Monday Rap: Peter Malnati Continues The Longshot Trend With Some Major Help From The Rules Of Golf

Julio Aguilar. Getty Images.

To be abundantly clear, this is not a knock on Peter Malnati. Golf punches you in the mouth repeatedly, particularly if you play the game for a living, so when it throws you a bone you take that bone and you run with it. He used the rules to his advantage, which is exactly what anyone else what do. 

The issue, then, with the finish of the Valspar Championship has nothing to do with Malnati, who won for the first time in nine years and, at more than 300-1 to win the event going into the week, continued the trend of mega longshot winners on the PGA Tour this year. It lies with the rules of golf. 

On the 16th hole on Sunday, while tied for the lead with Cameron Young, Malnati badly pulled his approach from the fairway toward the very left side of the green. His yellow golf ball landed on the back of the green and trickled into the rough, ultimately nestling down into what looked like a pretty gnarly lie. He'd have to judge a delicate chip from there and it'd be extremely difficult to judge the speed…only that's not what happened at all. When Malnati arrived at his ball he realized that, when he took a stance to play the chip, his left foot was sitting squarely on a sprinkler head. That entitles Malnati to a free drop under rule 24-2, which covers immovable obstructions. The player is entitled to free relief if the obstruction impacts his stance or swing, not only if the ball is sitting on it. What's more, Malnati quickly realized that his nearest point of relief—which is where you're supposed to drop the ball—wasn't further into the rough but actually back toward the green. By rule, a player is not allowed to drop a ball in this scenario onto the green, but he is allowed to take a full club length from his nearest point of relief and drop it anywhere inside that club length. In this instance, that meant Malnati could drop his ball directly onto the fringe. What was a very dicey up-and-down proposition on the 70th hole of the tournament became a pretty straightforward two-putt, which he handled without incident. 

That's not right. Again, it's not Malnati's fault for using the rule to his advantage. It's the rule's fault. You should not be able to improve your playing conditions because you were lucky enough to have your ball finish close to an immovable obstruction. And there are, in fact, rules protecting against improving your playing conditions if you're in a hazard or a bunker. If your ball finishes in a bunker and there's an immovable obsturction situation, your free drop still has to be in a bunker. Here it is verbatim:

b) Relief
Except when the ball is in a water hazard or a lateral water hazard, a player may take relief from interference by an immovable obstruction as follows:
(i) Through the Green: If the ball lies through the green, the player must lift the ball and drop it, without penalty, within one club-length of and not nearer the hole than the nearest point of relief. The nearest point of relief must not be in a hazard or on a putting green. When the ball is dropped within one club-length of the nearest point of relief, the ball must first strike a part of the course at a spot that avoids interference by the immovable obstruction and is not in a hazard and not on a putting green.
(ii) In a Bunker: If the ball is in a bunker, the player must lift the ball and drop it either:
(a) Without penalty, in accordance with Clause (i) above, except that the nearest point of relief must be in the bunker and the ball must be dropped in the bunker; or
(b) Under penalty of one stroke, outside the bunker keeping the point where the ball lay directly between the hole and the spot on which the ball is dropped, with no limit to how far behind the bunker the ball may be dropped.

Why is it any different when the ball's in the rough? Rough is not technically a hazard as defined by the rules of golf but rough is clearly intended to be an impediment to a golf shot. You should not be able to skirt that impediment due to a technicality. One of the only rules guarding scrambles, perhaps the friendliest golf format, is that if your team's ball finishes in the rough, you have to then play from the same grass type. You can't put a tee in the ground next to a ball that's one yard in the rough, take a clublength relief and then drop it in the fairway and play from there. And the best players in the world shouldn't get to do this on the 70th hole of a PGA Tour event just because they're standing on a sprinkler head. Malnati should've had three options: 

1. Play the ball as it lies 
2. Drop the ball in the same playing conditions (same grass) as it came to rest, no penalty
3. Drop the ball within one club length of the nearest point of relief, with a one-stroke penalty

Pretty simple fix here. I don't expect a change to actually happen, but it should. Let's also note that Malnati birdied the 17th hole and won the tournament by two in the end. He likely still wins if he didn't get that all-time lucky break. But he did, and it shouldn't happen moving forward. 

With that out of the way, we're now free to give Malnati his flowers. He's something of an easy target on tour. He's a Midwest kid. He didn't play at some blue-blood program. He's hardly ever in contention. He's extremely kind and polite and because we're such a cynical society that can often be misconstrued as disingenuous, but he really is that nice. It's one of the reasons he's stepped up to represent the "rank-and-file" among the PGA Tour player directors on the policy board; he's one of just six guys serving that role, and he's frequently been a voice for those outside the Player Impact Program rankings. When he got a sponsor's invite into the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am the general consensus was that he got it because he's on the board, and that it wasn't fair. How sweet it must feel for him to now get the W and earn his first start in the Masters at the age of 36. He's also now into all the signature events for the rest of the year. He can now turn to all the rank-and-file guys who're no doubt in his hear about the closed-shop nature of the signature events and say hey guys, I earned my way into them and you can too. 

Malnati used his bully pulpit at his post-win press conference to spread a message about the soul of the PGA Tour, which I thought was pretty cool.

