Adam Scott anchor-putted his way to a green jacket. (Getty Images)

Last month, Adam Scott won The Masters with some of the most dramatic putting in golf history. And after Jan. 1, 2016, he won't be able to duplicate the feat.

The USGA and the R&A, golf's two governing bodies, have ruled that anchoring a club, as Scott and many others do in putting, will be illegal as of Jan. 1, 2016. Rule 14-1b now bans the anchoring of long putters and belly putters against the body.

The governing bodies have prepared documentation explaining, in their words, "why freely swinging the entire club is the essence of the traditional method of stroke, and why anchoring is a substantially different form of stroke that may alter and diminish the fundamental challenges of the game." The full report is available right here.

It's worth noting that the rule will not actually ban long putters, but rather the practice of anchoring them against the body. Also worth noting: four of the last six majors have been won by players using a belly putter. In addition to Scott, Keegan Bradley

E.J. Manuel gets his first reps as a Bill. (Getty Images)

The job of a rookie quarterback was never what you'd call easy. But the sudden, meteoric splash of young talents like Robert Griffin III, Russell Wilson and Colin Kaepernick have meant that for new QBs, the learning curve is a ten-foot-high wall, and patience with their development is nonexistent. So it's got to warm the chilled hearts of Bills fans to hear that their latest prize acquisition, rookie E.J. Manuel, is acclimating well to the team's new offense under Doug Marrone and OC Nathaniel Hackett.

“The funny thing is it's easier to learn than the offense I had at Florida State,” Manuel said on SiriusXM. “It's a true West Coast-type progression offense. That's really what I wanted when I was coming through the pre-draft process. I wanted something that I could just go in and say 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, check it down and run it. That's it, it's that simple. I love it."

Now, the way that Manuel related it, the Bills' playbook sounds only slightly more complex than the "everybody get open"

Via Keenan Allen's Vine.That happy gentleman sipping on a cup there at right is Keenan Allen. He's living the high life right now, enjoying his status as a newly-minted NFL draft pick. Problem is, he's a draft pick of the San Diego Chargers ... and that there is a Raiders hat on his head.

Rookie move, KA.

This past weekend, Allen was trying a little social-media outreach, recording himself on Vine visiting an In-N-Out Burger. And, as so often happens when athletes get unfiltered access to the public, things turned ugly.

Now, it's generally good form not to in any way endorse your competitors; if you're a Coke spokesman, you don't want to get caught drinking a Pepsi, for instance. But you can figure that Allen, who went to college at Cal, might be a Raiders fan from way back, and almost surely owned the hat before he was drafted in the third round by that bolt-oriented team to the south. Reasonable mistake, right? We can all agree that it was a simple oversight, can't we?

Of course not. This is NFL fandom we're

Via Ray Rice's Facebook page

We all thought Oxbow won the Preakness Stakes in Maryland on Saturday, but that's apparently because we weren't looking far enough in front. Ray Rice led the pack!

Well, at least he did on his own Facebook page, where he posted the above Photoshop. Rice's teammate Torrey Smith was actually at the race, and gave the "riders up" command — horse-racing's equivalent of "start your horses" — while wearing quite the tie:

Torrey Smith at the Preakness.

And as for football players actually competing against their equine equivalents ... here, per Larry Brown Sports, is Ochocinco racing a horse. Giddyup.

For most sports fans, the Preakness exists for one reason: to serve as a to-do list item for any potential Triple Crown winner. But on Saturday, Orb, the Kentucky Derby winner and potential Triple Crown challenger, couldn't break free. Oxbow won, and there will be no Triple Crown in horse racing in 2013.

Eight times in the last sixteen years, a horse has won the first two races of the Triple Crown, and eight times has fallen short. This year, Orb appeared primed for a near-certain victory, with a powerful Derby finish and steady hand Joel Rosario atop the saddle. Orb started on the rail, a difficult position to begin, and hit the quarter pole in mid-pack. Oxbow led at the first turn by two lengths. Orb broke to the outside in the back stretch, and had difficulty making headway through a thick pack. Oxbow retained the lead through virtually the entire race, and won the race going away in a time of 1:57.54.

Shortly before post time, Orb was at 3/5

Ken Venturi enjoys the spoils of winning the U.S. Open in 1964. (Getty Images)Ken Venturi, winner of the 1964 U.S. Open and a longtime commentator for CBS, has died at the age of 82.

To one generation, Venturi is best known for the major he won as well as the major he didn't. To later ones, he was the voice of golf for decades. In recent years, Venturi had suffered from numerous health problems, including prostate cancer in 2000, quintuple bypass surgery in 2006, and heart issues in 2011. He had spent the last few weeks in the hospital in Southern California, and developed infections in his back and intestine as well as pneumonia. His son Matt revealed the news of his father's death.

Venturi won the U.S. Open at Congressional in triple-digit heat; at that time, the final of the U.S. Open featured 36 holes of golf. Venturi was advised to quit, but did not, proceeding onward through dizziness and heatstroke. That year, he won Sports Illustrated's Sportsman of the Year and the PGA Player of the Year honors.

[Related photos: Ken Venturi through the years]

That would be

Former NASCAR driver Dick Trickle is dead of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to Lincoln County (N.C.) police.

At about noon on Thursday, the Lincoln County Communications Center received a call indicating that there would be a dead body at the Forest Lawn Cemetery in Boger City, and it would be the speaker's. Return calls to the number went unanswered. Crews arriving at the scene found Trickle's body lying near his pickup truck.

Trickle ran in 303 races in the Sprint Cup series over the course of 24 years, finally retiring in 2002. His best year was 1989, where he notched six top-5s, including three third-place finishes, driving the #84 Miller High Life Buick. He ended that year ranked 15th, ahead of Michael Waltrip, Brett Bodine and Richard Petty, among others.

Look, we all know where the conversation about Mr. Trickle is headed. The guy's name was a punch line his entire career. But he was a hard-nosed racer in his day, and this is how we prefer to remember him

Tiger Woods takes a drop on the 14th hole during the final round of The Players Championship. (Getty Images)Barely a third of the way into the 2013 golf season, Tiger Woods has already found himself the focus of three different rules controversies. He's been questioned for his behavior on the course and, in effect, called a liar for his comments off it.

He was penalized two strokes for an illegal drop at the HSBC Championship in January, nearly got disqualified from the Masters after an illegal drop there and this past weekend was questioned for giving himself a favorable drop in the final round of The Players Championship.

[Related: Two marshals on the grounds at Players said Tiger Woods did not lie]

(And if that weren't enough, Sergio Garcia accused Woods of a breach of etiquette during their third-round pairing on Saturday at The Players, leading to a he-said-she-said exchange from four course marshals, two of whom essentially called Woods a liar, two who defended him.)

All of this leads to the question: Why is this happening to Woods again and again?

While it's certainly true that Tiger is