re: Hitting wrong ball is stupid penalty

quote:

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Never offered an excuse. I ate the penalty, I just provided context on how it happened and my thought on how it is a stupid rule.

It provides no advantage to a player....everyone gets put back into the same position they were in prior to the strike...there is no intent. Many of the rule changes that have taken place have been predicated on no intent. For example, contact with ball in practice swing, double hits....all used to be penalties.

I ate it.....I just think it is a dumb rule, but most seem to disagree.

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You did the right thing. I play in a Sunday money round every week. They are sticklers for certain rules. I agree with most rules but disagree with a few. But, we all agree on the rules before the round and you agree to play by the rules. I've started marking a line around my ball with a line marking tool. It's pretty easy to mark, you know your ball is marked with the line and it's visible any way you look at it. Nobody else marks their ball that way in my group. Lesson learned.

I may get downvoted to hell for my opinions here, but my least favorite rule is having to play out of a divot. Doesn't come up real often, but divots aren't avoidable hazards and increases the chance of a bad hit a lot. I dislike the rule even at the PGA level. My group also doesn't allow you to remove a ball from a footprint in the sand trap. And municipal courses, people are terrible about raking the traps. None of us are good enough to be making highly skilled shots with perfect lies, let alone low percentage lies.

In the end, I'd rather lose playing by the rules than win by cheating the rules.