At the 1925 U.S. Open, golfer Bobby Jones insisted on penalizing himself a stroke when his ball moved slightly in the rough as the blade of his irontouched the turf. Nobody else could possibly have seen the ball move. The penalty dropped him into a tie with golfer Willie McFarlane who went on to win the playoff.
Fifty-three years later in 1978, Tom Kite did the same thing. The self-imposed penalty caused him to lose the Hall of Fame Classic at Pinehurst by one stroke.
Reporters asked both men why they took the penalties. Both had essentially the same reply: "There's only one way to play the game."
The lesson is to ask yourself how you choose to play the game. Do you play by the rules, even when no one would know? How do you feel about your integrity?
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