10. The Mumble. This usually occurs when you are keeping score, and your opponent makes something higher than double bogey. You ask ‘What did you have there?” Your opponent mumbles, combining “I don’t know, seven” into one syllable. But that syllable is a lie. Your opponent is fully aware that he scored an eight or a nine, and hoped that you would just write down the seven to avoid the labour of going back and counting them all. Where there are mumbles, they are frequently lies.
9. The Out-of-Bounds Perversion. Everyone knows that an out-of-bounds shot carries with it the maximally stiff penalty of stroke and distance. For example, if you hit a drive out of bounds, you have to re-hit the shot, which will count as your third shot. Lost balls, or balls out of bounds should be assumed to accrue the stroke and distance penalty; an exception is if the ball crosses into a hazard, in which case the ‘distance’ part of stroke and distance is dropped. Beware when opponents try to feign ignorance and take a ‘lateral hazard’ penalty rather than an out of bounds penalty. Their consciences let them do this because, they think, ‘at least they are taking some penalty.’
8. The Ooch. Have you ever meet an oocher? Oochers are people who ooch their ball, in a somewhat sly but noticeable manner, so that it ends up closer to the hole. Ooches don’t matter much in the fairway, but they are very important around the greens. The most wicked of all ooches is the ‘out-of-the-leather’ to ‘in-to-the-leather’ ooch, which occurs on the putting green. It happens when you opponent marks his ball with a coin, but ooches the ball forward (very slyly) and marks the ball on top of, or slightly past, where the ball was. Then, the opponent, when replacing the ball, places it in front of the coin as though he had marked it a full inch behind it in the first place. On short putts, the ‘ooched’ distance in question can be the difference between a make or a miss.
7. The Pretend, not so Pretend Putt. This one really burns me up. It comes into play only in Scrambles. A player will slap his ball with his putter, toward the hole, as though it is not a serious attempt, as if to imply that the real purpose of the shot is to advance the ball closer to a partner’s ball, so that that ball is played by the team. Oops! The ball went in. Double Oops, your opponent begins to act like he made it intentionally. Only true slime will try this one, as it compromises all integrity.
6. The Convenient Bad Memory. As has been said, a lost-ball penalty is severe. When money is on the line, the last thing you want to do is lose your ball. How can you avoid doing so? Perhaps by making it possible that any ball found within a hundred yards of where you think your ball is is ‘yours.’ How does one do that? He tells his opponents that he can’t remember for sure what ball he was playing. When someone says, “Hey, I found a Molitar X-Out over here,” the liar says, “Molitar, yeah, that sounds right.”
5. The Vyper Snyper Wedge. Look, if your opponent’s sand wedge or lob wedge makes any reference to a snake, or has any neon colors on it, then it is probably not a regulation club. These wedges allow even the worst hacks to back the ball up like a pro. Even though technically they are not banned from ‘practice’, you should let your opponent know that you are aware that he has stooped to the level of trying to use the Vyper Snyper to beat you, while you are taking him on with a legal Cleveland Classic.
4. Hey, I found it! When your opponent is searching for his lost ball in an area where no one is watching him, then he might be tempted to drop a ball from his pocket, and say, “Hey, I found it!” Chances are, he’s telling the truth. He found the ball he dropped right in front of him. It’s too bad there are not portable lie-detector tests. Given that, you should probably keep your eyes on your opponent rather carefully, but don’t let it be obvious that you’re doing so, as this indicates to him that you don’t trust him. You don’t want to give away your hand.
3. The non-measured gimmie. This one is very effective, and absolutely ruthless. Gimmies in golf, if not completely obvious, should be measured by the shaft of the putter. Of course, to avoid perfunctory goings through the motions, some players, and rightly so, will just pick up putts that are inches away. Players with evil souls, though, will pick up putts when it is questionable as to whether they are gimmies or not. If you call them out on it, then you will look like the jerk. It’s a no-win situation for the cheated. The only penalty the overly liberal gimmie grabber gets is that he will get badmouthed behind his back.
2. The ‘what kind of press is this?’ ambiguity. Golfers generally gamble, and when they are losing, they generally ‘press.’ Pressing is, in a general sense, an act that intends to raise the stakes-an option usually but not always afforded the loser-for the purpose of allowing the loser to win back what she has lost (or lose a great deal more). Unfortunately, there are a wide variety of kinds of presses, and it is rarely made clear which one respective players believe to be in effect prior to the round. Clarify what press you take to be binding, or be prepared to watch your opponent claim to have assumed it was the one most financially beneficial to him.
1. The Vacuum-Suctioned Coin Nudge. Surely, this trick was invented by the devil himself. It is a way to very slyly move your coin closer to the hole on the green, and works most effectively on really long puts. Your opponent, if he knows this trick, will rub his putter many times, and with intensity, back and forth on a wet green. This creates a water vacuum, and the coin will stick to the bottom of the putter. The cheater then casually walks a few feet closer to the hole, and sneakily touches the putter to the green to deposit the coin to a closer vantage point. I have never seen a player ‘called out’ for doing this, but I imagine the resulting argument would not be a pretty one.
