Sports

Golf hurts itself with short-sighted new rule

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For years, we have heard golfers talking about “getting out of their own way’’ in an effort to allow themselves to play the game more freely.

Yesterday, with the anticipated announcement by the USGA and R&A that they will ban the anchored putting stroke as of Jan. 1, 2016, golf has gotten into its own way.

This not only is a shame, but it is misguided use of the USGA’s and R&A’s time, which should be spent more wisely on ways to improve the game and make it more popular and accessible — such as keeping costs down and speeding up the pace of play.

The USGA and R&A constantly thump their respective chests about the importance of “growing the game.’’ This decision is a hypocritical blow to that notion. It does nothing to help grow the game.

These are governing bodies of the game worldwide, not simply the governing bodies of professional golf. You can make the argument they should be more concerned with the popularity of the amateur game rather than the professional level.

Yet the decision to ban anchored putters that already have been around the game for some 30 years is a knee-jerk reaction to the fact that four of the past six major championships have been won by a player using an anchored putter.

If anchored putting is such an advantage, then why isn’t every pro using one? Why isn’t every winner on the PGA Tour using an anchored putter?

If anchor putting was so easy, why did Keegan Bradley, one of this issue’s poster boys as the first player to win a major anchoring when he won the 2011 PGA Championship, miss a short birdie putt on the 16th hole Sunday that cost him the Byron Nelson championship?

This ban has opened a worldwide can of worms, with questions about whether the PGA Tour and PGA of America will adhere to the ban and whether players who use the anchor putter will seek legal action against the USGA and R&A.

The PGA Tour and PGA of America, perhaps in a way to show their respective disdain for the ruling and make the USGA and R&A sweat a bit, issued statements yesterday that they will review the situation before deciding if they would adhere to the ban.

The reality, though, is that as strongly as those two organizations feel that anchored putters should be allowed, they feel even more strongly about there being no separate rules in the game — bifurcation. Eventually, both the PGA Tour and the PGA of America will relent and abide by yesterday’s ruling.

Different sets of rules in golf would ruin the best virtue of the game — which is that amateurs, even if for one shot in a round, actually can hit a shot as well as one of the pros they watch on TV. Sometimes it is that one shot per round that keeps us coming back to the course.

The game of golf is — and always has been — about getting the ball into the hole in as few strokes as possible. Every minute of every day, golf-club manufacturers are coming up with new technology for players to do so.

In doing that, the club manufacturers are making the game more fun and accessible for players because they are making it easier.

When it comes to advances in equipment technology, which includes drivers with heads as large as VW Beetles, the horse left the barn a long time ago. The golf ball is more juiced than Barry Bonds in his prime and, because of that, pros are rendering traditional golf courses obsolete, because they are hitting the ball so far. Pros are hitting 6-irons 230 yards.

So the fact the USGA and R&A believe banning anchored putting will reel in the game from being too easy is a joke. Sadly, the joke is on all the amateur players who use the anchored putter, because those putters makes the game easier and more accessible for them.

The USGA and R&A have wronged the players in the game they should be looking after the most — the amateurs who use these putters.

Thanks to the USGA and R&A, golf just got into its own way.

mark.cannizzaro@nypost.com