From Too Much Rest to No Hats, the U.S. Botched This Ryder Cup in Every Way Possible

Gary Van Sickle views the Ryder Cup as another major championship, but says only one side currently treats it as such.

The Ryder Cup came down to three things, two of which didn’t matter.

Preparation. Strategy. Something about a hat.

Let’s get real. The story of this Ryder Cup was The Rise of the European Empire. The Europeans played exceptionally well, every one of them. No American team was going to match this European performance, no matter who was picked to play, who was paired with whom or in what order they were sent out. Europe rocked, end of story (except for the top secret part of how they managed that).

The Europeans had a Big Three of Jon Rahm, Rory McIlroy and Viktor Hovland. The Americans had no answer for any of them, what with Scottie Scheffler and his kinda-O.K.-but-not-kinda-O.K putting. Then there were former U.S. Open champions Matt Fitzpatrick and Justin Rose, who played better and made more putts than any two Americans combined. Nicolai Hojgaard dropped a ton of birdies. Tommy Fleetwood and Shane Lowry repeatedly rose to the occasion. So did Scotsman lefty Robert MacIntyre. Down the line, the Europeans performed far better.

They smoked the U.S. in foursomes again by a 7-1 margin. Ballgame over. Note to future U.S. captains: You’d better find the key to playing foursomes and making foursomes pairings because otherwise, history will continue to repeat itself.

All the U.S. Ryder Cup players could do come Sunday evening was tip their caps. Well, the guys who still had them.  :: Alessandra Tarantino/AP

Sometimes, the Ryder Cup is simple. One team plays so well it is simply unbeatable. That was Team USA two years ago in Wisconsin. This time, that team was Europe.

That said, the Americans did not look ready for the Ryder Cup on Friday morning, Friday afternoon or even Saturday morning. What the hell? If we’re going to nitpick this thing to death, then someone has to be accountable. Presumably, it’s captain Zach Johnson and his posse of vice captains.

The FedEx Cup ended in August and finished with back-to-back, sizzling-humidity weeks in Memphis and Atlanta. So it was understandable the Ryder Cup players were ready for a break.

But a five-week break? Insert tennis legend John McEnroe’s trademark rant here: “You cannot be serious!”

Golf Channel’s Paul McGinley, a former European Ryder Cup captain, was the first to call out the U.S. team for its lack of competition leading into the Cup. He basically said, Would you prepare for the Masters or the U.S. Open by taking a full month off from tournament golf? That would be ridiculous. And yet that is what most of the American players did.

McGinley nailed it. Here’s a better question now: Should any American Ryder Cupper do that again? Should any American Ryder Cup captain let his players do that again? The correct answers are "No" and "Hell, no!"

The Ryder Cup is a major championship, at least to the Europeans. They have the right idea. They don’t bother worrying about their individual Ryder Cup won-loss records. They count how many winning Ryder Cup teams they’ve played on. The Americans have to get just as invested in that as the Euros.

The Ryder Cup, you can argue, is actually a bigger major championship than the standard four majors because it happens only once every two years. It’s bigger because 11 other team members, a captain and dozens of vice captains (exaggeration intended) depend on each player’s performance. And whole countries of fans care about the outcome. A Ryder Cupper is playing for them and his family and owes it to all of them to do what is necessary to get ready.

Look, the Americans were clearly rusty from the first swing. That opening session never looked as if it would be anything except 4–0 for Europe. Worse, the lack of preparation made it appear as if the Americans weren’t as motivated as the Europeans, who were still smarting from getting crushed two years ago in Wisconsin.

It is easy to mistake being demoralized for being unmotivated. The U.S. squad seemed united, at least from the outside, and seemed to badly want to end its 30-year losing streak on foreign soil. It isn’t a desire or effort problem. But poor shots, missed putts and the frustration of a relentless opponent who keeps chipping in or holing putts can wear you down and make you appear unmotivated.

A cynic would say the Ryder Cup was over after that opening foursomes sweep and if not then, definitely after another foursomes disaster the next day highlighted by Scottie Scheffler and Brooks Koepka getting spanked by a record 9 and 7 margin as the Americans fell seven points behind.

Did it seem like the Americans made a great rally in Sunday’s singles? It did. But check the scoreboard. They were five points behind at the day’s start and they finished five points behind. Oh, they briefly cut Europe’s lead to three points but it was never going to get closer than that.

