Anchoring: The Problem Isn’t With The Rule, It’s With The Rules Makers

No matter what you think of the proposed ban on putter anchoring, you should be upset by how the USGA/R&A went about the process. I don’t mean giving 90 days to discuss it, but how it came about at all years after they had the chance to nip it in the bud and didn’t. Are the ruling bodies in panic mode simply because the last few major champions anchored? Is this really, as some people have suggested, because someone with influence doesn’t like the aesthetics of anchoring?

What I think we have to worry about is that this actually is the USGA’s attempt to test the waters for further self-appointed decision-making about equipment (e.g., ball standards). Why are they building up a war chest of money? To fight, in court, when they decide to force one ball down everyone’s throats? That’s what I’m hearing.

I don’t like changing rules after the fact because someone has been clever enough to find a legal way around it. Why not pass a rule against taping the hockey stick, microphones in quarterbacks’ helmets, or stuffing the basketball? I’m sure you can find knowledgeable fans who find those tricks unappealing and against the traditions of their games.
And I also don’t like making golf harder than it already is, especially for those of us less skilled than the pros. Whether or not the anchoring ban will hurt the growth of the game (something I sincerely doubt), changing the rules mid-stream could be detrimental to the game: One of the reasons golf is great and appeals to so many is its adherence, even if it’s just what we say, to a code of rules. But making a change like this, for no rational reason, erodes our confidence in the rules and our likelihood of living by them.

Finally, I can only laugh at the USGA/R&A for applying a real “Catch 22” to the rules. In effect what this anchoring ban says is that those two bodies aren’t going to tell us what the rules are until we break them, and then we’ll change them. Why? Because we can.