Cody Gribble had no problem tickling a gator; Smylie Kaufman was freaked out by one

March 19, 2017 by

Cody Gribble took on a gator on Thursday at Bay Hill. (Getty Images)

On Thursday at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, Cody Gribble straddled the line between bravery and insanity as he strolled down a fairway at Bay Hill, approaching an alligator from behind and giving it a love tap on the tail. Fortunately for Gribble, the gator was spooked by Gribble’s touch, and it jumped right into the nearby water hazard.

Fellow PGA Tour winner Smylie Kaufman also had an encounter with a gator on Friday at Bay Hill, and it went a little differently.

Kaufman was making his way toward a green a Bay Hill in the second round, strolling with his putter in hand near the water, when he suddenly realizes there’s a gator sunbathing on the grass about 15 yards in front of him. He looks up and jumps back, spooked that he realized he was about to walk square into a gator’s territory.

Kudos to Kaufman’s caddie, who was walking a little farther from the water’s edge but was already parallel with the gator by the time his boss freaked out. The looper wasn’t scared, though he did stop and go back to check on his guy. That’s high-quality caddie work.

And here’s the video comparison between what Gribble and Kaufman each did.

Both players wound up missing the cut on Friday, but Gribble didn’t walk away empty-handed. Someone pranked him and left a fake gator’s head in his locker.

Thankfully, Gribble didn’t walk away looking like Chubbs Peterson.

Ryan Ballengee is a Yahoo Sports contributor. Find him on Facebook and Twitter.

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