12 costly and controversial golf rules scenarios from 2025 season

With hundreds of events and many thousands of rounds played across golf’s pro tours every year, rules violations abound. While the most common penalties rarely cause a stir, every season sees other rules scenarios that ignite controversy and, at times, can be incredibly costly to players’ bank accounts and reputations.

Still others offer bizarre situations that leave even the most studious expert on the Rules of Golf scratching their heads.

And the 2025 season was chock full of all of the above.

From cheating accusations to career-changing violations and beyond, here are the most costly, controversial and downright strange rules fiascos of the 2025 pro golf season, in no particular order.

Pro DQ’d for bizarre incident: ‘I didn’t cheat’

The first incident we’ll cover came at the DP World Tour’s premier event, the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth, in September.

There, veteran Marcel Siem was disqualified for a bizarre incident on the 18th hole. After losing his tee shot right in a water hazard, but not out of bounds, Siem mistakenly hit a provisional.

But it gets worse. After spectators found his original tee shot, Siem went ahead and continued playing his provisional. Given that he wasn’t supposed to hit a provisional in the first place, Siem was quickly DQ’d in the scorer’s tent.

Later that night, Siem took to social media to counter any cheating claims, saying, “Hey, guys, just wanted to give you a quick insight on what happened today. I just wanted to let you know I didn’t cheat. I would never do that, so I got disqualified, unfortunately.”

Shane Lowry’s controversial penalty at Open confirmed by video

Amid the 2025 Open Championship at Royal Portrush, the site of his 2019 Open win, Shane Lowry received a penalty that left him frustrated and confused.

On the 12th hole in Round 2, Lowry made a practice swing in thick rough next to his ball, then proceeded to hit his shot. The TV broadcast noted that his ball appeared to “oscillate” after his practice swing.

In the scorer’s tent after the round, rules officials told Lowry video reviews showed his ball moved, and he was hit with a two-shot penalty.

Later, Lowry revealed that he disagreed with the ruling but feared fighting the accusation would hurt his reputation.

“I was in there with the rules official and wasn’t arguing my case, but I’m disappointed that they don’t have more camera angles on it,” Lowry said after the round. “The one zoomed in slow motion, they’re trying to tell me if it doesn’t move from the naked eye, if you don’t see it moving, it didn’t move. I told them I definitely was looking down towards the ball as I was taking that practice swing, and I didn’t see it move.

“But I had to take the penalty because, to be honest, whether it was or not, but I had to take the penalty because I can’t have my name talked about or tossed around like that, and I just get on with it.”

Rory McIlroy denied relief from … banana peel

World No. 2 Rory McIlroy had a historic 2025 season, highlighted by his victory at the Masters. But the most bizarre moment of McIlroy’s year came in his very last start.

The five-time major winner made a highly anticipated appearance at the 2025 Australian Open at Royal Melbourne in December. In the third round, McIlroy hit a shot into the rough that came to rest in the most unlikely of scenarios.

His ball was located behind a large tuft of grass … with a banana peel resting on top of it. Fearing any attempt to move the banana peel would cause his ball to move, thereby eliciting a penalty stroke, McIlroy was forced to hit away.

After his round, McIlroy explained that he was confident that he didn’t deserve a free drop in the scenario, so he didn’t even bother calling in a rules official to help.

“The banana, it’s a loose impediment and it was rested on the ball,” he explained after the round. “So if I moved the banana peel the ball would’ve moved. I just didn’t even try.”

2 Korn Ferry Tour pros DQ’d after 1 reports rules violation

At the Korn Ferry Tour’s 2025 Memorial Health Championship, Cole Hammer’s uneasiness with a moment in the first round resulted in his disqualification. It also got his playing partner DQ’d.

When pro Nelson Ledesma’s caddie flashed four fingers at Hammer after Hammer had hit a 4-iron on the 17th hole, Hammer flashed four fingers back at him, confirming that was the club he hit.

The Rules of Golf prohibit players and caddies from giving advice to one another, including information on club selection.

The incident didn’t sit well with Hammer, so he reported it to rules officials in the morning. That’s when they determined that both players should be DQ’d.

“I didn’t think that they would be disqualified,” Hammer said of his playing partner Ledesma and his caddie. “I just thought since I was the one who gave the sign that I would be disqualified. And I thought that was worst-case scenario.”

Rules controversy strikes viral Internet Invitational

The inaugural Internet Invitational took the golf world by storm this fall, and it was not without its rules controversies.

Perhaps the biggest of all arrived in the middle of the final million-dollar match. At one point, competitor Malosi Togisala was accused of using the slope function on his rangefinder, which was not allowed during the tournament.

A Zapruder-like investigation followed, with accusations and recriminations flying around Big Cedar Lodge. In the end, Togisala denied any wrongdoing and held strong, so no penalty was called.

Rare penalty at Q-School costs pro his PGA Tour card

Ben Kohles was on the verge of earning his PGA Tour card for 2026 at Q-School, when disaster struck.

In a share of the lead during the final round, Kohles lost his tee shot at the 8th hole into a wooded area. As he tried to move loose impediments from around his lie, his ball moved.

