Rules Guy: My ball crossed a yellow-staked penalty area and fell back in. Now what?

The Rules of Golf are tricky! Thankfully, we’ve got the guru. Our Rules Guy knows the book front to back. Got a question? He’s got all the answers.

While watching the Players Championship — and wishing I was at TPC Sawgrass rather than looking at two feet of snow on the ground — I had a rules question regarding the famous island-green 17th hole. If the player’s ball hits the green, then rolls or bounces off the back into the pond, the ball goes over the yellow line marking the hazard. Why can’t the ball be placed where it crossed that line, instead of having to go to the drop zone or re-tee? —David Kocher, Eagle River, Alaska

On the bright side, we suppose you don’t have to worry about alligators on the course up in the Last Frontier…just grizzly bears, from what we’ve read.

As to your question, it’s because that’s specifically not something the Rules allow for a ball in a penalty area when it last crosses the edge where it’s yellow.

By rule, the player’s only two options are stroke and distance (in this instance, play again from the tee) or use back-on-the-line relief, which would take the player back across the pond behind the green.

Rules

The PGA Tour also provides a dropping zone as a third penalty relief option — something that tends to get a lot of use. If the lines were red instead, dropping within two club lengths of where the ball last crossed the edge, no nearer the hole, would be allowed. Hope you thaw out soon!

For more penalty-area guidance from our guru, read on …

I hit my drive into a lateral hazard, a drainage ditch marked by red stakes. The ditch was dry, so I had a swing at the ball …  except a small wooden bridge was in my swing path. Could I have taken relief from the bridge and, if so, hit from outside of the hazard? —John Ryan, Fairhaven, Mass.

Driving into a ditch next to a bridge isn’t the kind of thing one walks away from unscathed.

Under Rule 17.3, you don’t get free relief from an immovable object, such as a bridge with the ball in a red-staked penalty area.

Your options are to play the ball as it lies or take relief from the penalty area for a one-stroke penalty.

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Got a question about the Rules? Ask the Rules Guy! Send your queries, confusions and comments to rulesguy@golf.com. We promise he won’t throw the book at you.