Inside the PGA Tour’s new Video Review Center

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – After sharing a cramped trailer at PGA Tour events with another colleague the past two years, Orlando Pope and Rich Pierson are digging their new 20-foot-by-17-foot room of 340-square-feet of space with three workstations at the Tour’s new Video Review Center at PGA Tour Studios.

Pope, senior director, TV rules and video analyst, and Pierson, director of TV rules and video, are both longtime tournament referees in the field who took new roles based at headquarters and are responsible for manning the Video Review Center, which is designed to make rulings on the course quicker, especially in complex situations where players might otherwise spend significant time debating with officials.

Mark Dusbabek, who oversees the video review center and will work as the TV rules official at 22 of the 28 events, has watched the technology capabilities grow by leaps and bounds. Pope and Pierson have 10 TV screens mounted at eye-level tuned to various feeds and holes and two monitors in front of them, one of them splits into nine boxes. They are armed with the Hawk Eye System, an optical tracking system that utilizes fixed cameras on every hole, and can record up to 144 inputs including cameras and telecasts from the three major tours. The Hawk-Eye is the same technology used for instant-replay rulings in tennis, World Cup and Premier League soccer, and is integrated with ShotLink data for quick access to specific shots and full fast forward and rewind capabilities of video feeds.

“This is Mark’s baby, his vision,” said Pierson, who first heard about what Dusbabek planned to implement for the Tour two years ago at the Zozo Championship in Japan. “I jumped at the chance to be part of something from the ground floor.”

The Tour began implementing video replay in earnest three years ago. The new studio is integrated with on-air capabilities, which means Pope and Pierson will be familiar presences going on camera or voice-only on PGA Tour Live and the Tour’s World Feed (coming soon) and eventually with Golf Channel telecasts produced at PGA Tour Studios. Last year, they eased into having a video replay official — typically Pope — at 13 tournaments with four-round coverage. With improved technology this year? The Tour is stepping it up to do full coverage of 38 tournaments.

Another benefit is improved communication, allowing the video replay technician at the Video Review Center to talk directly to the on-course rules officials through intercom panels at PGA Tour Studios and radios for the on-course officials. After Brian Harman’s second shot on Friday at No. 8 at Pebble Beach Golf Links failed to clear the hazard, Pope reported this information to the rules officials on site.

“I don’t know if he wants a ride,” Pope said.

“Copy that, yes, sir,” a rules official responded.

“If you’re sitting on the golf course and watching three different holes, you’d never know it was happening,” Dusbabek said. “This is an example of the advantage to our pace. We’re able to give immediate feedback, reducing wait times that contribute to slow play.”

Another bonus available in the new studio: access to the feed of the ShotLink cameras, giving more options on the golf course and angles to analyze. That should remedy situations such as last year at the Players Championship where there was some debate over whether Rory McIlroy’s tee shot had crossed the line during the first round at the sixth hole. There was insufficient video evidence to help confirm the point of entry.

Pierson pointed out a similar scenario recently where a player believed his ball crossed a hazard and intended to take a drop well in front of where he had hit his previous shot but video evidence proved that not to be the case.

“If I don’t see that, there’s no penalty,” he said. “But what if TV sees it and makes a big deal out of it? And then what if fans start thinking a player is cheating? In that situation, we helped the player from looking bad.”

The Tour still is catching up to some of the other sport’s leagues but it has made big strides. While the Video Review Center offers great upside, the question remained: Would the rules staff buy in?

“I told the guys, ‘Look, I’ve been out there in the cold, the wind, the heat, the rain with you guys and I can see three or four holes. But in the studio I see all the holes,” Pierson said. “The benefit is we see something like if a ball is embedded and can call an official and say you might have an issue on five. They can get a head start to getting there before the player is even at the ball.”

At the Players Championship in March, Dusbabek, Pope and Pierson will work side by side in the Video Review Center, which still is in the proof-of-concept stage. But the facility was constructed with room to expand in the future and add men and women who have field experience administering the rules to cover the Korn Ferry Tour and PGA Tour Champions, too. Dusbabek is proud of how his baby is growing but he knows there’s more work to be done.

“You know how in tennis where they hit a serve and, boom, it shows that it hit the line?” he said. “I want to get to that.”

This article originally appeared on Golfweek: The new PGA Tour Studios includes the Tour’s first Video Review Center