PGA Tour officials unexpectedly forced to move hole location mid-round after player’s shot damages cup

MEMPHIS — Matti Schmid christened the new third hole at the renovated TPC Southwind Thursday morning by destroying it. Which thereby made him the lone competitor at the FedEx St. Jude Championship to play the 559-yard par-5 as originally set up for the first round of the opening FedEx Cup playoff event.

Mind you, Schmid didn’t do it on purpose, or demolish the entire hole. But he did damage the turf where the pin was cut when he nearly dunked his 207-yard second shot for an albatross. His ball landed on the front edge of the hole, making a deep gouge, and then bounded five feet to the left, from where he converted his eagle putt.

Though the grounds crew came out and repaired the hole—cut 12 feet from the front edge and three feet from the left—sufficiently for Schmid’s putt, officials could not fix it to a satisfactory degree for succeeding groups. The result was that officials were forced to cut a new hole 14 inches to the right for the rest of the 69-man field.

The final qualifier into the event—after birdieing his final three holes at the Wyndham Championship to lock in the No. 70 spot—Schmid was playing as a single because Rory McIlroy decided to skip the $20 million tournament, the first of three playoff events to wrap up the PGA Tour season. He went on to shoot one-over 71 with a round that included a double bogey and triple bogey.

Gary Young, the tour’s senior vice president rules and competitions, said it’s rare that a hole has to be moved in the middle of a round—let alone after just one golfer has played it—but it’s not unprecedented.

In this instance, the “newness” of the greens prevented the hole from being repaired satisfactorily.

“The integrity of the hole had been compromised,” Young said. “The lack of … not so much root structure, but the lack of a thatch layer being built up, it was impossible to repair the hole. Normally we carry a tool with us [a 4¼-inch in diameter metal ring] that we can use to repair the hole on the spot, but when the official tried to repair it, he just couldn't do it.

“The soil just wasn't allowing us to get it back where it would be stable for the remainder of the round. So we went ahead and just cut a new hole.”

Play was held up briefly first for the attempted repair and then to cut the new hole, affecting only the second group of Min Woo Lee and J.T. Poston. Both made par.

Schmid's round continued to proceed in a bizarre fashion over the next three hole when he made a birdie 2 on the par-3 fourth hole then a double bogey 6 and triple bogey 7 on the fifth and sixth. After a bogey 5 on the first hole and a par 4 on the second, that meant that Schmid had six different scores on his opening six holes.