How can a captain and all those vice captains not recognize that five weeks away from competition off before the Ryder Cup would be a potentially fatal mistake? Well, how did the Titanic’s captain not recognize that blazing full speed through a known ice field at night without a pair of binoculars on board was a fatal mistake?

Max Homa and Justin Thomas didn’t take five weeks off. They played in the Fortinet Championship two weeks ago and both finished in the top 10. Guess the only American with a winning record in Italy? Homa, 3-1-1. Guess who didn’t exactly regain his top form but scraped out just enough good shots and had enough guts to win 1.5 points? Thomas. This duo combined for five points, nearly half of Team USA’s 11½ total. That wasn’t a coincidence.

Meanwhile, the DP World Tour had a slate of events during that five-week U.S. siesta. Euro Ryder Cupper Ludvig Aberg won the European Masters in Switzerland; Shane Lowry and Rory McIlroy played the Irish Open; and seven Team Europe members finished top 10 in the BMW PGA Championship two weeks ago in England.

The European players had their games honed to a fine edge. The Americans didn’t. Plus, their captain’s picks included players whose recent form indicated they weren’t playing their best golf—Thomas, Jordan Spieth, Rickie Fowler and Brooks Koepka. Reputation doesn’t score points. Form does. The U.S. should learn from Italy.

Ultimately, this Ryder Cup was lost before the U.S. team arrived in Italy. Because they were the American Idles.

And another thing…

> The shortest dynasty ever ended with the Americans in Italy. Remember two years ago, after the European team took a whipping at Whistling Straits, how so many media experts predicted the Americans were a new Ryder Cup dynasty? Check the media outlets and see if you can find anyone owning up to those statements.

The Daily Mail, a London tabloid, went with this headline in 2021: “Get used to it.”

An ESPN.com scribe wrote, “The average age of the Americans who will probably carry their team in the future is less the 30. The Europeans might have their captains covered for the next 20 years but isn’t much coming down their pipeline of talent to adequately replace their aging stars.”

The Sun UK wrote: “It gets even more upsetting when you realise this was the youngest-ever American team and contained six rookies who are only going to become even tougher to beat in future matches. That adds up to compelling evidence that we are on the verge of an era of American Ryder Cup dominance to rival Europe’s glorious sequence of seven wins from the nine previous matches.”

In the wake of Italy, the tide has reversed. Even NBC analyst Paul Azinger, a former Ryder Cup captain, recognized it, saying “The U.S. has won singles four of the last 11 times, a total flip of what it was in the ‘80s and ‘90s. Europe has taken over, no question about it.”

The Call of the Cup belonged to NBC commentator Brad Faxon as he described Tommy Fleetwood’s putt at the 16th hole that came up 2 feet 8 inches short of the hole. That short putt was crucial because if he made it, Europe would be guaranteed the half-point it needed to keep the cup. “That won’t be conceded,” Faxon said. “No chance!” That’s what everyone assumed. About 1.3 seconds later, Rickie Fowler picked up his own marker and conceded Fleetwood’s putt. A two-foot putt? Hardly missable for a putter of Fleetwood’s skill. A two-foot putt to win the Ryder Cup? That’s missable for any player.

Fowler was praised for his sportsmanship by some. Wonder how it would have been viewed if that half point had been the decider and what kept the Americans from pulling off a record epic comeback?

> Was that an executive course? Because Marco Simone’s realistic par, with all the drivable par 4s and reachable par 5s, was about 65. No wonder there were so many birdies and eagles. It made for an exciting show. But did you see all those forced carries, giant bunkers and crazy roller-coaster-sloped greens? Nothing about the Ryder Cup telecast made me even think about wanting to play there someday. 

The hat thing went over my head, bad pun intended. So caddie Joe LaCava waved his cap for two seconds too long and stood two feet too close to Rory McIlroy while he started to line up his putt and that’s a controversy? This is what happens when you live in a tiny little bubble world of big money and professional sports. Something so small gets blown out of proportion by the athletes and the media. LaCava, as a caddie, should have apologized, and McIlroy, as a veteran player, should have ignored him instead of overreacting.

It could have been a non-story but McIlroy and others wouldn’t let it die. Many players used it as motivation. The most laughable example was when Justin Thomas, playing hatless in support of Cantlay and/or LaCava, made a putt to win hole and grandly tipped his invisible hat. It looked childish and out of place because his team was getting whomped at the time, something like 12-6 or 14-7. There’s an easy comeback to that hat tip: Check the scoreboard, pal.

> The Sunday evening quote. American Brian Harman on Cantlay: “He has great hair. That’s why he didn’t wear a hat.”