PGA Tour Should Ban Bunker Rakes

Voice over: Michael Robles
Writer:
John Schwarb
Video editor: Lance Keller
The PGA Tour
Should Ban Bunker
Rakes
Welcome to SI Golf’s Inaugural
Bad Takes Week
,
where our writers and editors have been asked
to offer their worst ideas and defend them.
These are columns on takes they believe in,
even if they made the rest of the room groan
during the pitch meetings. Keep an eye out for
more bad takes throughout the week.
If my oldest daughter’s childhood sandbox was
as nice as a PGA Tour bunker, she’d still be
playing in it-and she’s in college.
Tour golf is a TV show and the courses are the
stage, with gleaming manicured bunkers a key
part of the set design. Should a player land in a
greenside bunker, it’s rarely a penalty but
instead a chance to show off “These Guys Are
Good” skills by expertly thumping the ball out
(and don’t they always talk about that thump on
the broadcast?) and usually saving par.
The best scramblers from the sand on the PGA
Tour get up and down
nearly two-thirds of the
time
. Even No. 100 saves par 52% of the time.
These guys are good.
But why make it so easy for them?
The PGA Tour should ban bunker rakes during
play. Let sand traps have the potential to be
“traps” again.
Work with me here.
At the start of each day’s play, greenskeepers
may prep bunkers as a matter of routine
maintenance. But that’s the last time the bunker
will be touched.
If a player’s shot lands in a footprint or behind a
clump of sand, so be it. Your name is on the bag,
figure it out.
Lord knows weekend warriors like you and I
have to. Many of us play courses with neglected
bunkers that haven’t had sand since Tiger was
No. 1, and on rare rounds when we do find a
playable bunker, the rake jobs are suspect at
best.
Even with this rule, Tour bunkers over the
course of a round will likely never get that bad.
We’ll settle for a little awkwardness in the
weekly Tour birdiefests, though we’d take
Armageddon.
One argument against this is that players teeing
off early would get the best of the bunkers,
creating a competitive disadvantage. On
Thursday and Friday, that would even out with
morning and afternoon waves alternating. On
Saturday and Sunday, players with late tee
times have them because they’re the best
players that week-so, again, let’s see what
they do from an unraked bunker. (They also
have to deal with trampled greens and more
heavily divoted fairways, and that’s accepted as
part of weekend afternoon golf.)
Alas, the PGA Tour seems unlikely to go for this.
What if sand save percentages plummeted?
What if its cherished FedEx Cup came down to a
bad lie at the 72nd hole from an unraked
bunker?
But just like the adage “play better” is assigned
to pros lamenting their plight in the game’s
hierarchy, we offer this to any who complain
about unraked bunkers: Just don’t hit your ball
there.

[@tj.rockwell]

They rake bunkers to keep the game the same for all golfers. No unfair advantages.

[@mckinseyand2022]

I love your idea!!!!!!😍

[@igoraguiar]

Everybody: fairway divots are the worse rule in golf. I LUV GOLF: don't rake bunkers. LOL

[@rorygillmore6555]

If I always have to hit put of rock hard bunkers and footprints... then so should the pros... 😂
Also, penalty strokes for lost balls are pretty unfair since I don't have a camera crew and crowds of people to watch my ball. 😂

[@cliftonmanley3882]

Well, i must admit thats a new idea... i like it! 👍