Hello everyone, I’m here to express my abject criticism of the Disc Golf Pro Tour’s position on PDGA rule 807B and what baskets they allow at their tournaments. A combination of poor planning and questionable rule-following by the DGPT led in-part to the downfall of a professional’s event, and what’s worse is that the situation could have been avoided.  If the words “PDGA”, “rule 807B”, “DGPT”, or even “disc golf” feel foreign to you, that’s alright! I’ll try to explain the situation in terms that will allow even you to share in my outrage.

In the sport of disc golf, the objective is to throw your disc from the tee pad of a hole into the corresponding basket in the lowest amount of throws (or strokes) possible. At the end of a round, you want to have the lowest score, or amount of strokes, to win. On the Pro Tour, (yes disc golf has a Pro Tour) top level professionals compete in tournaments to make their living, so placing high is of the utmost importance to them. The tournament in which this event took place was the 2022 Beaver State Fling.

Now, allow me to set the stage for you all. The pro’s were on hole 15 of round 2 of a three round tournament, and a player named Corey Ellis was leading the way by one stroke to competitor Garret Gurthie. Corey Ellis, a professional who at the time of this tournament had still never won an event, was shooting strongly up until this point and was in contention for the win. When it came time to putt on hole 15, however, instead of making the easy putt for par, this happened. (Don’t worry about watching the whole video, just watch the putt once or twice)

Most people would expect for this bizarre putt to count, but in a decision made after the round involving PDGA rule 807B, it was concluded that Ellis would take an unfortunate bogey. This may not seem like a huge deal to a non-disc golfer, but in an extremely mental game, it’s easy to see your confidence crumble after a scenario like this one. After the round, Ellis had dropped into second place behind Garret Gurthie, who would proceed to win the event in round 3. Ellis finished third, only shot 5 down (In comparison to the -7 and -11 rounds that beat him), lost $1000 of prize money (which is a lot for disc golf), and didn’t go on to win another event until well into 2023.

There are two aspects of this putt that aggravate me; one, that the basket in question was even allowed on the course, and two, that there was no exception made in this unique case. 

First of all, baskets are meticulously designed to always catch discs that fall into them. Baskets that are damaged straight up don’t belong in a professional setting, especially baskets that fail to uphold their purpose. Damaged baskets should always be either removed or fixed before tournaments, and it shocks me that the hole 15 basket wasn’t. 

The second contention I have with the handling of this putt is the rigidity that the Pro Tour Used while following PDGA rule 807B. This rule states that a disc MUST “come to rest supported by the tray or the chains below the chain support.” I understand that the pro tour has to follow rules, but on a missed putt that entered the basket, had nothing to do with the fault of the player, and would have gone in on ANY OTHER BASKET, I feel like exceptions can be made. In my opinion, the PDGA should have made an amendment then and there to allow putts that fall through the bottom of damaged baskets and allowed Ellis to take his par and finish his tournament in peace.

I hope you enjoyed sharing my annoyance at the DGPT, and if you have any comments about the situation feel free to leave them on this page.