Here’s the scenario: You are watching a football game on TV. During the first quarter a team is off sides on a play. The ref doesn’t notice. No penalty. But a viewer at home saw it. That viewer sent an email to officials in NY. That official reviews the tape and sees the penalty that wasn’t called. He contacts the stadium officials. In the 4th quarter of a very close game, that team is assessed the penalty that they should have gotten in the first quarter. It backs them out of field goal range and instead of a game winning field goal, they lose. Ridiculous right? Absolutely!! No viewer at home should have an effect on the outcome of the game.
But, that is not what is happening in golf. The latest stupid penalty came in the fourth round of the LPGA event this past weekend. The infraction came in the 3rd round. But Lexi Thompson wasn’t penalized until the next day. After LPGA officials got an email about something they had seen on TV coverage. FOUR STROKES. That is a huge penalty! There are PGA officials all over that course. It’s their job to be watching for these things. I agree to a penalty for what she did (she didn’t place the ball back in its proper spot) on the day, during the round it happened in. But not 4 strokes the day after!
This has happened in the past. Late calls because a viewer saw something. It should be stopped. It’s not up to us a viewers to police the game. If that were the case they could just do away with refs all together. Maybe that’s what we should do. Instead of refs at the next Super Bowl, why don’t we just take a poll of the viewers and go from there.