Last night I fell asleep at around 1am and had no idea what happened at Oakmont a little later. I was watching the US Open coverage when I got too tired and went to bed. Dustin Johnson had just begun his round and Shane Lowry slowly but surely fell apart in his round and his plan to stay on top of the leaderboard. But the most interesting thing happened when I was snoozing away, which by the way is nothing too uncommon that things get exciting at the end of a golf tournament, but anyway…

Long story short, Dustin won the US Open in the end, his maiden major title, but something else hit the news very quickly when I was waking up today:

On the 5th hole, Dustin’s ball moved a little and both he and his scorer, Lee Westwood, said he neither touched the ball nor caused it to move in any other way. Rules officials had been contacted and consulted and it took them until Dustin played the 12th to tell him there might be a rule violation and that he should expect a stroke penalty.

Come on, guys! Tell him during the round?! How dare you putting Dustin under such mental pressure and uncertainty tell him and all his opponents that there will be an investigation and decision after the round!

Well, in the end it turned out that Dustin won with a 3-shot lead, so the USGA’s decision luckily didn’t harm much, but imagine it had been closer… imagine what this would have meant for Dustin who was runner up in majors so often.

This is what Dustin’s colleagues had to say (i.e. tweet) during the round: