Surely a one or two-hole play off was called-for to decide a winner.
Hokey spiritual messages or not, you can't declare a tie after 4 rounds of golf. Maybe they shared the money.
"Kids, you tried your best and you failed miserably. The lesson is, never try."
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I believe they didn't play playoff holes back then. It would've required an axtra 18 holes of golf.
shareA play-off would have been done in that particular scenario, but it was not essential to the plot nor the overall message of the story. I personally like that it ended in a tie.
shareif you read the book, it ends that way too. This part was true to the book, not much else was, but to be honest it would have been a long, bizarre movie if they had followed the book in every way. I thought they did a good job with making a pretty good sports movie.
shareThree things:
1> It was just an exhibition match
2> It was the 1930s
3> It was dark.
It's a pretty recent, Madden generation type of thing, that EVERYTHING has to have a winner and a loser. Ties used to be a fact of sports (except for baseball and basketball)
The NFL still has ties if no one scores in OT.
Boxing has ties (draws).
This is the first year in hockey that there are no more ties.
Ten years ago college football didn't have any OT at all, and there were many ties.
Back then, in golf, you would have playoffs for championships (like the US Open or Masters) where you HAD to have a winner, but simple matches could always end in ties. It was, and still is like kissing your sister, but the tie is something that is disappearing in modern sports. Everyone wants some kind of resolution, and a tie seems unacceptable today.
One of the greatest football games I ever played in high school ended in a 0-0 tie, but I digress..
Exhibition match, which means a great deal of latitude. Since the "authorities" (PGA, USGA, etc) weren't involved, if the three golfers chose to call it quits and enjoy the tie with respected competitors, there's nothing anyone could do about it. They couldn't be sanctioned and they fulfilled the terms of their agreement, i.e. come play four rounds of golf for a $10k prize. I suspect the argument from the filmmakers would be that Hagen, Jones and Junuh felt this was the perfect ending to The Greatest Match Ever Played between two long-time rivals, one of whom was retiring, and one upstart that had won their absolute respect.
share