PDGA TD Recourse?

[Doofenshmirtz]

At my local mini I had a player, let's call him "Jimmy," relate to me the following regarding a tournament in a nearby town that took place a week or so ago.

Jimmy and two other players arrive at the tee for the beginning of their round. During the player's meeting it was announced that anyone who showed up late was to be penalized per the rules. When the signal was made for the tournament to begin, one of the players had not made it to the tee box. The late player showed up while the group was at the third tee (after two holes had been completed by the group) and one of the local club members helping to run the tournament, actually a tournament director,* proceeds to follow the group and attempt to convince them, one by one, not to penalize the late player, who was a friend of the TD, but instead to let the late player play the missed holes after the on-time players completed their round.

*This was a dual sanctioned tournament with PDGA and SNDG. Different directors were identified on the scheduling for the different organizations. The one who attempted to persuade the players not to penalize the late-comer was held out at the tournament as the TD. There's little doubt that both TD's knew what was going on.

So, this is obviously an attempt by the Tournament Director to help the late player cheat and to lure the other players into cheating on behalf of the late player. Not that it matters, but the affected division consisted of more than one group. So I pose the question: What is a player supposed to do in such a situation other than stand his/her ground about application of the rule? What if you were in the other group and found out about it? Is there a way to report the TD to the PDGA and a mechanism to mete out some sort of punishment? Is this just a situation where its simly up to the TD?

I think that, had I been there, I would probably have at least recorded all the conversations (couple button taps on my phone). But would the PDGA do anything about that if I submitted the evidence to them?

 

[krupicka]

Use the contact links on the pdga.com web site to report the issue to the Tour Manager. If he's not the correct one to help out, he can point you to the correct person/committee.

 

[_MTL_]

PDGA Tournament event feedback on the page. This is read and used.

Currently, sanctioning requests on the B tier and C tier level are not reviewed / denied by the PDGA. These bad decisions by TD's are still needed to be handled on the player level - vote with your feet.

However, A Tier's and up are approved by some level at the PDGA. So if a TD gets lots of bad feedback, then their requests for top events, if they do it, could be denied. Mike Downes has been published saying that they look at those things.

It's not perfect, but 10 - 15 years ago, there was nothing like this to prevent on any level basically.

 

[Consult20]

To me it's pretty clear-cut the offending player should have added par plus 4 for the first two holes. It should not have been a group decision.

 

[krupicka]

PDGA Tournament event feedback on the page. This is read and used.

The event feedback link goes to the TD which in this case is probably not what the OP is looking for.

 

[JC17393]

As has already been said, there is a link on every tournament results page on PDGA.com called "Event Feedback" where you can report things about the tournament (good or bad) to the PDGA powers-that-be. Yes, it goes to the TD too, but so what? Do they not know that you were aware of what happened?

As for what a player can do...standing their ground with regard to the rules is #1. Don't go along with letting the guy play the holes after the fact. Obviously you can't physically stop the guy from playing the holes, but you don't have to go along as "witness" to it. Once you've completed your round, your obligation is done. Take the scorecard and head into tournament central to pass it in and get lunch or whatever.

If the player is allowed to get away with it and the TD fails to penalize him for the missed holes, I'd make a point of making sure everyone knew what was going on. I wouldn't make a scene or anything but I'd make it clear to any one who'd listen (especially within the affected division) what the TD was doing. Nothing is gained if the response to cheating is silence.

Last step I'd take would be to make sure I don't play any more events run by those TDs. And I wouldn't be shy about explaining why in case anyone else was curious.

 

[Consult20]

So did "Jimmy" tell you what the outcome was? Was the player allowed to play the first two holes or did he take par + 4 as he should have?

 

[Doofenshmirtz]

So did "Jimmy" tell you what the outcome was? Was the player allowed to play the first two holes or did he take par + 4 as he should have?

Does it matter? Would the TD's actions be perfectly justified if Jimmy stood his ground, i.e., no harm no foul?

 

[DiscFifty]

If we don't abide by all the rules, then rules don't apply. I've been late and been stroked. It's not fun.

 

[JC17393]

Does it matter? Would the TD's actions be perfectly justified if Jimmy stood his ground, i.e., no harm no foul?

