Paul McGinley has expressed his amazement that a seemingly controversial incident involving Brooks Koepka’s caddie during the opening round of The Masters wasn’t found to be a rules breach.
After Koepka’s second shot on the 15th at Augusta National, his caddie Ricky Elliott appeared to say “five” to Gary Woodland’s caddie Brennan Little, which seemed to suggest he had advised his counterpart on the club Koepka used.
If you go back and watch on the "Holes 15 and 16" feed, it looks like Koepka's caddie says "5" to Woodland's caddie after Brooks' 2nd shot. Which, at first glance, looked like he was saying that Brooks hit 5-iron (Woodland had not hit yet). https://t.co/hd2yctOqDCApril 6, 2023
That would have been a breach of Rule 10.2a of the Rules of Golf, which states: “During a round, a player must not give advice to anyone in the competition who was playing on the course.” In that instance, the caddie is an extension of the player, meaning Elliott would have breached the rules.
However, after questioning Elliott, The Masters Committee didn’t see it that way, and, in a statement, said: "All involved were adamant that no advice was given or requested" and that there had been no breach of the rules.
However, those denials of foul play baffled McGinley, who said: “It’s very obvious. It’s staggering that they’ve denied it because the evidence is there."
McGinley then went on to suggest that the Committee could have used the incident as an example to persuade others from breaching the rule, but chose not to. He said: “If the authorities want to stamp this out and really come down on this and make an example of it and obviously they haven't. They've chosen not to do that and it looked very clearly the evidence was against them."
Unsurprisingly, The Masters has far more attention than most tournaments and its website shows every shot of every player, so it’s highly likely any incident of contention will be scrutinised.
Still, McGinley said that where it comes to Rule 10.2a, it’s simply not something most pay much heed to. He said: "I don't think there's a player in the field hand on heart who could say that they or their caddie at some stage hasn't either taken the hand off the club so the other player could see it or something. I's just not seen as a serious breach."
The incident between the caddies wasn’t the only contentious issue during the opening round. A rules incident involving Collin Morikawa had set social media alight after he marked and replaced his ball on the 6th hole. However, like the issue with Elliott, Morikawa was later cleared of any rules breach.
