Tee
- This article is about the item of sports equipment. For the letter of the alphabet see T. For the item of apparrel see Tee shirt. For the Unix tool see Tee (Unix)
A tee is a stand used to support a stationary ball so that the player can strike it, particuarly in golf, Tee Ball, American football, and rugby.
Golf tees
In golf, a tee is normally used for the first stroke of each hole, and the area from which this first stroke is hit is informally also known as a tee (officially, teeing ground). Thus, for example the ninth hole of a course is played from the ninth tee to the ninth green, and similarly for the other holes. Normally, teeing the ball is only allowed on the first shot of a hole, called the tee shot, and illegal for any other shot. However, local or seasonal rules may allow or require teeing for other shots as well, e.g. under "winter rules" to protect the turf when it is unusually vulnerable. Teeing gives a considerable advantage for drive shots, so it is normally done whenever allowed. On short par 3 holes where the first shot is a chip, the tee shot may be played without a tee.
A standard golf tee is 2.125" (two and one eighth inches) long, but both longer and shorter tees are permitted and are preferred by some players.
History
The development of the tee was the last major change to the rules of golf. Before this, golf balls were teed up on little heaps of sand that was provided in boxes. This explains the historical name tee boxes for what is today known as teeing ground.
The earliest golf tees rested flat on the ground and had a raised portion to prop up the ball. According to the book The Singular History of the Golf Tee written by Irwin R Valenta, the first patent for this kind of tee was awarded to Scotsmen W Bloxsom and A Douglas in 1889.[1][2] The first tee with a ground-penetrating spike was patented in the UK in 1892, as stated in the book.[1][3] The book also shows tees patented in 1896 (by W. Kirkwood of Scotland) and 1897 (by P.M. Matthews of Scotland) which, with their slender shafts and cupped tops, are similar in both form and function to modern tees.
The first United States patents for golf tees, according to Valenta, were patented in 1895: P.L. Senat's cone-shaped "Combined Golf Tee and Scorecard" (U.S. Patent 570,821) and David Dalziel's "Golfing Appliance" (U.S. Patent 567,455), which included a rubber tee embedded in a platform fixture.
According to Mary Bellis at the website [inventors.about.com], the first U.S. Patented Golf tee was established in 1899 by an African-American dentist by the name of Dr. George F. Grant.(See U.S. Patent 638,920) This tee, similar to the modern type, was created out of wood with a rubber sleeve. In 1928, Dr. William Lowell patented the first commercially distributed tee called the "Reddy Tee." Lowell's product, which was similar to earlier designs, was a wooden peg with a flared top. This was copied around the world, and still remains the most common type of golf tee.
Tee Ball tee
Tee Ball is based on baseball, with the main difference being the use of a tee in the place of a pitcher. Much larger than a golf tee, the Tee Ball tee is a rubber stand attached to the home plate which supports the baseball at a suitable height for the batter to hit. It is adjustable to allow for variations in batter height.
Kicking tee
A kicking tee is a rubber or plastic platform, often with prongs and/or a brim around an inner depression.
In American football and its variants, a tee may be used on kickoffs to raise the ball slightly above the playing surface (up to one inch, by NFL and NCAA rules). The CFL and some high school leagues also allow the use of tees on field goal and extra point kicks, where another player (the holder) places one end of the ball on the tee (usually just a rubber block) and holds the opposite end.
Tees may also be used for place kicks in rugby.