Angler Gerald Swindle, who began the second day of the 2007 Bassmaster Classic in ninth place, has been disqualified on Saturday for violating rules regarding safety and sportsmanship.

Tournament director Trip Weldon told ESPNOutdoors.com that Swindle "ran too close to boats on the water," both those of competitors and non-competitors.

The disqualification will virtually assure that the 2004 BASS Angler of the Year from nearby Warrior, Ala., will not fish Sunday's final day of the Classic.

"I don't know the exact details," said his wife, LeAnn Swindle, when reached immediately after Weldon's announcement. "I just talked to Gerald about 10 minutes ago and he was still pulling them out of the water. He's very, very upset."

The crowd favorite has been criticized in the past for perceived aggressive boating. Two years ago at a tournament on Table Rock Lake near Camden, Mo., he hassled angler Zell Rowland off a section of water under a bridge that both had been fishing the previous day.

Saturday morning at launch, Swindle was quick out of the take-off, passing several other boats on the way onto Lay Lake.

A BASS photographer called Weldon telling him that Swindle was on plane too close to boat near Randy Howell on the north end of the lake.

Bassmaster tournament director Trip Weldon said he violated rules 5i, and 6ii (Bassmaster Rules).

I wonder if we'll get any of those witty,down home,aw shucks comments from the G-man on the DQ?

How he reacts will determine how many people will view him.  This could get juicy.

 Don't mean to step on any toes here. He is a good fisherman and has an awful lot of fans (glad ya'll don't give out addresses). Annnnyway, I saw the incident with Zell and a few other things and IMHO his attitude needs a little adjusting ...

                                                   As Ever,

                                                    Skillet

I guess I will never understand people. All the stuff that was thrown in Byron's direction because of his personality (I REALLY always thought he was O.K.) and then there's Gerald with his...

I wonder if he will get into as much trouble and loose sponsors like IKE did last year.

He just stepped up and apologized at weigh in

It's all good, bad judgement call on his part.  People make mistakes.

"Peopel make mistakes."

Tell that to the Ranger Boat Company as it applied to Ike.

I think Ranger over reacted regarding Ike's melt-down last year.

So let's see what happens to the G-Man, if anything.

I just seen the video and all I can say is what an inconsiderant and dangerous jerk.  I have never seen anything like that before on a lake or river, much worse than Ikes incident.

Can someone give me a link to the video.  I followed the link from "that other site," but it didn't work.

Destruction of ours nations flag?  I cant think of too many things that can top that.  Destruction of property not his own, criminal mischief and a crime in the state he was in at the time!  Careless boat operation is at most a civil infraction punishable by fine alone.  Big difference from killing or nations flag.

I havn't seen it,...link LINK LINK!!

http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/tournaments/classic/news/story?id=2778146

Replica,

Where do you click to see it?  I've clicked on a link at the bottom that tells me to download Micromedia Flash Player 8, but nothing happened.

OMG, are you kidding me? Pull that crap on the bay here and they'll beat you before they write the ticket and take the boat!!

Rude

Disrespectful to those anglers BIGTIME

UNSAFE!!!

Almost looks like horseplay, like he's playing chicken with a parked car.

Wow, I'm let down but not surprised. He made it sound like he was plenty far from the other boats,...NOT!!! I wouldn't go that close to someone fishing with my trolling motor, never mind a 21' boat wide open.

Irresponsible!!

I retract my previous comments.

Preach- download that player and you'll be fine.

When I first read/heard that he was DQ'ed it seemed a little ridiculous.  After seeing the video, that was definitely a BAD decision (very dangerous as well) and the punishment fit the crime

That's enough reason to put a hole through his lower unit with a G20. >

Wow, i felt kinda bad for him till i saw that video!  Just plain stupid.  There is no way he can say he thought it was safe.  Idiot.

Jason

WOW! Can't believe he would do something like that what was he thinking.

"He shouldn dun that" is right. What the H is he thinking. It's the Bassmaster Classic. Not that it should be done in any tourney but come on use some common sense. There's cameras everywhere. Why would he even think he could pull that??  :

Good thing he was DQ'ed. He could of killed someone.

             G-man made a mistake. He payed for what he did. We all have pulled some s#*t in our lives. In the heat of the moment your judgement becomes distorted. He is lucky that the boot from the Classic is all he gets.

I'm alittle torn.  I feel he was in the wrong in hindsight, but in the heat of battle I don't think he thought he was doing anything wrong, and I think the DQ was questionable.

To play devil's advocate a little:

When there is 500 thousand dollars on the line, there needs to be a more specific set of rules as to what constitutes a violation and subsequent DQ.  The rules are very vague and open to interpretation.  Someone may feel that something is safe and gets DQ'd for something they do all the time that somebody else takes offense to.

When somebody goes to a baseball or basketball game, they are given a seat and are not allowed on the playing field.  How can you keep a safe distance from other boats when they are allowed to go where ever they want?

I also think that all complaints should be made public.  If Randy Howell felt that he was really put in danger and that Swindle affected his fishing somehow, he should have to file the complaint in front of Gerald, or at least with Gerald knowing that he was the one who did it.  Acting like he was on Geralds side later when they talked, but really saying nothing, was a bit shady.  "He should be mad because he had a nice limit and could have been in contention to win this thing."  He didn't say that he should have been mad because he didn't do anything wrong.  He acted like it wasn't him, like was on Swindle's side.

Was it Howell that made the complaint?  I thought I read somewhere else that it was a BASS film crew worker that called it in.  Either way he was still in the wrong.

I thought it was pretty obvious from his comments when it happened and later as they were docking.  I also thought I had read somewhere that those kind of things have to come from other competitors or else anybody could start lodging complaints for no reason against anglers they don't like (??).

My understanding was that it was the film crew that called it in - not a complaint, per se, but rather a, "Hey you might want to take a look at this, Trip" perspective.