Meditations from a man who no longer knows what to make of the Ryder Cup:
> Team USA has won the Ryder Cup exactly four times since 1983 – and three of those wins involved behavior and attitudes which don’t belong on a golf course
In 1991, USA players wore Desert Storm-themed camouflage apparel as part of “The War by the Shore”. In 1999, after whooping the Brookline crowd into a Revolutionary frenzy, American golfers joined their caddies and wives in trampling over Jose-Maria Olazabal’s line after Justin Leonard’s miracle putt on the 17th green. And in 2008, Kentucky patriotism encompassed hearty applause for Boo Weekley’s impersonation of Happy Gilmore. In other words, I’ve spent most of my life rooting for Ryder Cup teams which have embarrassed me with bad behavior and/or bad golf.
> That said, sportsmanship isn’t the first word I’d associate with Seve Ballesteros – now the patron saint of European Ryder Cuppers – and European behavior at odds with the spirit of the Ryder Cup often goes overlooked. Paul McGinley admitted to rigging the European Tour’s first and second round pairings several times this summer to help likely pairs partners Graeme McDowell and Victor Dubuisson get to know each other better. Micro-manage much, Paul? I’m sure Samuel Ryder envisioned exactly that sort of stratagem back in 1927.
> The Ryder Cup obviously,
obviously means more to European golfers weaned on the idea of international sporting competition. The Americans always look like they’ve turned up for
an All-Star Game, whereas the Europeans think they’re playing in the World Cup final.
That said…what kind of stupid, artificial construction worthy of nationalistic fervor is “Team Europe”? The idea of a pan-European team made sense when the EU was still being forged, the European Tour was struggling, and Team GB&I desperately needed Seve to make the Ryder Cup competitive. But these days, the political rise of UKIP reflects a broader desire for more and more English speakers to abandon Europe, whereas a rugby-like “British and Irish Lions” side of McIlroy, Rose, McDowell, Donaldson, Gallacher, Poulter, Westwood, Donald, Lowry, Casey, Warren and Fleetwood may well have won at Gleneagles without Continental help. It’ll never happen, but a four-team rotation of USA, GB&I, Continental Europe and “The Commonwealth” (Australia, South Africa, Canada, etc.) in which the holders defend the Ryder Cup every year against the winner of the previous year’s Challenge Cup playoff – i.e., the new-look President’s Cup – could be so much more inclusive and meaningful than what we have now.
|
USA |
GB&I |
Cont. Europe |
Commonwealth |
|
Furyk (4) |
McIlroy (1) |
Garcia (3) |
Scott (2) |
|
B. Watson (7) |
Rose (6) |
Stenson (5) |
Day (8) |
|
Kuchar (9) |
McDowell (18) |
Kaymer (12) |
Schwartzel (24) |
|
Fowler (10) |
Donaldson (25) |
Dubuisson (23) |
Delaet (38) |
|
Mickelson (11) |
Donald (32) |
Bjorn (30) |
Leishman (44) |
|
Horschel (13) |
Gallacher (35) |
Jimenez (36) |
Senden (50) |
|
Spieth (14) |
Poulter (40) |
Luiten (37) |
Els (51) |
|
D. Johnson (15) |
Westwood (45) |
F. Molinari (49) |
Oosthuizen (58) |
|
Z. Johnson (16) |
Lowry (53) |
Ilonen (52) |
M. Jones (62) |
|
Woods (17) |
Fleetwood (63) |
Blixt (57) |
Sterne (71) |
|
Walker (19) |
Warren (65) |
Wiesberger (67) |
Ogilvy (76) |
|
Kirk (21) |
Casey (66) |
Larrazabal (69) |
T. Clark (78) |
Possible teams in a new-look, four-handed Ryder Cup
(Official World Golf Rankings as of 5 October in parentheses)
> More realistically, can we not expand Friday and Saturday already so every golfer plays in every match? If you’re good enough to be picked for the USA or Europe, you’re good enough to play five matches in three days. Remember when Jarmo Sandelin, Jean van de Velde and Andrew Coltart didn’t play on Friday or Saturday at Brookline in 1999? (See “at odds with the spirit of the Ryder Cup”, above.) Down with this sort of thing, I say – Phil Mickelson shouldn’t have to beg Tom Watson to play, and Watson shouldn’t be put in the position to have to say no.
> Speaking of whom, Watson
had a horrible Ryder Cup, but really, Ryder Cup captains get far too much attention, praise and blame. They fill a media void, pick the worst players to round out the team and throw a few
four-ball pairings together, then get treated and scrutinized like Bill Belichick and Sir Alex Ferguson. Captains don’t win and lose the Ryder Cup. Players do.
> The Ryder Cup remains the ultimate small sample size event in sports. PGA Tour professionals prove their worth at four majors and at least 15-20 other tournaments every season; the USA and Europe get three days every two years. Sweeping generalizations about team golf should be made very carefully: if you flip a coin 15 times, the odds of it coming up heads only four times are actually reasonably high.
> For the first time in forever, I didn’t move heaven and earth to watch the Ryder Cup this year: I had another commitment on the Sunday afternoon, and even before the competition began I decided to keep it. I still love the idea of the Ryder Cup, and recently I’ve found myself going back to watch recordings and highlights of old events to remember what I used to feel about it. However, for all of the above reasons I’m not sure I feel the same – and if this year’s record-low television ratings for NBC on Ryder Cup Sunday are at all indicative, I don’t seem to be alone.