"It’s not a divot?" - PGA Tour champ breaks down Wyndham Clark's controversial golf ball movement 'issue' at Arnold Palmer Invitational
On Friday, March 7, Wyndham Clark became the hottest topic on the PGA Tour when he found himself in yet another rules controversy. During the second round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational, he was given free relief on the third hole when his tee shot landed back in its own pitch mark.
If the ball had rested in another divot, Clark would have been given a drop under penalty. However, he escaped it and ended up making a par. While he was cleared by the PGA Tour, fans had divided opinions on the incident.
Fellow professional Michael Kim, who is also in action at Bay Hill, took to X (formerly Twitter) to share his perspective on the whole situation.
"Is the Wyndham embedded ball “issue” that it didn’t go into his own ball mark?" he wrote. "Or that because it bounced out, it’s not embedded? If it’s the latter, it doesn’t matter that it briefly came out of its own pitch mark.
"It only matters that it’s your own and if it went back in, it’s considered embedded. From the video, it looks like it went into his own and I don’t have any issue over what he did."
However, one of the fans objected to the free relief and wrote that players had to learn to deal with adversity. In response, the 2018 John Deere Classic winner explained that the relief wasn't for the divot.
"It's not a divot? I don’t think you should play from a plugged lie from the fairway?" he wrote.
PGA Tour releases statement on Wyndham Clark's Arnold Palmer Invitational controversy
The PGA Tour cleared Wyndham Clark of any wrongdoing in the third-hole relief incident after reviewing the video evidence.
"After reviewing ShotLink video of Wyndham Clark’s tee shot on the third hole during the second round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by Mastercard, the PGA Tour Rules Committee determined that the ball returned to its own pitch mark, which entitled Clark to free relief," the PGA Tour wrote in the official statement.
Following the second round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational 2025, Wyndham Clark is two strokes off the lead. He carded 1-under 71 on Friday to aggregate at 6-under. Shane Lowry fired 5-under 67 in the second round to take the 36-hole lead at Bay Hill.