PARAMUS, New Jersey, (Reuters) – American Jim Furyk was disqualified from the first of four lucrative FedExCup playoff events after sleeping late and missing his tee at the Barclays Pro-Am yesterday.
Furyk, number three on the FedExCup points list, said his cellphone alarm lost power during the night and he only woke up seven minutes before his 7:30 a.m. (1130 GMT) start time on a rainy day at Ridgewood Country Club.
“I overslept,” Furyk told officials. “I always use my phone as an alarm and it had no power this morning.”
Furyk said he bolted from his room with no belt, socks and untied shoes but arrived in the locker room five minutes after his start time on the 11th tee.
Slugger White, the U.S. PGA Tour vice president of rules and competitions, said there was no time to get Furyk out to his group on the 11th tee and that an alternate was sent out.
“The rules are the rules,” said Furyk.
The disqualification will not keep Furyk out of the second event of the series, the Deutsche Bank Championship in Boston.
The worst Furyk could wind up following the Barclays would be 19th place on the points list, a U.S. PGA Tour official said, and the top 100 players advance.
The overall points leader after the four playoff events in which the field is whittled to 70 for the BMW Championship and then 30 for the Tour Championship wins a $10 million bonus.
Furyk’s disqualification shrank the field to 121 for this week’s event, which begins today on the tree-lined course some 30 minutes from midtown Manhattan.