Bill Murray accidentally strikes woman with golf ball at Outback Pro-Am

LUTZ — Even Bill Murray could joke about this.

Murray struck a woman with an errant golf ball off his tee shot on the No. 9 hole at TPC Tampa Bay during the first round of the Outback Pro-Am on Friday.

Murray, 58, was finishing his round when he hooked his tee shot so wide left, it flew to a neighboring house and hit Gail DiMaggio, who was watching the tournament from her yard across the street from the course.

Murray's caddy took him over in a cart to the woman's yard, where the paramedics were attending to her.

"I wasn't sure I was inbounds or not," Murray said. "And I saw this NBC golf cart coming at me and he said, 'I hate to be the one to tell you this, but you hit a lady. She's down on the ground.' That is, you know, sobering."

Murray did not finish his round, though tournament officials said DiMaggio was laying on the ground, but conscious and moving.

Murray was apparently not shaken by the incident.

The Ghostbusters star joked with reporters after signing his scorecard, even claiming DiMaggio isn't the first spectator he's hit with a ball.

"She was overjoyed when she saw me, because she said she had come out to see me and her husband had just said, 'I hope he hits it over here,' '' Murray said.

Murray, an avid golfer who often plays in celebrity tournaments, including the Pebble Beach Pro-Am, said DiMaggio would be taken to a local hospital.

But the SNL alum couldn't pass up an opportunity to poke fun at the situation.

"She's alright. She's got a hole in her head, in fact, a little indentation of a number three and the word Titleist," Murray joked. "She got whacked in the head and there were doctors there and a dental hygienist because she got a bunch of her teeth knocked out. And they took her to the hospital, and she's going to take this opportunity to have cosmetic surgery done, get her eyes and ears pinned back and some electro-shock therapy. So it's a happy story, really."

— Mike Camunas, Times Staff Writer