Rules?

Which rules should be exculed from the "Official Rule Book" and if they are in the book do we need to follow them?

[Erin]

All I have to say is Section 804.06 Grouping and Sectioning, part C.

[eric beich]

tagging to see what becomes of this. personally I've never encountered any rules that have really hindered my fun level in any tournaments but my experience tourney-wise is way less than others.

the only things Ive seen cause problems have been when a tourney has lots of mando's and OB's added by a TD and hastily put in a player handout and explained at the players meeting ,which still left some confusion once actually playing those particular holes.
and OMG, Erin.. have you ever perused the PDGA forums in the rules section? haha. thats a joy.
but some good discussions nonetheless.

good topic.
oh yeah, curious as to what part of this?
C. Groups shall not be less than three players, except under extenuating circumstances, as deemed necessary by the director, to promote fairness. In cases where fewer than three players are required to play together, an official is required to accompany the group and may play as long as this does not interfere with the competing players

[JC]

What is "exculed"?

If you're playing a tournament, ALL the rules ought to be followed. Can't really pick and choose. Casual play however...do what you want, knock yourself out.

[eric beich]

haha, Tim, your a goofball!!

[Erin]

If a rule is not going to be enforced and all players believe that the rule doesn't matter, then way do we still have it? How are players supposed to know which rules they need to follow in the rule book and which ones they can ignore? Section 804.06 Grouping and Sectioning, part C, implies that 2-somes are not allowed to ensure fairness unless there is an official with the group. Well at a recent A teir event I heard that there was a little problem with this. I don't understand why people would advise other players to ignore this rule...it's in the rule book and the TD did not declare it out of effect. So if this rule is so unimportant why have it at all? is it a pick and choose your own rule book? I believe there needs to be some revisions to our official rules so "little" rules like that one can have a chance to be re-wrote to be more effective...like actually having a punishment besides DNF. I understant trying to bend the rules a little to stop someone from getting a DNF...but i think there needs to be a long term solution to this. because frankly if i'm not going to be punished for breaking some rules, i am not going to go out of my way to follow try to follow those rules. If we want our sport to continue to grow and become mainstream we have to have a set rules that we are going to enforce. Not a set of rules just for the sake of having a set of rules.

[kcbrez009]

It depends, I think. I'm not a fan of every rule, and when I'm with a buddy or my kids or by myself, we play by our own rules. If you're playing in a tournament, however, all of the rules should be followed closely so that everyone has equal footing.

A lot of ball golfers do the same thing with mulligans, improving lies, "winter rules," and that sort of thing. I've thrown a second disc after it hit "that tree," if you know what I mean, on many occasions when we're just out pitching plastic. The key is to be sure that you have fun while keeping everyone involved on a level playing field.

[JC]

Enforcement starts in one place...YOU.

If you believe the rules need to be enforced, you have to enforce them yourself before you can expect others to enforce them the same way. Re-writing rules that you believe aren't being enforced anyway isn't going to suddenly cause them to be enforced more often.

But you've peaked my interest...what was the way that the grouping rule was bent to accommodate players in an unfair way. Nothing more frustrating than vague innuendos of something without a clear explanation. The rule states that groups shall be no less than three, UNLESS there are extenuating circumstances as deemed necessary by the TD. Well, without details of the incident, how are we to know that there weren't perfectly valid reasons for a two-some to play a round?

Players shouldn't be ignoring any rule. Just because one is ignored by a player or a group or a TD doesn't make it right or a general invitation to ignore rules yourself. Speak up if you think something is wrong. It's the only way to rectify situations.

[JC]

If there was no seconding in place, what would stop a jerk of a player from just calling random violations on other players? I could call you on a foot fault on EVERY throw and what would stop me? Do you see where this is going?

As for nothing getting called, it's because most players have no guts. See it and call it, it's not hard. If you're considered an a-hole for playing by the rules, oh well. My experience has been more that people just aren't paying attention. I've called foot faults and had no second because nobody else was paying attention...they had their head in the bag looking for a disc or they were off looking for their own drive, who knows. Fact was they weren't watching.

Personally, I call what I see. If I'm the a-hole, so be it. If I don't get a second, so be it. If you aren't attempting to call rules violations yourself when you see them, then there's really no room to complain that no one else is calling them either.

I don't mean to rant, but it's a bit of a pet peeve of mine. I see it as no different than blaming a disc for a poor throw (and who hasn't seen or heard that before?). The old adage, "it's not the arrow, it's the Indian" is often applied to the discs we use. It can be applied to the rulebook too. The rules aren't broken, the people not using/enforcing them properly is what's really the matter.

[CAZ]

My response to these two posts
"What is "excluded"?

