, indeed, an 8-iron.

Kim waited until the end of the round (10 holes later) to tell the pair that they had violated Rule 10-2. While players can, and do, look into other players’ bags to see what club is missing, they cannot ask a fellow player or caddie for information.

Even though Weber didn’t have a clue that any of this had transpired, she was given a two-stroke penalty along with Dye because of her caddie’s mistake.

Oh yeah. That’s the good stuff. A penalty called by a player in the group after the round when nobody had any idea they violated any rules AND a caddie who unknowingly made a huge mistake! At least it didn’t affect the outcome, right? Wrong!

The top 45 players in Q-Series get their LPGA Tour cards. Unfortunately, both Weber and Dye ended up missing out. Weber shot 82 the next day while Dye rinsed her final tee shot Saturday after entering the hole just two shots outside the top 45.

“I’m gutted for the other player [Weber] who was over her shot, ball in air and had no idea what was going on,” Dye told Golfweek, adding that she didn’t know the rule. “By no means was I trying to cheat.”

“I have just seen so many caddies and people do it,” said Schram [Weber’s caddie]. “It was just a subtle gesture that I didn’t think twice about.”

“It affected me way too much,” said Weber. “It shouldn’t have. That’s absolutely, 100 percent on me.”

As for Kim, her actions were technically justified as soon as she saw the infraction take place under Rule 1.3n(1) which states that “ if two or more players deliberately agree to ignore any rules or penalty they know applied and any of those players have started the round, they are disqualified.”

Kim said that calling the infraction out was “truly just coming from my heart.” But she has been met with serious criticism to the point where people started calling her a narc!

“I’ve been called a narc. … Unfortunately, the rules of golf don’t really care about who your friends, don’t really care about your personal emotions, and one thing I pride myself in is my integrity and just knowing that I had to do the right thing,” Kim said Sunday on Golf Channel’s Morning Drive.

“If I was going to sit there and try to protect my two friends, one, I’m in breach of the rules, which is something I hole scared, and two, that’s unfair to the other 95 players in the field, so it was a really tough decision.”

“I wasn’t trying to start any drama,” she added. “All I was trying to do is just remind people, hey, if you’re going to do something just make sure you do it within the confines of what is and isn’t allowed.”

Kim then decided to spend some time on social media defending herself. Here’s a smattering of her responses:

  • “I had to sit on this with a pit in my stomach for three hours because I didn’t want to bring this up. It affected everyone and sometimes people forget that.”
  • “You break a rule, you break it. Not a matter of intent. An infraction is an infraction is an infraction. And sometimes it’s ok. It doesn’t have to mean cheating. I have nothing but love for these individuals but nothing is higher than my love for what’s right.”
  • “I calmly stated what I saw to the official, which was CONFIRMED by the people in question. The rules committee then went and had a discussion amongst themselves and contacted each of us afterwards with the verdict.”
  • “Why? I’m not a gossip. It was an innocent mistake that was made, but just as Mount Everest was the tallest peak in the world prior to its founding in the 1850s by Andrew Waugh, not knowing the rule doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.”

As you can imagine, Dye was not pleased with the way the situation was handled by Kim either.

You can click the tweet above to read the whole thing but this was the juiciest part:

However, I am very disappointed in a fellow player’s unprofessional and public action for taking this to Twitter, to players and caddies in our field and causing a huge distraction for myself and other players during such an important event.

“I own up to the penalty,” said Dye. “I had no idea that was the Rules of Golf. Lesson learned.”

LPGA DRAMA! Hate to see it and love to see it at the same time. But that’s the beautiful thing about golf. The rules are the rules and they should be enforced by the players assuming they know them.

However, when it comes to protecting the field, that should be priority A, especially during a qualifying event. Something like this can’t happen. You can be the best golfer in the world, but if you don’t know the rules or can’t adhere to them, well, unfortunately, that’s a big part of the job and you don’t deserve to be a professional.

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