Need a ruling. Was I right
 

I'll try and lay this out clearly. In my mens league 2 two men teams play each other.
One the first tee, 520 yd par 5, my teammate and I had the honor. We both hit our drives in the fairway as did the first player on the other team. The last guy to hit, hit his first drive hard left clearly out of bounds. There was no need to go look for it, because we all clearly saw it go into a woods staked OB and we all agreed it was OB.
He then hit his next drive (3rd shot) left through the fairway into tall heather not OB. Just in case, he went ahead and hit another ball (provisional) which followed nearly to same path left into the same patch of heather.
The four of us headed to the heather patch but after 10 minutes of searching, neither ball could be located.
At that point, the player returned to the tee and hit another ball, this time hitting the middle of the fairway.
While we waited on him to return, his partner than (standing alone) decleared that he had located the first ball hit in the heather. His teammate went over and said yes, that is my first ball.
At that point, I protested by saying the ball in the fairway is the ball in play. I said once we searched 10 minutes and no ball was found, and he returned to the tee, all other balls were out of the picture. His argument was that he simply returned to the tee to hit another provisional ball.
I said once we left the tee you could not hit or declare another ball as a provisional and that the last ball hit after he returned to the tee had to be the ball in play. Really upset the guy badly and he still won't speak to me to this day. Another argument was what he was laying if he played the ball in the FW.

1st shot clearly OB left (no question all agreed).
Next shot (3) left into the heather lost
Provisional while on the tee (5) left into the heather lost (then found later)
Back to the tee to hit another (7) in the fairway.

In the end he played both balls (laying 3 in the heather) of which he made a 7 on the hole and the other ball (laying 7 in the FW) he made a 12.

Spoiler In the end our pro after everything was layed out agreed that he could not return to the tee to hit another provisional ball and because we called off the search after the allowed 10 minutes, the last ball hit (7) was in fact the one in play and the 12 should stand.

The worse thing is that I played some with this guy in weekend skins and he has put me on the "pay no mind list" and will not even look my way. I feel bad, but should I?

The worse thing is that I played some with this guy in weekend skins and he has put me on the "pay no mind list" and will not even look my way. I feel bad, but should I? You should ask on twitter- I hear you can find really good rules advice there!

you stood up for what's right. That's what's matter. He sounds like the kind of guy who shoots a 90 and COMPLAINS all day about how yesterday he shot 76.
He doesn't want to accept how NOT good at golf he is and you popped his bubble. how selfish of you. http://www.thehackersparadise.com/fo...es/biggrin.png

Rules are rules... I think he needs to understand that

yup. Violation.

In a serious answer.

You have a defined amount of time to search for a lost ball, and once that time is passed the search is given-up and the ball is lost.
I would also argue that once he returned to the tee he has "given up" the search for his previous balls making the next play a live ball, though I am not good enough with the rules of golf to be sure of that.

In other words- I think you were right but I would wait until someone smarter than me answered

i thought you were only allowed to look for a ball for 5 mins then it is declared lost? As soon as he went back to the tee and hit another his 4th that was the one in play no matter if he finds his ball, 12 stands.I don't know why the guy was upset it's clearly in the rules and one of the easier ones.Suggest you buy him a gift to make up,maybe a rules book!!http://www.thehackersparadise.com/fo...es/biggrin.png

I don't want to question the guys character because he is a fairly well respected, and one of the better players at my course. We have both been members for a long long time and while he and I have played very few rounds together, we know each other well enough to cross paths time to time and make smalltalk.
From what I was told by others is that the guy just thinks our league is "layed back" whatever that means, and we should have cut him some slack. Because this team was a better team than mine that night on paper and we needed to win our match with them, I wanted to be sure everything was on the up and up and I would have thought they would have wanted the same.
It has just been on my mind this winter knowing the guy is PO'd still about it. Others has said we did the right thing but it still makes me feel bad. One of things you wish you would not have been involved in I guess.

The big point our pro made to us that night was that once you leave the tee box you can not return to hit a provisional, you can only return to hit another shot which then becomes the ball in play.

The point shewy makes is most relevant also, only 5 minutes are allowed to search for a ball. 10 minutes is waaaaaaaay to long and I wonder why his partner continued to look for the ball after he had gone back. Smells fishy to me, and I don' t think you have to question the man's character, he has already displayed it for you to see.

My only question is on the provisional ball. If after is was deemed lost does it then become a lateral because it was inside the OB stakes? It makes sense that going back to the tee is correct. Just wondering.

Its always good to talk rules.

Not sure what you mean by a "lateral"? He returned to the tee because that is where he hit his last shot from, he just thought he could call that one a provisional as well and I said no you can't, once you leave the tee. You can return and hit a shot, it just can't be labled provisional and that shot had to be the ball in play.

I would just like to know what the group behind you was doing, they must have been fit to be tied.

I can only guess that since they were looking for two balls they figured they got 5 minutes apiece http://www.thehackersparadise.com/fo...es/biggrin.png

And surely the ball his partner found was the 1st one he hit over there too. LOL

How does that matter? It was tournament play and he had to hit the next shot with his playing partners already out there. I doubt they could let another set of team's through if in te same tourny.

Didn't take long for this discussion to change directions.

Humor...

Not that it matters, because you were right, but what was the format? Leagues I have played in are usually better ball and, if so, this guy was clearly out of the hole.

Our league is match play made up of 3, 3 hole matches each worth 2 points with the 2 high index guys playing each other and the low 2 playing each other. There is 4 points available to the team with the lowest stroke total for the 9 holes played, so it was important to make sure we were counting strokes correctly.