The innocuous Tiger Woods moment that could change golf forever

A seemingly innocuous moment during the radical Tomorrow Golf League (TGL) tournament has lit a fuse under a long-running debate plaguing the sport.

The issue of pace of play in professional golf has been simmering for decades, and seems to get worse as players adopt new, often bizarre methods around their putting stroke in particular.

While there are universal guidelines in place to encourage players not to take too long on the course, the rules are vague and almost impossible to police.

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The last player to be handed a stroke penalty for slow play on the PGA Tour was Glen Day in 1995.

Since then, monetary fines have been handed to players sporadically, but many professionals toe the line and are never punished.

Commentators were livid over the weekend when groups at the PGA Tour's Farmers Insurance Open took up to five and a half hours to complete a round.

"The policy has been feckless for the last 31 years," George Savaricas said in a Golf Channel round table chat this week.

"The problem has got substantially worse over time and there's a competitive imbalance. Slow players impact fast players, fast players don't impact slow players.

"Slow players know they only pay a monetary fine but to them, it's comparatively so much less than the purses are that there's no incentive structure to change their pace of play."

Fellow Golf Channel pundit Rex Hoggard labelled the issue "an outrage" and took aim at the Tour for failing to police slow play.

Hoggard wants the Tour to enforce more stroke penalties in real time, rather than fine players relatively paltry sums at the conclusion of a round or tournament.

But the answer may have just been answered by the TGL.

The new league, which is the brain child of modern legends Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy, is played on an indoor simulator and offers fans the chance to watch in-stadium or on television, where they won't miss a shot.

The TGL has a 40-second shot clock on players and it was Woods himself who fell afoul of it during an event this week.

Woods stepped up to putt, but the clock ticked down and buzzed about one second before he made contact with his ball, which missed the hole anyway.

The timing was curious - whether Woods purposely timed out to make a point to the PGA Tour will perhaps never be known.

"Normally I slow my heart rate down before I pull the trigger, so dropping my heart rate down sometimes takes a little bit longer than others," he later explained when asked about the moment.

Australian great Adam Scott - who played against Woods in the TGL event - seemed to suggest a shot clock could work in proper 72-hole golf tournaments.

"It's a slight adjustment, Tiger got a time violation, you have to be careful," Scott said.

"But I think for this format it's creating a good tempo.

"(The 40 seconds is) about right… you have just enough time, but you can't mess around or you're going to be stressing getting over the shot and it could lead to an error."

Bringing a shot clock in to proper golf - that is, on an outdoor course and not using a simulator - would be much harder than doing so in the TGL.

Administrators would have to decide whether the clock is in place only on the putting green, or includes tee and fairway shots.

With millions of dollars and big trophies on the line it would need to be policed properly, with trained staff watching every player on every hole - up to 54 at a time - all the time.

Then there's the question of when the clock would start - when a player first approaches his ball? When he chooses his club? As soon as the other player has had their shot?

It's not an easy solution but one that administrators will no doubt be looking into already.