Ramsay's trial by video
Travelling to and from the on the weekend of the I listened to football fans vigorously debating on Five Live's 606 the merits of using video technology to decide goal line decisions.
Departing Celtic Manor, I'm reflecting on how the use of video evidence in golf can fuel rather than quell controversy.
While Florent Malouda might have scored an FA Cup final goal had there been the chance of a second look, .
John Paramor, probably the most respected official in the game, had been alerted to pictures of Ramsay using his foot on the damp fairway as he was preparing to place his ball on the eighth hole of his late evening third round.
The question was whether the former winner of the US Amateur Championship had improved his lie and was therefore liable to a two stroke penalty? The pictures didn't look good, but they weren't conclusive.
So, as is the way with golf, Ramsay was asked for his thoughts when darkness brought a premature end to his round.
"I said to John that the perception might be that it didn't look good from there, but I can say 100 per cent that I didn't improve the lie," Ramsay said.
"They said go away and think about it (at 11.00pm on Saturday) and it was the same this morning. I can only tell the truth. That's all I can do. I spoke to my playing partners and they were fine about it."
Ramsay saw no reason to call a penalty on himself and his scorecard remained unaltered.
The incident raised eyebrows at Celtic Manor and will no doubt be discussed at length in locker rooms for some time, especially as it merited a full two hours of post-round debate with officials.
There's no suggestion that Ramsay was deliberately trying to gain an unfair advantage or more bluntly was trying to cheat.
But had he been found to have unwittingly broken a rule? The fact is that despite the presence of the TV camera directly behind him, only Ramsay knows whether this might have been the case and he is convinced that it wasn't.
For many a player just the thought of being questioned by the Tour's chief referee would be enough to cop the penalty for fear of locker room whispers that might follow, so Ramsay must have been absolutely certain of his ground.
Golf is, after all, a game that trades on the honesty and integrity of its players.
American Kenny Perry was involved in something similar of late after video footage from his FBR Open play-off win surfaced recently.
The shot in question was a pitch to the green. The camera angle was again from behind the shot and prior to address Perry's ball was barely visible in the rough.
The Ryder Cup star, who , grounded his club a couple of times and all of a sudden the ball became clearly visible to the camera that had not moved an inch during this process.
Had he improved his lie? Was he liable to a penalty? To some observers the answer was yes to both questions, but crucially Tour officials, the man beaten in the play-off Charlie Hoffman, and Perry saw nothing wrong.
No one had noticed at the time, perhaps because the had started and sporting interest was elsewhere, and it wasn't until the Players' Championship more than three months later that the issue was raised.
"Well, I mean, I said the truth will set you free. I looked at it (the video footage) and I thought it was crazy, my first impression," Perry later said.
"I went to Charlie Hoffman and I asked Charlie 'do you have a problem with it?' That would be the only guy, if he had a problem with it, it would really upset me, if he thought something was done wrong there.
"He said: 'That's crazy. You didn't do nothing wrong' and patted me on the back."
The incident has been widely debated in golf chatrooms but Perry remains bemused by the fuss. "I hit it 25 feet from the hole. It's not like I hit a great shot.
"Someone brings something up four months down the road. I didn't understand," added Perry who admitted to being stunned when he was approached at the Players'.
But this is the risk all professionals face as they ply their trade in the public eye and it's been the case ever since television became involved in golf. There are too many instances of television viewers picking up and alerting officials to possible rules infringements to list here.
They say the camera never lies, but in golf it doesn't always tell the whole story which can lead to the uncomfortable situations that Perry and Ramsay have recently experienced.
It's also why golf has to rely on players' integrity and no golfer can afford for that to be called into question.
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Comment number 1.
At 7th Jun 2009, uberman21 wrote:Agree, video usage in golf is more likely to be counter productive. In football it would be useful to have goal line technology and maybe some way of getting a quick decision on key events such as whether a penalty is merited but these are occasional, game turning events in a team sport.
With all the TV coverage you'd actually have an inequality as top players (see Tiger) garner the most coverage and video usage is simply not applied equally to all players. Conversely Tiger put his ball into some rough a tournament or two back and the TV coverage was replayed and the commentators radioed their man on the ground where the ball landed and the ball was found within the time limit. Tiger gets the benefit of video there.
TV coverage is there to provide coverage for a viewing public, it is not there as a game refereeing mechanism and should not be used on an ad hoc basis as such. Its up to the players, spectators (dubious imho) and tournament officials to spot and deal with incidents. If they don't then its gone. Challenging Kenny Perry's integrity at a big tournament some months after an incident which did not register at the time can't be right.