That resulted in a one-shot penalty, and Kohles made double bogey to fall out of the lead.

It didn’t get better at the next hole. At the 9th, Kohles hit his tee shot into the water, eliciting another penalty and another double. He eventually signed for a five-over 75, which dropped him into a T29 at six under, five shots short of a playoff for the final Tour card.

Pro suspended after ‘reckless infringement’ of rules

Swiss pro Cedric Gugler got into a whole lot of hot water this year on the DP World Tour’s junior circuit, the HotelPlanner Tour.

At a tournament in the Czech Republic this year, Gugler was disqualified for “playing his ball from the wrong place on putting surfaces on multiple occasions” during the first round.

But the punishment didn’t stop there.

In November, an Independent Disciplinary Panel ruled that Gugler had “conducted himself in a manner that fell below the standards of behavior and ethical conduct expected of Tour members.” Furthermore, his actions in the Czech tournament constituted a “reckless infringement of the Rules of Golf.”

As a result of the findings, Gugler was suspended for the first 10 events of 2026.

DP World Tour pro fined for ‘breach’ of behavior

At the DP World Tour’s Nexo Championship in August, pro Sam Bairstow disqualified himself after learning of a penalty he committed on the 14th hole. But after an outcry from fellow pros, Bairstow was also fined for a “breach of the DP World Tour’s Code of Behavior.”

So what happened? A fan video showed Bairstow’s ball move before he hit his second shot from deep rough on the 14th. He should have placed the ball back and taken a one-shot penalty, but he did not.

When confronted by rules officials after signing his scorecard, the pro first denied any wrongdoing, but eventually disqualified himself when shown the footage of the penalty.

Bairstow reportedly received a €25,000 fine for his actions.

Davis Riley self-reports rangefinder penalty

Safely inside the cutline on the 17th hole at the CJ Cup Byron Nelson, Davis Riley’s heart sank when he looked through his rangefinder and saw two numbers. One represented the yardage for his shot, the other showed his slope-adjusted yardage.

Players were permitted to use distance-measuring devices early in the 2025 PGA Tour season, but they were not allowed to use the slope function.

Riley didn’t think twice. He self-reported the violation and received a two-shot penalty to fall outside the cut line. Incredibly, he eagled the 18th to make the cut after all.

“It’s a game — it’s a gentleman’s game,” Riley said after his round. “That’s just something, when you start out with that, that’s the integrity of the game knowing guys are going to keep that there. You kind of have to have that same trust as if guys, what happened to me today, have the security to say, ‘Hey, I shot this, and it was accidentally on slope.’”

Pro’s slow-play penalty threatens Tour card hopes

At the 2025 Nationwide Children’s Hospital Championship, the second of four Korn Ferry Tour Finals events, Bryson Nimmer was in 36th place in the season-long standings. He needed to jump into the top 20 over his final events to earn a PGA Tour card for 2026.

It was a tall task, but one within reach. But Nimmer made his quest even harder when he earned a slow-play penalty at the event. According to Tour officials, Nimmer took 68 seconds to play his approach shot on 18 in the opening round, which far exceeded the 40 seconds allotted for most shots.

Due to a rule change that increased the punishment for slow-play violations, Nimmer received a one-shot penalty. He would go on to miss the cut and finish 47th in the final Korn Ferry standings, missing out on a PGA Tour card but securing KFT status for 2026.

Amateur plummets down leaderboard after improving lie penalty

Thanks to his 2025 NCAA individual championship title, amateur Michael La Sasso earned invites into several PGA Tour events. And at the Sanderson Farms Championship near his college, Ole Miss, La Sasso thrilled the local fans with an opening-round 66 that put him in second place.

But it wouldn’t last. Unbeknownst to fans, La Sasso earned a penalty on the 6th for violating Rule 8.1a which governs improving lies. A two-shot penalty. That dropped the star amateur to four under and into a tie for 13th.

On Friday, La Sasso struggled to a 76 and missed the cut.

2 pros penalized for playing wrong ball on same hole

The last rules scenario one the list is one you may have never seen before.

During the final round of the 2025 Sentry, PGA Tour pros Cam Davis and Will Zalatoris committed what might be the most embarrassing rules violation of the year.

On the par-5 15th hole, the two pros both played the wrong ball on their third shots. As in Davis played Zalatoris’ ball, and Zalatoris played Davis’ ball.

Upon realizing their error, the two pros replayed their shots from the correct spots and added two-stroke penalties to their scorecards. The penalties cost each pro hundreds of thousands of dollars in winnings.

The error also earned the pros’ criticism from NBC analysts Dan Hicks and Mark Rolfing on the TV broadcast.

Said Rolfing: “Wow, what a pair of mistakes there.”

Said Hicks: “Especially with the money involved here and the FedEx Cup points. It’s just frustrating, disappointing, everything above.”

Said Rolfing: “Almost doesn’t seem possible in today’s game. You cannot play your own ball.”

Said Hicks: “Losing a little bit of focus, right? Just kind of get careless.”

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