America At Large/ George Kimball's Column: Mark Hensby wouldn't be the first professional golfer to lose because he had no balls, but he may have been the first to admit it.

Hensby is a 33-year-old Australian pro from Melbourne who is enjoying (or was "enjoying" until last Friday, anyway) his second go-round on the US PGA tour. His first ended in 2001, when he lost his tour card and was forced to play his way back on, which he did by finishing seventh on the Nationwide Tour in 2003.

Provided with this window of opportunity, last summer he guaranteed himself exempt status through next year by winning the John Deere Classic.

At Bay Hill last week, Hensby, already nine-over-par, was out of contention at Bay Hill by the time he reached the 18th tee. When he hooked his drive out of bounds, he tossed his driver to his caddie, jammed his hands into his pockets, and walked in with his group.

After shaking hands with playing partners Mike Weir and Andre Stolz, he attested one scorecard and signed his own, which included an X for the final hole.

Since the rules of golf required him to play a second tee-shot, which he did not, Hensby was immediately disqualified, as he fully expected to be.

What he hadn't anticipated was how roundly vilified he would be in the days to come. Announcers on the Golf Channel lambasted him for his failure to respect the game. At least one newspaper described his actions as "shameful".

Now, it isn't exactly as if he'd been the first golfer to walk off the course without finishing his round. John Daly has done it at least half a dozen times. I've seen Sam Snead do it (albeit in the Augusta par-3 tournament), and in 1989 Greg Norman's score for the final hole of the first-ever British Open play-off was the same as Hensby's on the 18th at Bay Hill - an X.

"Maybe," supposed a fellow pro, "he thought this was a Stableford."

Hensby wasn't even the only golfer not to finish that day. Dudley Hart, citing a bad back, quit after nine holes, the last of which had been the same 18th - on which he took a 10. Arron Oberholser, Steve Flesch, Scott Hoch and Ryan Palmer also withdrew.

Tournament host Arnold Palmer was 15-over with a hole to play when darkness curtailed play that night. When Palmer didn't turn up to play his final hole on Saturday, nobody ripped him.

And Hensby had a better excuse than any of them: he was out of ammunition.

After playing poorly in Thursday's round, Hensby hadn't restocked his bag when he set out on Friday. When he made a double-bogey on the ninth, he ordered his caddie to give the ball away, and the caddie also tossed a couple more to well-wishers in the gallery.

When he drove into the water off the 11th tee matters began to get critical, and by the time he reached the par-3 17th - which requires a carry of over 200 yards across water - his caddie informed him that he was down to one golf ball.

He dodged that bullet, but when his drive struck a cart path and hopped a fence on the last, he knew he was done.

Hey, it's happened to all of us. At Presidents Golf Course in Quincy, Massachusetts, I once played behind two Japanese golfers who set out with two dozen brand new Titleists apiece. By the time they walked (or in their case, drove) off the course 15 holes later, they didn't have a single one left.

There's not a golfer alive who hasn't had a day so bad that he didn't have to resort to borrowing a ball or two from a playing partner when his stash tapped out. On the pro tour, however, a competitor is required to play the same ball throughout his round.

Weir uses Pro V-1X and Stolz Callaway balls. Hensby was playing a regular Pro V-1, so he couldn't even cadge a ball from one of them.

Nor was retrieving his wayward tee-shot an option. No sooner had that ball come to rest than it was retrieved and pocketed by the souvenir hunter who ran off with it.

But Hensby didn't skulk off the course in bad humour, he pointed out, although he's certainly been happier. He walked the final hole with his group, shook hands with his playing partners and their caddies, and even sheeplishly waved to the crowd.

The truth didn't emerge until Hensby arrived at TPC Sawgrass on Monday for his first practice round for the Players Championship, which begins today.

"I had no golf balls left," Hensby confirmed to the Boston Globe's Jim McCabe. "What can I say? It was embarrassing."

Hensby concedes that he could have saved himself a lot of grief by explaining the circumstances at the time, rather than leaving the Golf Channel people to draw their conclusions.

But he seemed particularly galled by TV criticism that he had failed to show "respect for the game".

"I live and breathe the game," Hensby told McCabe.

"The trouble is, they never came and asked me what happened."