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Comment number 2.
At 7th Jun 2009, chilli-mkII wrote:So we're allowed to discuss the Perry situation now? Any attempt to do so on 606 a few weeks ago was quickly removed by the moderators, strange that.....
Golf has had a good reputation for players calling penalties on themselves or preventing opponents from incurring penalties, it's always been one of the best features of golf. It does seem, in the case of Ramsay, that the officials may have been hoping that he would do so rather than forcing them to actively punish him. By leaving it in his hands they have essentially said that they wouldn't punish him if he said that he was content - that isn't strong leadership.
Cases like Perry, and O'Meara at the 1997 Lancome Trophy, are very strange situations - what good comes from bringing these incidents to light so far after the fact? All that it really does is to bring controversy to the tournament and taint the players' name. If it is a clear case of cheating then i'm all for flogging them but all of these seem to be firmly in the 'grey' area.
Still, it would be nice to get back to the days of Bobby Jones and the decision to penalise himself at the 1925 US Open - "You may as well praise a man for not robbing a bank" - now that was a gentleman playing a gentleman's game.
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Comment number 3.
At 8th Jun 2009, Redrage wrote:It was a pretty harsh turn of events. I think they should have been satisfied with his explanation given the conditions.... and he was on the fairway, who much more can you improve your lie in lift and clean conditions from the fairway? It destroyed his chances of getting through the weekend and competing for his maiden win.
There was an incident last year when Robert Karlsson grounded his putter as he addressed a putt and the ball moved. Karlsson told the rules official the ball had moved before he addressed the ball and was allowed to play on without penalty. At the end the same official that gave Ramsay this grilling asked Karlsson to watch the video and asked him again if he stood by his claim as to not to have addressed the ball. Karlsson then deducted a shot from himself. In Karlssons case he got his explantion wrong, Ramsay gave a perfectly fare explanation IMO, to me the official had his mind made up that Ramsay had cheated an was trying his best to make him admit it. That is very poor IMO.
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Comment number 4.
At 8th Jun 2009, Gary wrote:Yes but.... Trial by TV should only be used on the day in question and not after. Afterwards will have no bearing on the result and neither should it because in all honesty the player would have signed his or her scorecard and the score verified and agreed.
I recall an incident many years ago in the USA where Chip Beck clearly improved his lie in a waste area/bunker by removing loose impediments (sand) from around his ball creating a clear approach for him to attack the shot and sitting the ball up as if it was on a tee. There was much debate about this and as we all know trail by TV in the US is much more than here but he managed to get away with it. Clearly sometimes honour is not the same as honesty.
Having said that in a situation of lift, clean and place I thought that the visual evidence was clear to show that Ramsay had made an improvement and thathe should have called the penalty on himself.
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Comment number 5.
At 8th Jun 2009, ThumbsUp wrote:I agree. Tv will on the whole cause more problems than it solves.However, there is no doubt there are times when it is useful. I recall Monty had a problem a few years ago when play resumed after a bad weather delay, he was accused of replacing the baLL in a much more advantageous position. The TV evidence certainly did not look good and though Monty was not officially reprimanded or penalised, he obviously felt guilty at being caught out or embarrased, enough to donate his winnings to charity. But was this action sufficient? In this case, it could definately be argued that he would not have won the tournament if he had not had an improved lie.
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Comment number 6.
At 9th Jun 2009, kwiniaskagolfer wrote:Two points here, Iain.
1).Why are 91Èȱ¬ correspondents permitted to discuss this but not chilli? It's about time some of you at the 91Èȱ¬ took note of the fact that your 606 bloggers know considerably more about the issues in golf than your infernal moderators who do you a daily disservice. It's a great shame you've chosen not to respond to chilli.
2).In most of these cases, Golf needs to look at how closely a golfer should approach his ball in anything other than pristine conditions. PGA Tour players, not just Perry, routinely move the ball as it sits nested in the rough, although 99% of the time the position of the ball is restored naturally. Everyone does it, no exceptions. Golfers should not be permitted to get close enough to their ball where even the merest hint of impropriety is possible. Rough, bunkers, water hazards, imperfections in fairways even, are there to be dealt with, not to be somehow sanitised.
Clearly that doesn't address incorrect positioning of the ball (Tom Kite probably guilty in a famous incident many many years ago) but it would obviate the Ramsay, Beck, Perry nonsense.
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