Five new PGA Tour rules explained as golf responds to Shane Lowry controversies

Golf’s rulemakers don’t move quickly. But after a year of jaw-dropping penalties, television slow-motion drama and Shane Lowry being left to boil over on the biggest stages, the PGA Tour is finally blinking.

From this season, a number of new rule tweaks are being rolled out on the PGA Tour — and make no mistake, they’ve got the fingerprints of recent controversies all over them.

Some are technical, others are common sense, and a couple feel very much like the governing bodies quietly admitting they got it wrong.

Among some of the Model Local Rule changes being introduced for 2026 are:

• Embedded-ball relief extended in the fairway
• Reduced penalties when a player doesn’t realise their ball moved
• Tweaks to relief near putting greens
• Internal out of bounds now limited to the teeing area only
• Broken clubs can now be replaced with components

But it’s the first two that will really grab players’ attention — and none more so than Ryder Cup hero Lowry. 

The pitch mark that sparked outrage

Back in May during the PGA Championship, Ireland's Lowry found himself on the wrong end of one of golf’s most infuriating technicalities. 

Lowry's drive on the 8th hole at Quail Hollow plugged into a pitch mark in the fairway. 

Problem was, it wasn’t his pitch mark.

Under the old rule, that mattered. 

Despite being embedded below the surface in a fairway cut short, Lowry was told he couldn’t take free relief because another player had created the mark. 

After a lengthy rules discussion — broadcast helpfully to the world by an ESPN camera — Lowry proceeded to chunk his shot and vent his frustration by thumping the turf in disgust. 

But from this season onwards, that situation is history.

The updated wording allows free relief if a ball is embedded in any pitch mark in a fairway-height area, provided it hasn’t been repaired. Whose pitch mark it is no longer matters.

In other words: common sense prevails.

As PGA Tour rules boss Steve Rintoul has outlined to Golf Digest, the old scenario simply didn’t pass the smell test. 

Why should one player get relief and another not, from the exact same mark?

It still requires referee involvement to make sure the pitch mark hasn’t been altered, but the aim is clear — fewer farcical rulings and fewer moments where players look like they’re being punished for bad luck rather than bad play.

The Portrush penalty that broke the internet

If Quail Hollow was unlucky, Royal Portrush was brutal.

During the Open Championship, Lowry accidentally caused his ball to move with a practice swing on the 12th hole. He didn’t see it. He didn’t feel it. He had no idea it had even happened.

The TV cameras did.

After the round, Lowry spent 20 minutes reviewing footage with officials before being slapped with a two-shot penalty — one for causing the ball to move, another for failing to replace it before playing on.

Lowry accepted the punishment, but the logic didn’t sit right. Without HD cameras and zoomed-in replays, the incident would almost certainly have gone unnoticed.

But again from 2026, that changes.

Under the revised local rule, a player who causes their ball to move without knowing it will only receive the one-stroke penalty — and won’t be punished again for playing from the wrong spot.

The thinking is simple: you can’t fix something you don’t know is broken.

Smaller changes, big implications

Elsewhere, the PGA Tour is also tightening up “lift, clean and place”. Instead of a full club-length of freedom, players will now only be allowed to place the ball within a scorecard’s length — roughly 11 inches.

It’s a subtle shift, but one designed to stop players gaining sneaky advantages and keep balls closer to where they originally finished.

Add in changes to internal out of bounds, relief near greens and broken club replacements, and it’s clear the Tour is trying to iron out grey areas that have caused confusion — and fury — in recent seasons.

Too late, but finally right?

For Lowry, these changes arrive too late to erase the scars of 2025. The penalties still stand. The moments still happened.

But for players moving forward, this feels like a long-overdue step towards fairness — and an acknowledgement that modern golf, with its wall-to-wall coverage and forensic scrutiny, needs rules that reflect reality.

Golf may never be perfect. But at least now, it’s listening.

Maybe one day, just one day, they'll amend that dreaded divot in a fairway rule too...