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Even the Champions sometimes make flop. The Regions Tradition, which ended Saturday with the clear victory of a great Steve Stricker (5 shots ahead of Steven Alker), once again showed the great level of the game expressed by the Seniors.
But this time there were also two cases that led to the disqualification of the players involved. The first flop (for importance) was made by Alex Cejka, also Defending Champion of the Regions Tradition. The German was the first professional Tour player to breach the Model Local Rule G-11.
Very briefly, the standard concerns the characteristics of the "maps" for reading the greens and the possibility of integrating the information. Cejka closed the third round in 66 strokes, for an overall final score equal to par, which would have guaranteed him a tied 43rd place.
John Daly, disqualification
But in the press release of the tournament, released by the media staff of the PGA Tour Champions, the news appeared of the disqualification imposed on the German player for having used "a yardage book not approved for the tournament by the PGA Tour Champions Rukes Committee".
Moreover, it is not the first time that Cejka has suffered this type of disqualification. In 2019 he was disqualified after the 14th hole of the first round of the Honda Classic for using a yardage book that did not conform to the scale used in the images of the greens.
Persevere diabolicum? But Alex was not alone in his misfortune. He joined the "DQ" club with John Daly, disqualified after the second round. JD had finished his second round in 72 hits. Combined with the 68 of the first day, it guaranteed him a 16th place before the final lap.
But he was disqualified under rule 3.3b (2). He did not sign the score. The reasons remained unknown, given that the PGA Tur Champions did not give any indication, and the player least of all. I try to make a hypothesis. The fact that he missed four strokes in the last three holes of his round, closing hole 9 (he started from 10), a par 4, with greens in regulation and 4 putts could have negatively affected his mood. But it is only a hypothesis.
