A player's ball lies on the putting green in 2. The player marks and lifts their ball. The player replaces their ball at another player's nearby ball-marker and sinks the putt. Another player tells the player that they played from the wrong ball-marker. The player replaces the ball at the correct ball-marker and holes the putt. What is the player's score for the hole? 

A.      4

B.      5

C.      6

D.      7

In this week’s question we find a situation that happens from time to time when ball markers are located in close proximity to each other on the putting green. Cleary the player has played their ball from a wrong place and is unsure in how to proceed. The first thing to decide is if the player has committed a serious breach in playing from the wrong location. To help determine this we can reference the definition.

Serious Breach

In stroke play, when playing from a wrong place could give the player a significant advantage compared to the stroke to be made from the right place.

In making this comparison to decide if there was a serious breach, the factors to be taken into account include:

• The difficulty of the stroke,
• The distance of the ball from the hole,
• The effect of obstacles on the line of play, and
• The conditions affecting the stroke.

The concept of a serious breach does not apply in match play, because a player loses the hole if they play from a wrong place.

Based upon this we now know that the player did not gain a significant advantage when playing from the wrong place as it was just a couple of feet from where they should have been. But what procedure is needed to finish the hole correctly and protect our player from being disqualified? Do we need to correct this mistake by playing from the right spot on the green? Is the hole complete and if so what type of penalties are applied? Rule 14.7b will give us a clear understanding of what is needed to have a counting score for the player.

14.7b How to Complete a Hole after Playing from Wrong Place in Stroke Play

(1) Player Must Decide Whether to Play Out Hole with Ball Played from Wrong Place or to Correct the Mistake by Playing from Right Place. What a player does next depends on whether it was a serious breach - that is, whether the player could have gained a significant advantage by playing from a wrong place:

• Not a Serious Breach. The player must play out the hole with the ball played from a wrong place, without correcting the mistake.
• Serious Breach.
• The player must correct the mistake by playing out the hole with a ball played from the right place under the Rules.
• If the player does not correct the mistake before making a stroke to begin another hole or, for the final hole of the round, before returning their scorecard, the player is disqualified.

• What to Do If Uncertain Whether Breach Is Serious. The player should play out the hole with both the ball played from a wrong place and a second ball played from a right place under the Rules.

When the player played the ball from the wrong location the player received a wrong place penalty, 2 strokes, but it was not considered a serious breach. Meaning the hole is over when the ball is holed and there is no penalty for replacing the ball and putting it again.

Based upon this information we can now determine that the player took 3 talent strokes and 2 penalty strokes for a score of 5, making B the correct answer.

Do you have a rules question that you have often wondered about? If so, please send it to dmiller@mvgolf.org for an answer and who knows it could very well be our next “Rules Question of the Week”.