In Golf, Rules Are Rules. Even the "Stupid" Rules. The bizarre calls didn't change the outcomes Sunday for the Arizona Cardinals or Graeme McDowell, but they could have. If the Cardinals had lost their opener to the Seattle Seahawks, the replacement referees would have come under attack for giving the Seahawks an extra timeout in the final minute. McDowell, on the other hand, had nobody to blame but himself after failing to advance to the Super Bowl of golf; his tie for 34th at the BMW Championship was marked by a two-stroke penalty that he called on himself. Unlike football players, golfers not only have to accept mistakes, however accidental, but they are also expected to call attention to them even if nobody else notices. The golfers" diligence in enforcing rules more arcane than the typical N.F.L. infraction was driven home during the first round of the BMW Championship when McDowell turned a 66 into a 68 after owning up to having brushed a fallen leaf while addressing his ball in a bunker on the ninth hole at Crooked Stick Golf Club. "It was a very unusual scenario," McDowell said, "where I've got a small branch behind my ball with a leaf attached to it, and in the process of addressing my ball I grazed the top of the leaf, and I'm deemed to have touched a loose impediment in a hazard, which is a two-shot penalty." It mattered not that McDowell didn't benefit from what he did. "Despite the fact that nothing has moved, the lie hasn't improved, I just didn't give the branch enough respect," he said, adding: "It was just one of those moments where I've never seen that scenario before. It's a tough lesson. At the P.G.A. Championship last month, Carl Pettersson lost out on a second-place finish when he incurred a two-stroke penalty for brushing the grass and grazing a leaf during his backswing when he was hitting out of a lateral water hazard. After finishing tied for third, Pettersson said: "It's just one of those things. We have a lot of stupid rules in golf. McDowell overcame the penalty and was poised to qualify for the 30-man field for next week's Tour Championship with a strong finish Sunday. He closed with a six-over-par 78 - his only score not in the 60s - to fall one spot in the point standings, to No. While McDowell refused to blame the penalty for his failure to advance, there's no telling how, or if, it wore on his psyche. Unlike athletes in other sports - some events at the London Games come to mind - golfers accept that there's no difference between the letter and the spirit of the rules. "We're dropping the ball, we're marking the ball, we're doing things where if you were that way inclined, you could gain an advantage, if that's the way you want to play this game," McDowell said. He added, "Guys call stuff on themselves, and it says a lot about what this game is all about." Ryan Moore, who called a penalty on himself this year in Charlotte, N.C., when his ball moved on the green after he had addressed it, said the sport had to be self-policing because the field of play was so spread out. "There's nobody watching over you, and sometimes you're 40, 50 yards apart on holes," Moore said. I think it's just a really important, kind of a special part of the game of golf, is you're just honest out there. You're not trying to take advantage of anything, where other sports you try and get away with everything you possibly can. Who needs replacement referees when the players police themselves? "I think it's important for the integrity of the game," said Bo Van Pelt, whose father, Bob, was an offensive lineman who was drafted in the fifth round by the Philadelphia Eagles and spent time with the Detroit Lions and the Cincinnati Bengals. Van Pelt added: "If I had one complaint about the rules of golf, I think sometimes we have to call penalties on ourselves, like, for instance, Carl Pettersson at the P.G.A., that really have no effect on the outcome of the shot. I think we can simplify the rules. It would help the game. I think we have rules that sometimes penalize you for no apparent reason. He'll get no argument from McDowell, who said that when he sought a second opinion, the tour rules official commiserated with him while confirming the penalty. "The referee said to me we need to change that rule," he said. No good to me right now, but I get it. I get it.