Patrick Reed has had a controversial career during his tenure on the PGA Tour. The golfer left the Tour to join the newly found LIV Golf. However, the cheating allegations have been haunting Reed to this day. Today, we take a look at both sides of the story when Patrick Reed was given a 2 stroke penalty for cheating

Back in 2019, Patrick Reed was participating in the Hero World Challenge. The tournament is annually hosted by the 15-time Major champion Tiger Woods. All proceedings from the event go to the Tiger Woods Foundation.

During the unofficial PGA event, Reed was caught up with another stir of controversy. When Reed was getting ready to play his third shot on the par-5 11th hole during the third round at Albany, his ball was in a depression in the sand and he was in a waste bunker. Reed was caught on cameras hitting the ball twice in practice swings while shifting sand out from under it. According to the PGA Tour’s rulebook, that is illegal.

PGA Tour penalizes Patrick Reed

While struggling to get the ball out of the bunker, Reed ended up receiving a two-stroke penalty from the officials. The 2019 Masters winner understandably defended himself against the officials for the penalty.

Reed was then called to watch the replay before being imposed the penalty. However, he asked the officials to watch another angle of the shot that proved Reed’s innocence. But the replay was satisfactory enough for the officials to penalize the golfer.

As per PGA Tour’s ruling, a player is allowed to ground his club in the sand. However, moving sand from behind the ball violated Rule 8.1a (4), which states that a player is not allowed to “remove or press down on sand or loose soil” in order to improve the conditions affecting the stroke. According to this rule, Patrick Reed is totally at fault. However, did the 32-year-old deliberately dig the sand, or was it a genuine mistake?

Reed comments on the infamous incident

After the round, Patrick Reed had the opportunity to defend himself. He shared his side of the story of how the penalized shot was a mistake and unintended. He said, “I wish [the cameras] were actually directly on the side of me because it was in a pretty good footprint … and I felt like my club was that far behind the ball when I was actually taking the practice stroke, which I felt like I was taking it up. And it was … obviously, it was hitting a little sand.”

The 32-year-old further added how the golf club would eventually touch the sand no matter what during the practice swings. He then said, “Whenever they brought it up to me and I saw it, it definitely did drag some of the sand. Because of that, it’s considered a two-stroke penalty.” After monitoring the incident more thoroughly, Reed acknowledged his unintentional penalty by also indicating how his golf club was far away from the sand.

He ended by saying, “It was that far away, but whenever you do that if it does hit the sand, just like if you’re in a hazard area and you take a practice swing and it brushes grass and the grass breaks, it’s a penalty. So because of that and after seeing the video, I accept that, and it wasn’t because of any intent, I thought I was far enough away.”

Despite Patrick Reed’s defending statements, the golfer was still penalized. As per the rule book, Reed did break the penalty. However, the golfer states it is a clear misunderstanding of the officials. Nonetheless, Reed managed to finish the tournament in the third position despite the indecent third round.

Whose side of the story do you think is valid? Let us know in the comments section below!

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