I don't think that's what he was asking at all. No one is justifying the TD's actions (at least not the attempt to cheat for his buddy), but it would be cool in a finish-the-story way to know whether the player was penalized properly or if the TD's cheating prevailed and the player was allowed to play the holes penalty-free.

Regardless of the outcome, I still think it's worth reporting the instance to the PDGA. If the TD did cheat, he could face disciplinary action. If he did apply the penalties properly, at least there's a record of the attempt if the PDGA were to ever have another accusation of malfeasance against the TD or the player. My feeling is if the TD were that brazen in trying to circumvent the rules for his buddy's benefit, that wasn't the first time and might not be the last.

 

[Golden Tuna]

It sounds like the TD overstepped their authority in this instance, but I don't know if I would go so far as to accuse them of cheating... Many people in disc golf still like the grassroots (hippy) mentality of the game and aren't into the formality of sanctioned events. So, they don't put much stock in rules like this. I'm not defending him. He is wrong, I'm just trying to understand the catalyst for these actions...

- Yes, I know, if they are not into the formality, they shouldn't be playing in those events, but volunteers, especially TDs, are hard to come by...

I actually had the inverse situation happen to me. I was tied for the lead after day 1. Upon arriving at the course for the 2nd (& final) day. Three of the 4 folks on the top card were present and ready to go. The 4th was missing, as was the TD.

The TD arrived ~15-20 minutes after scheduled tee off, which obviously delayed our group. As it happened, the late player arrived minutes after the TD. My group had already teed off and were walking down the first fairway when the late player (who happened to be the guy I was tied with for the lead) was allowed to play the hole 'with us' because we had not completed the hole by the time he teed off. So, no penalty was issued.

What really grinds my gears was that the TD was late, which pushed back the start time for everyone. Had the TD been on time, we would have played 1-2 holes before the guy I was tied with showed up and I would have had a 4 stroke lead going into hole 3 instead of starting hole 1, even with a competitor.

This was over 10 years ago, and my mental game at the time was not strong enough to overcome this scenario. So, I choked, as did the guy that was late, and the guys in 3rd or 4th ended up storming back and taking down the event.

 

[JC17393]

I think if it was a simple matter of a TD overstepping his authority because of a dislike for the rule or local tradition being that a late player gets to make up his missed holes at the end of the round, he'd have just stated that's what was to happen and that would be that. Unfortunate, but not egregious.

That he was trying to cajol the group into going along with letting the player make up the missed holes rather than stating with TD authority that the player would make up the holes is what leaves me with the impression that this wasn't something he was about to do for just anyone. Had there been another group with a late player, and the group followed the rules and penalized him, I don't believe that player would have been afforded the same option to make up the holes that the player in the OP was given (or was attempted to be given). That's where it steps over the line in my view.

I've played tournaments where the TD didn't penalize players for incorrect scores...he just corrected errors and let the new score stand. It's not something I agreed with or would do as a TD myself, but it was his philosophy and he was consistent about it so in the end, not worth making into a huge deal. But if he were to have been selective about applying the penalty, say penalizing a guy in his own division for it but letting a buddy in another slide, particularly if placement in the standings (and prizes) was affected, then it would be something to make a stink about. It's relative.

 

[Consult20]

Does it matter? Would the TD's actions be perfectly justified if Jimmy stood his ground, i.e., no harm no foul?

I don't think that's what he was asking at all. No one is justifying the TD's actions (at least not the attempt to cheat for his buddy), but it would be cool in a finish-the-story way to know whether the player was penalized properly or if the TD's cheating prevailed and the player was allowed to play the holes penalty-free.

Regardless of the outcome, I still think it's worth reporting the instance to the PDGA. If the TD did cheat, he could face disciplinary action. If he did apply the penalties properly, at least there's a record of the attempt if the PDGA were to ever have another accusation of malfeasance against the TD or the player. My feeling is if the TD were that brazen in trying to circumvent the rules for his buddy's benefit, that wasn't the first time and might not be the last.

JC nailed it, the conclusion to the story is missing that's all.

But even if the co-TD convinced the other players on the card not to par+4 the offending player for those 2 holes, the offending player would still have to go along with it and throw those two holes at the end knowing that was against the rules, and also knowing most likely everyone else in the tournament would find out.

Hopefully he just took par plus 4 for those two holes and realized his reputation/good name was worth more than two holes in one tournament.