If you're playing a tournament, ALL the rules ought to be followed. Can't really pick and choose. Casual play however...do what you want, knock yourself out."

"Enforcement starts in one place...YOU.

If you believe the rules need to be enforced, you have to enforce them yourself before you can expect others to enforce them the same way. Re-writing rules that you believe aren't being enforced anyway isn't going to suddenly cause them to be enforced more often."

My response to that is the rules that are excluded would be rules that are written and not enforced with any other action than a warning. You may ask what that would be and I will tell you the rule about groups of two is not an enforceable rule. The reason I know this is because at the said A tier there was not a group of two but 5 groups some consisting of pros and some ams. When I complained I was told that it is a rule but there is no penalty for it. Well in that case thanks a lot rules committee for wasting PDGA time, paper, ink and money for a worthless rule that cannot be enforced. I do understand a lot of it is volunteer work but why volunteer to waste PDGA resources?

As for enforcement starts with me....well tell that to the person on the rules committee and all the upper ams and pros that were so angry with me at pointing it out and complaining that nothing was done. Not only were they mad they called the president of my club CCR to complain about me wanting rules enforcement. They and members of my club wanted to kick me out and ban me from club events because I disagreed with a person on the rules committee who was wrong. Well to them I say this "why are you so threatened by an am 3 complaining rules were not followed if you’re so right"

The fact of the matter is it was an A tier and rules were broken. The TD agrees but has also said that the rule does not call for a punishment. This in and of itself is a lack of forethought and common sense that the rules committee needs to address!

[CAZ]

OH and on a side note I feel so outcast for calling a rules violation I see why people do not take this game serious and stick with it.

Would you play any other sport if you were the only one who cared if everyone played by the same rules?
How about if a ref told you I wrote the rule so what I say is right...even though the rules clearly say it is not....would you still play?

With all this said I want to thank everyone who has the courage and guts to call what they see and who stick to their guns when other players berate them for their honesty!

[JC]

Oh, ok, "exculed" is supposed to be "excluded"...well, that makes some sense then. THAT's why I asked in the first place.

I still don't know what the crux of the issue is here. All I've gathered is that there were two-somes at an A-tier and no one did anything about it. Were those two-somes created intentionally by the TD? If so, what reason did he give? If not, how did they come about? Because there certainly is recourse to penalize players who intentionally play in two-somes...rule 804.05 A (3).

The reason I ask is that the rule states that there shall be groups of no less than three UNLESS there are extenuating circumstances. If there were such circumstances and the TD can justify them, then no rules were broken. There is no punishment for this because the rule has an out clause for TDs in a pinch.

So I'll ask again...why were there two-somes?

And there is most certainly recourse for a TD "breaking" a rule...report him/her to the PDGA for it. The PDGA can sanction a TD for poor practices...suspend him/her from running an event, knock the event down a tier next year...all kinds of things. There doesn't need to be a specific punishment in the rule book...how would you as a player penalize a TD in an event anyway? If he's the one putting the two-somes together, is it fair to penalize the players involved? I'd say no.

I guess the bottom line is I personally have no idea what happened. All I have are rather vague explanations to read. "Rules were broken"...how, when, why, and by whom? Until I do know what exactly happened, I'm not going to support re-writing or exclusion of rules.

[CAZ]

Ok first I want to say the TD did an awesome job and did not send any twosome out intentionally.
However there were groups with varying reasons...players walked off, no shows and the like. I do know one twosome did report to the TD and he sent an official with them...as REQUIERD by the rules. I do not have an issue with that group as they did what was required as good players.

The other groups were just negligent of the rules and not just a little but a lot. The am 3 group that did it allowed a casual to play along (no the casual was not an official or with the event.

I do not want to report the TD as he, as best as I understand it, would also like clarification on this also, and he did the best he could considering the situation.

My big pet peeve was when a pro told me that there is a rule they can be penalized with but he said I need to find it. To him I say he helped people cheat if he was unwilling to point the rule out himself.

The biggest problem was a person on the rules committee and who carries a lot of weight in the disc golf world and he had told a group of pros to play in a twosome with no official. Not this person was not an official with the event he was just another player. he was mad that an am 3, me, said that he was wrong in doing so and as the pdga tour manager said to me "the white rabbit could have given them ( the 2 pros) permission he was not in any position to make that call as he was not the TD."

I do have to say I respected the said player a great deal until that event! I have no respect for any player big name pro or am 3 that breaks or tweaks rules to suit their cause or opinion!

If anyone wants to ask more specific questions feel free to call me 269-929-0023 and if you want to tell me I’m stupid and you don’t agree then call me then too, I know I would respect that more than calling my club president and complaining to him as if he were my mommy.