Using static properties that return _instance.variable...

Hi guys, I have seen this in some tutorials and random scripts on the Wiki, and I also use it in some of my Singletons, but I am not sure if there are any drawbacks or differences that I should be aware of.

Let's say you have a Singleton like so:

public class MySingleton { private static MySingleton _instance = null; public static MySingleton Instance { get{ return _instance; } }

 // Now for some properties
 // here's a normal public getter, accessed like: MySingleton.Instance.Score
 private int _score;
 public int Score
 {
     get{ return _score; }
 }

 // Now here's a static public getter, accessed like: MySingleton.Score
 private float _distance;
 public float Distance
 {
     get{ return Instance._distance; }
 }

}

Both example in the above will return the variable the same way, except one is shorter then the other when accessing it from another class. But are there any drawbacks or problems with the second way of returning Instance._myPrivateVar? If they are both exactly the same, is it bad practice in general to use the second way? And I am not talking about good/bad practices when writing CSharp code, I'm really only talking about writing code for UNITY, since it is different enough compare to writing normal CSharp classes.

Thanks guys!
Stephane