Bizarre Ending on PGA Tour with Lengthy Ruling

Many of us probably watched the playoff between Jim Furyk & Brian Davis yesterday at the Verizon Heritage Classic. The ending was bizarre - to say the least. After making an 18-footer on the final hole to get into the playoff, Davis 2nd shot to the first playoff hole (#18) wound up in Calibogey Sound to the left of the green, marked with a RED line indicating it was a lateral hazard. The ball rested on sand and among some reeds. With Furyk on the green and probably going to make par, Davis elected to play his shot out of the hazard (he could have taken a drop under penalty of one-stroke and possibly chipped in for par). During the backswing, his club touched one of the brown reeds behind his ball and he continued the stroke blasting to about 25 feet past the hole. He immediately called Tour Official Slugger White over and indicated he had touched the reed on his backswing (TV replays also clearly showed this action). What happened next was almost as bizarre as the touching of the loose impediment as it seemed to take forever with multiple conversations on the radio between White and other Tour officials. The simple act to me would have been for White to pull the reed to see if it was a "loose impediment" which he finally did, confirming it was indeed a loose impediment. Rule 13-4c: "the player must not touch or move a loose impediment lying in or touching the hazard.....penalty = two strokes." The Tour got it right after what seemed to me to be a much longer delay than needed. Maybe because it was a playoff caused the delay but Davis admitted he touched it and hats off to him for calling the penalty on himself proving once again golf is a gentleman's game!