- 2018 Masters champion picked up ball before official arrived
- Reed penalized in 2019 over incident at Hero World Challenge
- Rory McIlroy involved in similar incident on Saturday
- Both players cleared of any wrongdoing by PGA Tour
Associated Press
Sun 31 Jan 2021 12.46 EST
Patrick Reed was involved in another rules controversy in the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines before being cleared of any wrongdoing by the PGA Tour.
On the par-four 10th, Reed hit a 190-yard shot out of a bunker with a TV replay showing the ball bounced once before settling into the rough. Believing the ball didn’t bounce, Reed picked it up to see if it was embedded before a rules official arrived. Reed told the official that no one in his group, as well as a nearby volunteer, saw it bounce.
Reed was awarded a free drop and saved par. He bogeyed four of the next holes before birdieing No 18 for a two-under 70 and a share of the lead with Ortiz at 10 under. Ortiz had a 66 on the South Course.
Rory McIlroy was involved in a similar situation at the Farmers Open on Saturday, ESPN reported on Sunday. The PGA concluded that both players acted correctly.
In December 2019 in Tiger Woods’ Hero World Challenge in the Bahamas, Reed was penalized two strokes for appearing to deliberately improve his lie in a bunker.
“It’s an unfortunate situation obviously, but at the end of the day when you finish a round and the head rules official comes up to you and has the video and shows everything that went down to the whole group and says that you’ve done this perfectly, you did this the exact right way, the protocols you did were spot on, at that point, you know, I feel great about it,” Reed said after Saturday’s round.
“The ball just disappeared. None of us saw it bounce,” said Reed, who added that a nearby volunteer told him that it did not bounce. “I looked at my group and said, ‘Guys, she didn’t see it bounce it, either, so I’m going to mark this ball and see if it’s embedded.’
“Once I marked it, the first thing I wanted to do was make sure I got the ball out of my hand because you don’t want to clean it or anything because you don’t know if it’s embedded yet. When I put my finger down there and felt like it has broken ground, the first thing you do is call the rules official. … The rules official said, ‘Yes, this ball has broken the plane.’”
John Mutch, Ken Tackett and Gary Young have reviewed the Rory McIlroy videos from No. 18 yesterday and determined that it was virtually the same situation that Patrick Reed faced. Both players took proper relief under the Rule 16/3. https://t.co/Xt2jJ6aO2m
— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) January 31, 2021
The PGA Tour said in a statement that Reed and McIlroy had acted properly.
“It was reasonable for both players to conclude – based on the fact that they did not see the ball land, but given the lie of the ball in soft course conditions – that they proceed as the rule allows for a potential embedded ball,” the tour said in a statement. “They marked, lifted and assessed the situation to determine if the ball was embedded.”
The ground was soft because of rain overnight on Thursday and during the second round on Friday, when play was suspended for nearly an hour because of a storm.
The tournament concludes on Sunday.
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