Can you take advice from a caddy who is also your playing partner?

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I am a caddy at a resort and sometimes I am asked to play with a client. If you’re playing, how many strokes should I take each time I give a client a tip? Does the client also receive a penalty? —Steve “Cadillac” Heslin, Las Vegas

This all sounds very sketchy, even in Vegas, where “customers” often ask for bad things. Now, just as the Cadillac can pull double duty as a personal ride and as an Uber, but not at the same time, so can the Golf. You are either a caddy or a player.

Therefore, a fellow golfer gets two strokes each time he asks for a tip, according to Rule 10.2a… and he gets two strokes for giving a tip under the same rule. Call it a variation on the old caddy saying: “Show up, keep quiet and shut up.”

For more caddy-related advice from our guru, read on…

I’m a caddy. On the last loop, my boys were brutal putters – they never hit the line I gave them. On the last hole, one of them had a six-footer that had to start on the left fairway. I pulled the pin and raised it in the air so that its shadow made a line from his ball to the left edge of the hole. He sunk the putt while I caught a shadow on that line. Assuming this is illegal, what if I remove the shadow just before the golfer putst? —Maddox Miller-Jones, via email

Maddox, you are right to fear for your reputation, as placing a player while his reputation is still intact would be a violation of Rule 10.2b(2), which deals with advice and other assistance. It earns your man the usual penalty of two strokes in stroke play and losing a hole in match play.

That said, using the shadow to point the line before the heartbeat is correct – in fact, it’s more than correct, it’s plain smart. Give yourself a big tip.

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