Kevin Kisner was actually following Bryson DeChambeau’s group on Friday at Royal Birkdale during NBC’s coverage of The Open.
Kisner now works almost exclusively as an on-course commentator and golf analyst for NBC.
The four-time PGA Tour winner got a close-up view of what happened when DeChambeau entered the rough to find his ball on the fifth hole at Royal Birkdale.
Of course, nothing happened at the time, but when Bryson DeChambeau finished his second round at The Open, he was informed that he had broken rule 8.1a.
DeChambeau received a two-stroke penalty at the Open after he was deemed to have cleared the pathway to the back of his ball by trampling down the tall grass in the rough on the fifth hole.
The LIV Golf star was fuming with the decision and even suggested that he might pull out of the tournament as a result.
That obviously didn’t happen as DeChambeau returned to Birkdale on Saturday with his tail firmly between his legs.
Now Kevin Kisner has offered his take on the situation.
Kevin Kisner comments on the Bryson DeChambeau Open fiasco
Kisner spoke about the DeChambeau incident on the Fore Play Podcast and offered his take on what happened.
“All I could see were the camera angles. Obviously, it didn’t look great on the camera angles,“ Kisner admitted.
“My argument, I still argue, is, like, why wasn’t the walking official over there near that? He just can entertain an awkward situation, right?
“Every walking official I’ve ever had, if you’re in a situation that you might need a ruling, you might need to know something is close by. And he was not close by.
“You can go back and look at the videos. He wasn’t even over there, because they had already chopped around in that grass to find the ball. There must have been 30 people ever looking for that ball.
“I didn’t like the way Bryson was stomping around there. Nobody does, right?
“But I have a really hard time going back after rounds to penalize people based on them being on camera, right? I mean, I don’t know if anybody else hit it over there.
“But if, for example, Jose Ballester hit it over there and did the same exact thing. He’s not on camera. We’re not giving him a penalty, right?
“Well, no, we have the capability to show every shot that we can watch these guys, if that’s what we’re going to use to police things, even though there’s a walking official in every group.
“I hate it. I hate having to go back on it.
“I hate that, you know, we’re looking at awkward camera angles to say, like, he helped his intended swing.
“I mean, it didn’t look good, right? But I can’t be the one telling you that he should get a penalty, and I don’t think anybody at the R&A sitting up there in the office can either, based on those camera angles.
“There was no camera right down the line going, well, that was his intended swing, and he stepped exactly on that bush, and that’s exactly why he could hit that shot on the green. So I just have a hard time with that entire process.
“If you want me to be honest, I don’t know if that’s the best way to go about it. You’re affecting one of the biggest championships in golf based on some guy’s opinion on it.
“It could have been inadvertent. Like, what are we talking about, dude?
“How can this guy, in an office, police an inadvertent movement on an awkward camera angle? I just don’t know.“
Kevin Kisner reveals what an R&A official told him at Royal Birkdale
Kisner went on to explain how there was absolutely no communication between the on-course official and the R&A when the incident occurred.
“People can hate on me all they want on my take. Bryson DeChambeau is not a cheater. You don’t play for 15 years on a PGA tour, and you’re a cheater, right? If you are, it sticks with you,“ he said.
“If you asked everybody before Friday, is Bryson a cheater? Not one person would be like, ‘Yeah, man, he’s a cheater’.
“Now, did it look good that he’s over there stomping around in the weeds and, you know, high stepping, like I said, like a WWE wrestler? No.
“So, the whole situation, I think, was just total chaos and I don’t know if it was handled appropriately.
“I wish that the official would have been over there, so he could have been like, ‘Hey guys, look at this’.
“I asked the R&A, I was like, ‘did the walking official radio in?’ He’s like, ‘no, he didn’t say a word to us’.“
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