This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

The Southern California Golf Association came up a few days with 15 major golf rules violations in 2022.

Here, I won’t repeat all the 15, but will focus on this one:  Hughes misses cut after wrong ball penalty.

The story said this:

“PGA Tour pro Mackenzie Hughes has every right to be angry at one rules official in particular who may have cost him thousands of dollars.

“It all began after Hughes’ second shot on the par-5 9th at Torrey Pines North Course during the Farmers Insurance Open.  According to Hughes, he walked up to a flag placed by a marshal that had marked a ball, hit his next shot to within a few feet, and marked before his par putt — only to learn that the ball he had hit wasn’t his, and that his real ball was a couple yards away from the one he hit with his third shot.

“Despite the fact that the marshal deserves some share of blame, it was a clear violation of Rule 6.3c, and the result was a devastating two-stroke penalty.  The blunder had happened on Hughes’ final hole of the second round, causing him to miss the cut by a single stroke.”

Why does this story capture my attention?

Well, exactly the same thing happened to son, Eric, as he played in a Nike Tour event at Shadow Hills Golf Club in Junction City, Oregon.

I was on the bag as Eric’s caddy.

As we came to hole #5, a par five, Eric hit a decent drive, but it landed in the rough to the left of the fairway.  We walked toward his ball which had been marked by a volunteer with a flag in the rough.

Eric proceeded to hit a decent second shot, which put him in the middle of the fairway about 150 yards from the green.  A par looked achievable.

However!

When we got to his ball in the fairway, both of us learned that, like the story about Mackenzie Hughes, the ball was not his.

The volunteer had marked the wrong ball!

It was his fault, but, of course, as is always the case, the two-stroke penalty belonged to the player. 

And, as for the caddy, me?  I bore at least a portion of the responsibility because, as a good caddy would have done, I should have reminded Eric to check markings on his ball in the rough before hitting it.

Didn’t do that.  My bad.

So, Eric, with a two-stroke penalty, made a 7 on the hole rather than a par 5.

Lesson learned?  No doubt.

I wish the penalty would have been given to me.  I deserved it.