Reed penalized for Rules breach at Hero World Challenge
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NASSAU, Bahamas – With players making moves all around him, 36-hole leader Patrick Reed was spinning his wheels with 10 straight pars in the third round of the Hero World Challenge at Albany Golf Club.
Then things got worse.
Reed hit into a bad lie in an unraked portion of the waste area at the par-5 11th hole, and grounded his club with a sand wedge, which is legal. But in taking a few practice swings, he brushed the sand away from behind the ball, seeming to improve his lie as NBC Golf Channel’s cameras captured and replayed the entire sequence.
“He not only did it once,” Dan Hicks said from the broadcast booth, “he did it twice.”
“That is a way better lie than he had,” Paul Azinger added.
All that was left was for Rules officials to review the footage and assess a penalty, or not.
Reed birdied three of the final five holes to salvage an even-par 72 before being told he would in fact be penalized. With two strokes added to his score, it became a 74 as he went from 12 under and a shot off the lead to 10 under and three back going into Saturday’s final round.
After being shown the tape, Reed called it something “I didn’t intentionally do.”
He said it took four or five minutes to review the incident with Rules officials. He was ultimately penalized for improving the line of play.
“You cannot remove or press down loose soil or sand, that’s the bottom line,” said PGA TOUR Vice President of Rules and Competitions Slugger White.
Reed took the news well, White said.
“Intent would not matter here,” he added.
"After seeing the video," Reed said, "it's a two-stroke penalty. I accept that."
Cameron Morfit began covering the PGA TOUR with Sports Illustrated in 1997, and after a long stretch at Golf Magazine and golf.com joined PGATOUR.COM as a Staff Writer in 2016. Follow Cameron Morfit on Twitter.