What? You do not know who Brian Davis is? It's OK, neither did I until yesterday.
Brian Davis is a professional golfer on the PGA Tour. The reason I had not heard of him until yesterday is that he has not really played well enough to make it high up on the leaderboard. That all changed yesterday.
Trailing Jim Furyk by 1 stroke, Davis made a birdie putt on the final hole of the tournament to force a sudden death playoff. Now, you may be thinking, 'big deal , that has happened before'...be patient, I am getting to the good part.
His approach shot to the green on the first playoff hole landed left of the green and settled on some twigs and reeds. When Davis started his back swing on is next shot, he thought he saw a reed move. (pssst...here is the good part) He immediately called over a rules official to explain what had happened. Davis had though he violated Rule 13.4 which refers to moving a loose impedement during a takeaway, and called himself on it.
Apparently no one else had seen it, and it took looking at the swing in slow motion replay to determine that he had indeed moved the reed. He incurred a 2 stroke penalty and conceded the hole, and tournament, to Jim Furyk. Had Davis won the tournament, he would have taken home $1,026,000 - his second place finish earned him $615,000.
Davis called himself on a penalty no one else saw knowing it would cost him over $400,00. That is the kind of character I want my kids to have.
And that is why I love the game of golf. There are not too many other sports where a player would call himself on a penalty with so much on the line.
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