I don't know specifically what is being said about me, about the PGA Tour, about our sport in general, but I know the direction that it has been going for the last couple years," Malnati said. "And when I was outside, I was compelled to say this. I feel like this win, this win is, you know, first and foremost, it is, it's for me, it's for my family, it's for my caddie, it's for my team of people who support me. But on a larger scale it's also, it's for Tampa, it's for the Copperheads, it's for Valspar, and it's for all the events on the PGA Tour who find themselves in this new ecosystem kind of wondering where they fit and if they matter because I wanted -- I said this out there because I wanted the Copperheads and the people of Tampa and the people from Valspar to know that there are thousands of Peter Malnatis out there who are 10 years old right now, teenagers right now, who dream of playing golf on the PGA Tour, and they want to have the moment that I just got to have. If we don't have communities that believe in what the PGA Tour does and sponsors who support what the PGA TOUR does, we don't have those moments.

"I know that the narrative turns a lot to we're coming up to Augusta, we're preparing for the majors, we're in that season. In terms of the actual people who participate in golf at the highest level, 90 percent of us dream of the moment that I just had. There's a 10 percent that really do probably gear their schedules and focus on the majors, but 90 percent of the people who have made it to the top level of professional golf and a hundred percent of the people who dream of being at the top level of professional golf, live for that moment that I just had. It's amazing. I'm proud of myself, I did a lot of hard work, I'm proud of my family, they supported me, but it doesn't matter, all that hard work and everything. We don't have tournaments to play in if we don't have communities that think these tournaments matter, and if we don't have host organizations like the Copperheads and, you know, several other amazing host organizations around the country, we don't have a PGA Tour."

Another near-miss for Cameron Young

One man's win is another man's heartbreak, and what a brutal near-miss for Cameron Young yet again. He's among the 5 or 10 most talented players on the PGA Tour from a ball striking perspective. He's a guy that stops you in your tracks on the driving range. He's a guy other players point to as someone who's able to hit shots they're not able to. But he simply has not been able to summon the magic when it matters most. Young played an excellent back nine to get himself into a tie for the lead with two holes to play. He missed a good look at birdie on 17, but that happens. It was 18 feet. You're going to miss more of those than you make. But what happened on 18 was inexcusable. 

Young bailed himself out after a horrible drive with a nice recovery shot to the right side of the green. Just as this was happening, Malnati birdied 17 to push it to 12 under and take a one-shot lead. If you're Young, you simply have to find a way to two-putt the final green from 50 feet and make Malnati earn it with a par at the last. Instead, he left his approach putt a good 9 feet short and missed the par putt for a backbreaking three-putt bogey. He was, predictably, not enthused after the round when asked what his emotions were. 

"I don't know," Young said. "Honestly, I realized I wasn't going to win pretty quickly, and I have a four-hour drive home with a one and a two year old, so whatever emotions are attached to that."

Feel that. Feel that hard. 

Nelly Korda gets it done in California

Nelly Korda made his first LPGA start this week since winning the LPGA Drive On Championship in January, ending a seven-week break. This wasn't the most standard case of winning back-to-back on tour, then, but that's exactly what it was. Korda handled tricky conditions at a very windy Palos Verdes Golf Club in Los Angeles to win her 10th LPGA title in a playoff over Ryann O'Toole. 

Korda began the day trailing by two but had a three-shot lead after this eagle on the par-5 14th, which was captured expertly by some very cool camera work. 

She bogeyed the 18th and had to wait a considerable amount of time for the playoff with O'Toole to begin. Both players missed the fairway and both players found the green, only for Korda to heart a 15-footer for her second consecutive victory. 

The victory brings her back to world No. 1 and let's hope she can build on this and carry it into major season, because Korda has breakthrough star potential to appeal to a general sporting audience. A dominant Korda in 2024 would absolutely help grow the women's game. 

Elsewhere…

—Jesper Svensson won the Singapore Classic on the DP World Tour in a playoff over…Kiradech Aphibarnrat! Yes! The Barn Rat! Back! It's his best finish since a T2 at the BMW PGA Championship in 2021. 

—Another Thai player finished second this week—Thongchai Jaidee, who lost by one shot to Padraig Harrington in the Hoag Classic on the PGA Tour Champions. Harrington, 52, has now won seven times on the senior circuit and shows precisely zero signs of slowing down. He still plays a full schedule, a mix between PGA Tour and DP World Tour and PGA Tour Champions events, in addition to filming tons of content for his Paddy's Golf Tips series on YouTube. He's still smashing it 300+ yards. He seems to never, ever tire. 

—We're inching ever closer to the Masters, which begins in 17 days. Only two Texas events on the PGA Tour are left before Augusta: this week's Texas Children's Open and next week's Valero Texas Open. Scottie Scheffler is back in action this week looking to win his third consecutive PGA Tour event. He's listed at just +300 to win the tournament this week, making him the biggest favorite on the PGA Tour since Jon Rahm opened at +240 at last year's Mexico Open at Vidanta. He finished solo second that week to Tony Finau, who's the defending champion this week. 

—It sure seems like the PGA Tour is making strides in its ongoing negotiation with the Saudi Public Investment Fund over a potential investment. The six player directors, including Tiger Woods, met with PIF chairman Yasir al-Rumayyan at Albany in the Bahamas early last week to discuss the future of the professional game. This meeting should've happened months ago, but better late than never. Woods and al-Rumayyan played golf together. PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan relayed a bare-bones summary of the meeting to membership before warning that he cannot publicly comment on an ongoing negotiation. Onward this saga goes. 

Until next week,

Dan

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