The Do-Over Everyone Knows

Golf’s friendliest custom arrives exactly one swing late.

Your hands are cold, your back is tighter than your 3-iron, the coffee has not kicked in, and your first ball just met the cart path. The breakfast ball is real in weekend golf culture and nonexistent in the rule book, which is exactly why it works. It’s a first-tee redo in casual play. Take it and the second ball is the one that counts.

Is it legal? No, and that is fine

Under the Rules of Golf, mulligans do not exist. If you plan to post a score for handicap, state associations remind players you cannot fix the opener with a redo and pretend it never happened. Some guidance even suggests leaving that hole blank if your group has a standing first-hole mulligan agreement.

Enjoy it in friendly rounds, not league night or a money match.

Where did it come from?

The breakfast ball springs from a broader redo: the mulligan. The origin story for mulligans is classic 20th-century golf-lore. The USGA Museum catalogs a few versions, including 1920's Canadian hotelier David B. Mulligan re-teeing after a frazzled commute and New Jersey locker-room man John “Buddy” Mulligan asking for a redo in the 1930s. Either way, the second-chance idea has been baked into American golf for nearly a century.

Etymology sleuths, on the other hand, have chased a curveball. Some argue that “mulligan” drifted in from baseball slang tied to a fictional slugger named “Swat Mulligan,” with the golf meaning firming up by the early 1930s. It is a fun theory and a reminder that second chances were in the air long before launch monitors.

House rules

Because this is a you-and-your-buddies kind of tradition, agree before you peg it. A simple set keeps things fair and fast:

• First tee only. If the opener is a wipe, reload only once.
  
• No scouting advantage. If the first was pure, there is no curiosity swing for a different line.
  
• Save it for casual rounds. League, skins, or events mean play on.

Why it sticks around

Most of us roll in with a coffee lid still clicking, pull on a glove that feels half a size too tight, and hear the starter call our name with no range and no stretch, just swing. That is why the breakfast ball exists: one clean do-over on Shot No. 1 that knocks down the jitters, avoids a five-minute bushwhack, and sets an easy tempo for the day.

Keep it where it belongs, first tee only and one swing, and offer it before you ask for it. It is not a loophole, it is a courtesy that keeps pace up and tempers down. Take it, smile, and play the second one like it counts, because it does.