Poulter Calls Out Matsuyama For Damaging Doral Green; They Tee It Up Again At 11:15 Saturday!

You have to love Ian Poulter's Twitter honesty and lack of fear in calling out a competitor who committed what sounds like a pretty grave etiquette error Friday at Doral.

Let's let the Tweets speak for themselves...clicking on the links to each will let you read the conversations with readers which, in the world of Poulter, are always lively.

The first:

playing with Matsuyama tomo. He buried his putter in the 13th green 5 ft from the hole, Referee had to repair the crater. Because he didn't.

— Ian Poulter (@IanJamesPoulter) March 8, 2014

Number two: 

Why should Matsuyama leave a crater in the green for others to putt over, or have to call a referee to repair the damage. Idiot.

— Ian Poulter (@IanJamesPoulter) March 8, 2014

Number three: 

Im no saint & first to say. But that was disgusting. I wouldn't bury a putter in a green 5 ft from a hole & have players behind deal with it

— Ian Poulter (@IanJamesPoulter) March 8, 2014

And finally...

I can't wait to. @Lainger66 are you going to speak to him like a man or just blast him on twitter like all the other keyboard warriors?”

— Ian Poulter (@IanJamesPoulter) March 8, 2014

Update on 2014-03-08 17:04 by Geoff

**The resolution!

Matsuyama came to Poulter on the range to apologize for yesterday's attempt at redesigning the 13th green. pic.twitter.com/D7xQOsbbXJ

— Alex Miceli (@alexmiceli) March 8, 2014

Update on 2014-03-08 18:18 by Geoff

**Adam Sarson posts a GIF of the Matsuyama act. Not awful, but also not great to leave a dent in the green. I'd be more sympathetic too if the player in question was not one of the slowest in golf.

Update on 2014-03-10 04:14 by Geoff

**Good mash-up from the SI/golf.com gang on this:

SHIPNUCK: It’s great fun, for sure, but a punk move. Handling it the old-school way would’ve been better -- that is, behind closed doors. Hideki was an easy target. No way Poults is that strident with a big name.

VAN SICKLE: I don't think Poulter is afraid to call anyone out. And what Matsuyama did was completely wrong. It's one mistake to do that, it's a worse mistake not to fix it. Somebody put a diaper on that baby when he's done with his tantrum. There is no excuse for behavior like that. Poulter was right on the money.

PASSOV: Poulter is such an opinionated, loose cannon, that it's always fun to see what he'll say on any topic. I don't think he would have called out Tiger or Phil, for instance, but Poults is king of social media these days, so you never know. I guess I'm from a different era, when these sorts of matters were handled privately, behind closed doors, but nowadays, everybody and everything seem to be an open book, so perhaps Poulter was within his rights in calling out Matsuyama.

Bamberger: We Need Elk's Tweets!

Funny, I was just talking to someone today about how golf continues to experience black eye moments in social media, but Michael Bamberger opines that Steve Elkington's homophobic Tweet this week provides a public service of sorts.

He writes:

That first handbag tweet, it’s crude. It’s stupid. It’s not funny. But it’s useful, because it reminds us again of what’s out there. And because it reminds us again that one of our most fundamental rights is to, on occasion, make an ass of ourselves by abusing our rights to free speech. I’m going to keep reading Steve Elk. He’s better than this sorry mini episode.

He is. But so far, he hasn't shown it.

Elkington Keeping PGA Tour Fines Department In Business!

Lost in the outrage over Steve Elkington's latest distasteful Tweet is the job-creating work he's doing by keeping someone at 100 PGA Tour Boulevard gainfully employed to read these missives and report to Commissioner Fine'em Up!

Luke Kerr-Dineen on Elkington's latest conduct unbecoming moment on Twitter, which is pretty sad even for Elkington's twisted sense of social media. Ryan Lavner with the roundup of past conducts unbecoming, all raising an undisclosed amount for charity because of course, the PGA Tour does not disclose fines. But Elkington is a PGA Tour member, however, and it's a safe bet he's getting some money deducted from the account for these Tweets.

The offending Tweet, since deleted:

 ESPN's Jeff MacGregor with the best comeback:

A handbag-throwing joke FROM A MAN WHO PAYS ANOTHER MAN TO LIFT HIS GOLF BAG.

— Jeff MacGregor (@MacGregorESPN) February 25, 2014

Update on 2014-02-25 20:26 by Geoff

**Elkington has since Tweeted an explanation of his issue with ESPN's coverage:

It goes back to "a ball hit an oriental spectator".There's no oriental spectators..There just spectators.."like m Sam...He's just an athlete

— Steve Elkington (@elkpga) February 25, 2014

Update on 2014-02-26 06:31 by Geoff

**Jason Sobel takes on Elkington and says Tweeting has tarnished the legacy of a major champion with one of the all-time great swings.

There’s a good chance that if Elkington had never clicked the button to sign up for a Twitter account years ago, he’d be remembered for that buttery golf swing that earned him the 1995 PGA Championship title and nine other PGA Tour victories in a career that spanned parts of four decades.
That’s the beauty – and ugliness – of social media.

There’s another beauty to this whole story, though. Unlike in a news conference setting at a tournament, we can all just choose to ignore him.

Wozilroy Engagement Fall-Out: Twitter Up, Ladbrokes Down

Miriam Donohoe analyzes the young couple's decision to announce their engagement on Twitter and says that while the sharing of private moment might be odd to one generation, it's also a sign of savvy media management by Rory McIlroy and Caroline Wozniacki.

Donohoe writes:

However, while this kind of sharing may seem like self-inflicted privacy invasion, in many cases it amounts to savvy media management. It is a way for celebrities to actually control privacy rather than giving it up.

WHILE the paparazzi won't stop stalking the tweeting stars such as Britney Spears, what they can get from them now is often devalued. We know it already -- directly from source.

The truth is we all love knowing about the lives of celebrities. And by sharing information authentically, celebs are engaging with fans and are building their brand. Twitter is one of the quickest ways to reach millions and millions.

So congratulations Rory and Caroline. Look forward to your updates. And one question for you Rory? How much did that huge rock on Caroline's finger cost?

Esther Addley in The Guardian reports that bookmaker Ladbrokes will pay up on the news.

The bookmaker Ladbrokes, which offered odds of 5-1 last January against the couple getting engaged in 2013, confirmed that it would pay out, even though the announcement came after midnight New Year's Day, Australian time. "It's not the time to be pedantic as far as we are concerned," said a spokesman.