The golf world abandoned stymies in 1963, but the Sunday Morning Group keeps them alive, sort of, by using them in playoffs, which we conduct on our practice green. On New Year's Day in 2013, we invented a new version, ball-marker stymies, in which the old stymie rule applies on every green, but to ball markers instead of balls:
On Wednesday, we invented yet another new version: leaf stymies. Gary, our terrific superintendent (shown stymied by my ball marker in the photo above, which was taken at Dyker Beach, in Brooklyn), keeps our course remarkably free of leaves, but when the wind blows hard he and his crew can't possibly keep up, especially on greens with overhanging oak trees. Removing leaves from everyone's line takes forever, and then the wind just blows them back, so we decided: screw it. From now on, the leaves stay where they are:
Remarkably, having even a lot of leaves in the way does very little to a putt. Here's Rick trying for birdie on the fourth green:
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