How one Players contender used the Rules of Golf to escape dodgy lie and make controversial birdie
Last updated:
It pays to know the Rules of Golf. Literally, in JJ Spaun’s case…
JJ Spaun may have lost out to Rory McIlroy in Monday’s Players Championship playoff, but he will take home just shy of $3 million, he will move into the world’s top 50, and he will be all but guaranteed a second Masters invitation.
And he will look back at one moment in particular that catapulted him back into the mix.
The 34-year-old was playing himself out of contention on a weather-interrupted day at TPC Sawgrass. He had bogeyed the par-4 5th and the par-3 8th to surrender the lead and then hit an horrendous approach into the thick rough on the par-5 9th.
Facing an uncomfortable hack out of the thick stuff, Spaun reached his ball to find a sprinkler head impeded his stance.
That, under Rule 16.1a, entitled him to a free drop within a club’s length and no closer to the hole.
But this is where it gets really interesting.
While Spaun marked his area for his initial relief, he found that within that was another sprinkler head, so he dropped his ball on that to ensure he was entitled to more relief.
By this point, his relief area now included the fairway.
Jim ‘Bones’ Mackay, commentating for NBC, was nearby.
“It was fascinating,” the long-time PGA Tour caddie turned on-course analyst explained. “JJ got up there and his ball was in a horrible lie. He was standing on a sprinkler but still nowhere near the fairway, so he took relief. Within that club length was another sprinkler, so he intentionally dropped it in the sprinkler, got a second club length away from that, and got himself into the fairway.”
If you’re struggling to visualize the scenario, this clip captured by Normal Sport’s Kyle Porter sums it up rather neatly…
That left Spaun with a relatively straight-forward up-and-down and a birdie that catapulted the American back into contention. And while he gave up that shot at the next par-5 – the 11th – Spaun picked up two more gains at the 14th and 16th to reach 12-under-par and join McIlroy in a playoff.
Naturally, armchair fans were angrily thumbing into their phones about how Spaun’s third shot did not reflect where his second shot had ended up. But Spaun did everything within the laws of the game to ensure he made the situation work to his advantage – and you would be allowed to as well.
Remember, the Rules of Golf are there to help you. And it pays to know them.
In Spaun’s case, to the tune of several million dollars…
