This Bizarre Rule Can Save You Shots (If You Remember To Use It)

I feel like the Rules of Golf get a bad rap.

Yes, there are some rules that should be amended. Yes, there are some really strange rules that sound fake. Yes, there can be some frustration figuring out how to follow them all.

On the flip side, there are many times when being knowledgable about the Rules of Golf can absolutely save your bacon.

These situations are rare but the smart golfer knows when to press the proper button to get the most out of the rules.

My favorite example when this comes into play:

You can actually replay a putt from your original position if you are in the unenviable position of putting your ball off the green into a spot of bother.

This little-used rule can save you strokes

Golfers tend to only think of penalties as adding to their score.

What if taking a penalty could lower your score?

This is where taking an unplayable lie comes into greater focus.

An unplayable lie—which you can read more about here—is when you take a one-stroke penalty to get yourself out of trouble. Most of us think of it in terms of having your ball stuck in a place where your ball is, well, unplayable.

A bush. Tree roots. Frankenstein’s fat foot. You know the deal.

However, the Rules of Golf clearly state that golfers have the right to take an unplayable lie in any situation.

“If you are in a situation where you don’t want to or don’t think you can play your ball, you always have the option of taking relief under the unplayable ball Rule,” according to the USGA. “You are the only person who can decide that your ball is unplayable, and this can be done anywhere on the golf course except when your ball lies in a penalty area. If your ball is in a penalty area, your only relief option is to take relief under the penalty area Rule.”

So you can take an unplayable lie from anywhere on the course for one penalty stroke. When you do, you have three options.

• Go back to the spot of your previous stroke and play again (stroke-and-distance relief).

• Go back as far as you’d like and drop on the line from the hole through the spot where the ball lies (back-on-the-line relief).

• Drop anywhere within two club-lengths of where your ball lies, no closer to the hole (lateral relief).

You can use this rule to your advantage in a bizarre way

You might be saying to yourself, “Unplayable lies are a common rule. MGS has covered this in the past. What’s your point?”

I have two points to make here.

The first is that unplayable lies are not used enough even in normal situations like the ones I listed above. Too many golfers try risky maneuvers to extract themselves from danger rather than taking a penalty stroke and moving along.

However, my second point here is the purpose of this article.

Golfers should remember that any shot can be replayed for the cost of one penalty stroke.

So let’s say you have a birdie putt on a tricky green and hit the putt a little too hard. It goes into a bunker or trundles off a false front, leaving you with a very difficult shot.

Conventional wisdom would say you have to go chase your ball and then hit it again.

But if your chances of getting the ball inside where you putted from are relatively low, the smartest move would be to replay the putt.

Yes, you can do that!

This is what Phil Mickelson should have done during the 2018 U.S. Open when he double-hit a putt on the 13th hole.

Your birdie putt has turned into a bogey putt—but you take away the risk of an even bigger number.

Because what happens if you go to try that next shot and catch the false front again? Now you might be stick-handling your ball back and forth across the green.

Instead, you could replay the shot. And because you literally just had that shot, you would think this next effort would be considerably better than the original.

There are also other scenarios beyond the green where this could be used. If you are in a relatively good position and hit a shot into a particularly terrible position—where you’ve possibly gone backward—you can save yourself a lot of pain by replaying the shot under the stroke-and-distance penalty.

Is this scenario going to happen a lot? No. Rarely ever.

But imagine pulling this baby out during a match. What a power move.

Would you ever use this rule? Let me know below in the comments.