{"id":179194,"date":"2025-06-12T19:57:13","date_gmt":"2025-06-12T19:57:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/179194\/"},"modified":"2025-06-12T19:57:13","modified_gmt":"2025-06-12T19:57:13","slug":"stupid-mistake-for-very-intelligent-man-bryson-dechambeau-caught-up-in-bizarre-us-open-rules-controversy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/179194\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Stupid mistake for very intelligent man\u2019 – Bryson DeChambeau caught up in bizarre US Open rules controversy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bryson DeChambeau’s first round at the US Open did not quite go to plan early on.<\/p>\n

The defending champion found himself involved in a bizarre rules controversy early on as play got underway on an unforgiving Oakmont track.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"DeChambeau<\/a><\/p>\n

5<\/p>\n

DeChambeau made the move to pick up and place his ballCredit: @TonyJohnstone56\"DeChambeau<\/a><\/p>\n

5<\/p>\n

DeChambeau recovered to make parCredit: @TonyJohnstone56<\/p>\n

The strange scenario unfolded at the mammoth 621-yard, par-five<\/a> fourth hole, where DeChambeau blocked his drive into a bunker and was forced to lay up with his second.<\/p>\n

Having advanced his ball around 100 yards back onto the fairway, it came to rest on a spectator walkway that crosses the fairway, so DeChambeau was entitled to free relief.<\/p>\n

However, it appears that his caddie, Gregory Bodine, picked up his player\u2019s ball before the defending champion had the chance to mark its position.<\/p>\n

DeChambeau had a lengthy discussion with a USGA rules official before an agreement was struck on where he could take his free drop.<\/p>\n

But instead of dropping his ball from knee height as per the Rules of Golf, he placed it on the deck and headed back to his bag for a nine-iron, and the rules official was quick to advise him of his error.<\/p>\n

The commentary team were taken aback by what they witnessed, pulling no punches in their criticism of last year\u2019s US Open<\/a> champion.<\/p>\n

\u201cHowever you look at it, that was a fairly stupid mistake for a very intelligent man,\u201d said Nick Dougherty, commentating for Sky Sports <\/a>in the UK.<\/p>\n

Alongside him, two-time European Tour champion Andrew Coltart added: \u201cI\u2019m just astounded that he placed it, it\u2019s just not a natural thing to do.<\/p>\n

\u201cVery bizarre scenes there for Bryson DeChambeau<\/a>, but he does that to us, doesn\u2019t he? He likes to keep us guessing!\u201d<\/p>\n

Former PGA champion Rich Beem, the on-course commentator for Sky Sports at Oakmont this week, was following the group of DeChambeau, Xander Schauffele<\/a> and US Amateur champion Jose Luis Ballester.<\/p>\n

\"DeChambeau<\/a><\/p>\n

5<\/p>\n

DeChambeau made a ‘stupid’ mistake on the fourth holeCredit: Getty\"DeChambeau<\/a><\/p>\n

5<\/p>\n

DeChambeau is the defending champion at this week’s US OpenCredit: Getty\"Bryson<\/a><\/p>\n

5<\/p>\n

Bryson DeChambeau was involved in a bizarre sequence of events at OakmontCredit: GETTY<\/p>\n

Like his colleagues in the commentary booth, Beem was shocked at DeChambeau\u2019s loss of concentration.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust going through that whole sequence again, he had his caddie pick up his golf ball without actually marking the position it was at,\u201d said Beem.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut if you\u2019re going to take relief why would he take it so close to where it was? Why not take it an extra five yards back?\u201d<\/p>\n

USGA officials have yet to declare if DeChambeau would be liable to be hit with any penalty, while some observers on social media questioned where he took his drop.<\/p>\n

It was suggested that he did not take full relief and had one foot on the spectator walkway when he played his third shot, an infraction which would incur a penalty.<\/p>\n

Rory McIlroy<\/a> was harshly dealt with in a similar incident in Abu Dhabi in 2014, when he was penalised two shots for not taking full relief from a spectator path.<\/p>\n

DeChambeau, meanwhile, shrugged off the incident and signed for an eventful par five before going on to card a level-par 35 over the front nine of his first round.<\/p>\n

A bogey six on the 618-yard par five 12th saw him fall back to one-over-par as the course began to bear it’s teeth after a gentle morning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bryson DeChambeau’s first round at the US Open did not quite go to plan early on. The defending…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":179195,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4106],"tags":[2826,4299,4298,79,16,15,16022],"class_list":{"0":"post-179194","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-golf","9":"tag-liv-golf","10":"tag-pga-tour","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-us-open-golf"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114672163192744245","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179194","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179194"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179194\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}