When Your Heroes Let You Down

I've noted here before that Phil Mickelson is my favorite golfer.  His go-for-broke style on the course and the time that he makes for fans off the course endears him to millions of other golfers.  I've defended him in arguments that he is a phony and is just as snobbish as Tiger Woods--but that he puts on a public persona that has made him as popular as Tiger--without the same amount of success.  He even skated on an insider trading allegation that sent one of his best friends to Federal Prison.  But Phil's actions over the weekend at the US Open make me question his integrity as not only a player, but also as a person.

In case you missed it, Phil was having a horrible third round in brutal conditions at Shinnecock Hills when he struck a putt on the 13th hole too hard.  When it became clear that the putt was going to roll off the green and back down the fairway, Phil ran after the ball and hit it while it was in motion back toward the hole.  It was the kind of thing that you see a four year old do at the mini-golf place with the waterfall and the windmill--not in the middle of a major championship.

Social media immediately went insane--demanding that Mickelson be disqualified from the tournament--and once again questioning his integrity.  Phil made things worse in his post-round interviews by playing off the incident as some kind of joke, claiming he had thought about doing it in the past and knowing that it would only cost him 2-strokes--instead of the three or four he faced having to chip back onto the green from a very difficult angle.  He smiled and called it "taking advantage of the rules"--rather than the egregious breaking of the rules that it really was.

The United State Golf Association--the so-called "Keepers of the Game" that develop and enforce the rules of the sport--added fuel to the fire by assessing Phil just the two-stroke penalty and not disqualifying him.  Those officials twisted their interpretations of the rules in a way that made it clear they were not going to DQ one of the most popular players in the history of the game--even though he clearly deserved it.  That decision just compounded an ugly situation that started earlier in the day with multiple player complaints about the near impossibility of the course due to the USGA setup.

When I got up on Sunday morning, I expected to hear that the USGA had changed it mind and had disqualified Phil.  I also thought that Phil would issue his own statement, saying that after further consideration, he realized that his actions were a serious breach of the rules, hurt the sport and embarrassed his fellow pros--and that he was withdrawing from the tournament on his own.  But, none of those statements were ever issued.

Golf is a sport that prides itself on being a game of honor.  Players are expected to police themselves, calling penalties on themselves for rules violations that perhaps no one else saw.  The USGA has promoted that in some of its promotional videos and commercials.  We have lauded pros like JP Hayes of Appleton that DQ'ed himself from PGA Tour qualifying a few years ago because he used a prototype ball that had not yet been approved for play by the USGA--costing himself his career.

But Phil Mickelson's actions--and the USGA's gutless decision not to send him home immediately--have sullied the sport's reputation.  And it has proved yet again that all of our idols have feet of clay.