{"id":35029,"date":"2022-06-03T13:12:40","date_gmt":"2022-06-03T13:12:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/hideki-matsuyama-disqualified-from-the-memorial-for-substance-on-club\/"},"modified":"2022-06-03T13:12:40","modified_gmt":"2022-06-03T13:12:40","slug":"hideki-matsuyama-disqualified-from-the-memorial-for-substance-on-club","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/hideki-matsuyama-disqualified-from-the-memorial-for-substance-on-club\/","title":{"rendered":"Hideki Matsuyama disqualified from the Memorial for substance on club"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Hideki Matsuyama was disqualified from the Memorial Tournament on Thursday because of what a rules official described as an \u201cexcessive\u201d amount of a white substance on the face of his 3-wood.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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It was Matsuyama’s first disqualification from an event on the PGA Tour, on which he began competing regularly in 2013. A 30-year-old native of Japan, he has eight tour wins, including the 2021 Masters and a victory at the Memorial in 2014 .<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Matsuyama has played in the tournament every year since then, with two more top-six finishes, but his appearance this time was brief. Chief referee Steve Rintoul told reporters that he first spoke with Matsuyama about the situation on the fifth hole before telling him to play on while Rintoul conferred with equipment experts from the USGA.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Matsuyama was disqualified after playing nine holes in Thursday’s first round and carding a 3-over 39. He reportedly left the Muirfield Village course in Dublin, Ohio, without speaking to the media.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Had he not used the 3-wood by the time Rintoul spoke with him, Matsuyama would have been allowed to stay in the tournament, with a warning to leave that club in his bag. However, after confirming to Rintoul that he used it to tee off at the first hole, the \u201cdamage was done,\u201d said the official.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cOne shot and it’s a disqualification,\u201d said Rintoul. “… Just unfortunate set of circumstances for Hideki, for sure.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Rintoul described the substance on Matsuyama’s club face as similar to the white-out fluid used to correct typography mistakes on paper. The substance was arranged in a circle of small lines around the center of the club face, which Rintoul called \u201cexcessive\u201d and indicated was probably meant to help Matsuyama’s setup.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIt’s okay to have very small discrete markings on your face for alignment purposes, like a Sharpie dot here and there, that aren’t going to influence the ball,\u201d Rintoul said. “But that much substance is clearly above what the equipment rules allow.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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If the lines had been painted \u201cin the bottom of the grooves where it’s not on the face, not making contact with the ball,\u201d that would have been acceptable, Rintoul added. However, the position and quantity of the substance made it possible to affect the flight of the ball and potentially reduce spin. Rintoul noted that applying lip balm to the face of the driver, which can help keep shots straight, is illegal.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Passage 4.a. (3) of the USGA’s Rules of Golf came into play, said the official. In that section, the rules state: “A player must not make a stroke with a club whose performance characteristics he or she deliberately changed during the round … [b]y applying any substance to the clubhead (other than in cleaning it) to affect how it performs in making a stroke. “<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Rintoul said tournament officials learned of Matsuyama’s 3-wood after images of it were posted online and flagged by an unidentified \u201cperson in the golf industry\u201d after Matsuyama started his round. The official asserted that the only silver lining of the situation was that it was handled early in the tournament, as opposed to a scenario in which Matsuyama could have played into the weekend and been in contention before his fairway wood’s markings came to light.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIt’s never a good time to disqualify a good player,\u201d said Rintoul. “But certainly getting it out of the way before it impacts the competition is the best way forward.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Placeholder while article actions load Hideki Matsuyama was disqualified from the Memorial Tournament on Thursday because of what a rules official described as an \u201cexcessive\u201d amount of a white substance on the face of his 3-wood. It was Matsuyama’s first disqualification from an event on the PGA Tour, on which he began competing regularly in …<\/p>\n

Hideki Matsuyama disqualified from the Memorial for substance on club<\/span> Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/wp-apps\/imrs.php?src=https:\/\/arc-anglerfish-washpost-prod-washpost.s3.amazonaws.com\/public\/6FNGABME7BE37MR6BNIMJNCVRE.jpg&w=1440","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35029"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35029\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}