Sports

Golf Gazette: What are your pet peeves on the links?

Regular readers of the Golf Gazette know I have little tolerance for cell-phone use on the golf course. Come to think of it, I’m not a big fan of walking down a supermarket isle and listening to a fellow shopper on their phone asking the party on the other end if they should get the eight-ounce or the 16-ounce container. Do you really need help buying a bottle of ketchup? And then there are those out for their daily walk, arms flailing, chatting up a storm. Catching up with their spouses do you suppose? Hmm. But the worst of the worst are those who talk or text while driving. Makes my blood boil.

I would like to take the opportunity to commend those who have a sliver of cell-phone etiquette and move to the periphery when they make or receive a phone call. To you folks, I say thanks.

Etiquette: The conduct or procedure required by good breeding or prescribed by authority to be observed in social or official life.
—Merriam-Webster Dictionary

Golf course etiquette should be the first thing a beginning player is taught: where to stand; when to hit; repairing divots; raking sand traps; marking your ball on the green; where to walk; fixing ball marks on the green. And the list goes on.

There are some golfers who unintentionally, or perhaps intentionally, try our patience by disregarding what to do and what not to do when playing a round of golf. I chatted with some of your golfing neighbors to find out which breach of golf etiquette annoys them the most.

Karen Danzer of Southold said, “When I’m on the green and there is a person’s shadow in my putting line and the person doesn’t move.”

Playing out of turn annoys Tony Mortillo of Greenport. “It bothers me when I’m waiting my turn to hit and a player in front of me hits before I do.”

Barbara Koch of Southold had this to say: “I get upset when the group in front of you finishes playing a hole and they take their time putting clubs back in their bags, they talk, they count up their strokes. They should leave the green and do all of that on the next tee.”

Jack Malone of Cutchogue complained, “Slow play really gets to me, when nobody in front of you gives a hoot and they don’t let you go through.”

And what ticks off your golf guy? Finding sand traps not raked and ball marks on the green left unrepaired.

Share with us your thoughts on golf course pet peeves with a comment below. Read Jay’s full column in Thursday’s paper.