2023 rule changes to know: A local rule to curb controversial DQs
Soon, your scorecard signature won't hold outsize influence on your tournament play.
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The Rules of Golf are changing — ever so slightly — in 2023. Here’s a few of the most notable changes you need to be aware of.
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Not all DQs are created equal. Particularly not in the world of tournament scoring.
As those who have played golf in competitive settings know, there are a host of rules that accompany tournament play — rules that bring grave consequences for those who do not abide.
At the top of the list of those rules is 3.3b (2), a rule that is arcane in nature but vitally important to those with aspirations of emerging victorious from tournament play. Rule 3.3b (2) “imposes a penalty of disqualification when the hole scores on the scorecard haven’t been certified by the player, the marker, or both.” In other words, those competing in a tournament must sign their scorecard. If not, they’re disqualified. No sig = no dig.
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The rule doesn’t often find its way into use in tournament play, but every so often, a story emerges from one of golf’s forgotten corners. In 2013, an New Zealand-born pro named Nick Gillespie tied the course record at the Victorian Open Championship in Australia with a first-round 65 only to forget to sign his scorecard. He was promptly DQed from an event he was leading after one round. In 2007, Sergio Garcia famously signed for the wrong scorecard at the PGA Championship — a slightly different but no less serious offense (he too was disqualified).
In 2023, however, stories of rule 3.3b (2) finding its way into tournament use may soon grow even more rare. The USGA and R&A announced in November that, among its annual review of changes to the Rules of Golf, it decided to enact Model Local Rule L-1 — a new rule that reduces the penalty for a failed scorecard from a disqualification to a mere two-stroke penalty.
The rule change, in the eyes of golf’s governing bodies, would maintain the spirit of the rule — to punish those who fail to sign their scorecard — without elevating that punishment to the degree of being disqualifiable. The hope is that the rule change will be received as a common-sense decision aimed at enforcing golf’s rules fairly but not unreasonably.
It will be available for tournament committees to input on their own events — including on the PGA Tour, DP World Tour and LPGA Tour — beginning on January 1.
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