 

[Reniger]

I've shared this story before, but here it goes...

When I was new to tournaments (had been playing for 10 years, watched plenty of tournament coverage, knew rules well, this was my fourth tournament, but first year of tournament play) I played MA3 and my first round I had a cardmate who blatantly ignored the rules. At first, I was polite and would inform him of violations and remind him, but by the ninth hole, he was still stepping out from any lie he didn't like (trees, mud), he would step on his disc when throwing (didn't use a mini), walked in front of players throwing and putting, throwing out of order without group consent, "lost track" of how many strokes he took on the previous hole, and would obviously lie about scores.

We had another player on the card who knew the rules well, so we both got out our rulebooks and started calling stance violations, courtesy violations, and reminded him his stroke count after every throw, then confirmed after all players had holed out.

He got pissed (shocker) and still would try to lie about strokes on a hole. On our 17th, he took a 9 and was pissed that his 6' putt bounced off the belt and demanded that it counted and we should mark him for an 8. Then on the 18th hole (anthill basket) he putt, bounced off the cage, walked close to the basket, but stopped about 6-8' away behind a tree... so I lined up my putt... right as I released it, he stepped out - grabbing the basket to help pull himself up the small hill, which tilted the cage toward him, lifted the cage away from me, causing my disc to hit the nubs and fall in the ground.

I was LIVID at this point. I called him for interference, got seconded, reputt (making it) and told him we were adding two stokes for interference, showing 810 in my rulebook.

Now, at the end of the round he was up to 11 penalty called strokes for the ridiculous amount of poor behaviors. While I understand being in Rec division shouldn't be a huge deal, he was ruining the rest of the cards round and effecting our scores.

We all went to the TD together to work things out and three of us recalled his behavior, stated that we began with polite information about rules, then reminders, before finally calling violations. Well, the kid in question happened to be in leagues with the TD, and evidently knew each other well, and yelled about us being a-holes who tried to sabatoge him. TD said we shouldn't worry about it since we were "just MA3" and took off his penalty strokes, moving him from dead last, to 5th place out of 10-12 players in our division.

End of the day, the kid took the last cash (gift card) spot in MA3. I was so pissed. It didn't effect me since I was in 3rd, but some poor guy didn't get his recognition or reward for playing better than a TD's buddy who had a terrible attitude, was carelessly distracting, and blatantly cheated. Last I ever played anything that TD was involved with.

TL;DR: Kid cheated, violated courtesy rules, threw a fit to his friend who was the TD to get 11 penalty strokes removed and ended up in the final cash spot in MA3.

Now, after I've shared this story a few times, multiple people have told me I should have contacted the PDGA. At the time, I was new to tourneys and didn't know better. Now, I absolutely agree. Do not let this type of behavior from people in positions of authority continue. Ever. If a TD is playing favorites, even in lower divisions, hold them accountable. It matters for PDGA ratings, it matters for cash and prizes, and it's a matter of pride. People are not getting the recognition they should for placing well because someone's friend fixed their score. Accountability is drawn into the rules of the sport and the governing body should be made aware of missteps by the leaders of sanctioned events.

 

[Doofenshmirtz]

It sounds like the TD overstepped their authority in this instance, but I don't know if I would go so far as to accuse them of cheating...

I know this TD but was not at the tournament. He is an experienced, knowledgeable TD who runs absolutely fantastic tournaments. They are well organized and executed and the way he coordinates the local club to put them on is truly and exemplar as to how they should be done.

But what really piqued my interest about the story that I was told was that this very TD announced at the players meeting the same rule at issue, that par+4 was to be added to any late players score for the holes that they missed. Then, after announcing that, 15 minutes later he started lobbying every other player in the group to cheat as well.

I know that you don't like to call that cheating and I take no issue with that. To me, it's cheating. This TD knows better and still did it to help out a buddy.

Incidentally, the area where this episode occurred is rife with made-up rules. In one tournament a friend was told that he couldn't use a disc that had gone OB, meaning that he couldn't throw it anymore in that round. Just one example of many.

 

[ToddL]

Btw, when you fill out the Event Feedback form on the PDGA page, it emails the TD as well as the PDGA tour manager. And if you're logged into your account on the PDGA website, you will be identified by name. You know, if that changes how you would write the feedback.