The dust has settled… and the questions are louder than ever. 🇺🇸🇪🇺
In Episode 13 of Inside the Swing, Jeremy Lee, PGA, and Matt Vick, PGA break down the aftermath of the Ryder Cup — the numbers, the strategy, and the emotions behind another tough American loss.
Who’s really to blame?
Was it the captains, the pairings, or the players themselves?
And what needs to change before Team USA risks losing three straight Ryder Cups?
Jeremy and Matt bring data-driven insight and real-world PGA experience to separate opinion from performance, breaking down putting stats, course setup, leadership dynamics, and how the U.S. can get back on track.
🎯 Honest takes. Real data. All passion.
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Welcome back to Inside the Swing. We are past RDER Cup. We’re licking our wounds, Jeremy. Oh my gosh. I don’t care what the final score, man. That was a butt whooping. It was a butt whooping. Sunday was the most dramatic. We almost I thought that when Cam got his match, when Justin got his match, I was like And then I saw the board and the board was pretty red across the board. And then I saw D Shambo coming back. I was like, man, this could actually be the biggest comeback in Ryder Cup history. You and everybody else, if I was a conspiracy theorist, I would be definitely saying that they threw those early matches to get the viewership because it went from a snoozefest to all of the sudden everybody rushing in from the golf course and the range to watch the to watch it finish. Yeah. No, I agree. It was wow was it exciting but to get to there wow was it rough. So so many things had to go so many things had to go right and and and like you said the dominoes began to fall for the for the US and we just couldn’t quite just kind of the the comeback ran out of steam largely because of that you know crazy rule with Havland uh the automatic half point based on an injury. We got to talk about that. Yeah. What’s your thought? Okay. you basically have a forfeit, right? technically you got a free forfeit a forfeit without penalty you’d call it because right because if you have an injury instead of an alternate stepping in which would be one option they just automatically they put they put um each captain puts the name of one player in an envelope at the beginning of the week and if there is an injury on one side that person sits and then they open the envelope on the other side and that person sits and they get they get they split points they get a half a point the matches are automatically have so you know I’m not crying foul on the Euro’s decision for Havlin to sit he may really be hurting but if it’s even in question and you’ve got an 11 and a half to six and a half point lead going into day three there is no way in Hades that he’s playing on Sunday And that’s the unfortunate way that it turned out. Yeah. There was a lot of people on online that did not like that. It g it hurt us more than it hurted us. Oh. Oh, for sure. Because we didn’t have a chance to get the whole point. It was just automatically boom, you’re out. Nope. Half point. We needed every we needed every victory we could have gotten. And you know, if you think about it, if Havlin had have gone out there slightly less than 100%, which who knows, maybe we had a couple guys that weren’t always 100%. Everybody can sleep on their sleep on their shoulder wrong, sleep on their neck wrong, and um and if you know, he goes out there a little bit less than 100% and he’s losing, that’s one more half point coming down. And Shane Lowry’s half wouldn’t have wouldn’t have won it for him. you know, that that certainly could have been the case the scenario coming down the stretch u yesterday. So, I don’t know. We’ll we’ll see. I I was hoping for a tie because I was wondering if if something that dramatic there’s been two ties. I looked it up. Two ties in Ryder Cup history where it finished 14 all. Yep. Um if it finished 14 all yesterday, but it couldn’t have finished 14 all, could it have? If if the US had won all the matches after Lowry, then it would have finished 14 all. There’s several scenarios, but they’re always 28 points available total during the RDER Cup for the week. And that’s why you see them talk about whoever has the cup needs 14 points to retain the cup, but it takes 14 and a half to win the cup. And the US since the Euros won the last one, the US had to get 14 and a half points to take the cup back from Europe. So, it would have been interesting to see if in the modern era, because I don’t believe it’s happened in a long time. In the modern era, if we had a 1414 tie, if the next year we wouldn’t see some sort of um looking into a tiebreaker of sorts, which would be the highest drama you could possibly come up with, right? It would be crazy. Well, and and to be honest with you, we can’t really complain about Hodlin because up until Sunday, we were dismal. It was bad, Jeremy. Dismal. It was bad. And we had talked about this last week about, hey, where do we think the stats will run that will be over the top? Like, it’ll be the determining factor. I said fairways and you said putting and by God it was putting. It just feels like when we lose at the Ryder Cup, um, historically guys that we, um, you know, sometimes don’t even see that much over here playing on the PJ tour, uh, just running putts in left and right. And, um, and sure enough, that’s what we saw. Uh, strokes gained wise, you and I kind of did a deep dive into some of the numbers. Um, just to share with you with you all. Um, if you look at strokes gained on PJ tour in terms of putting, what you’ll find is probably what you’d expect. It’s kind of tit fortat. Sam Burns leads. I think the second best American that was on the RDER Cup is Cam Young at sixth, but then Rory Maroyy’s in there at seventh, and then there’s another Euro that’s 10th, and then an American at 12th, and then a Euro at 15th. So, there’s an even dispersion going down for seasonl long putting statistics on the PJ tour. There was an even dispersion. There’s no there was no clear advantage um strokes gained uh in putting. And strokes gained, by the way, if you’re not familiar, is a stat that essentially measures a player’s performance versus the field and not some sort of imaginary. You know, total putts gives us an example of of of a stat, but does it tell the whole story? putts per greens in regulation is a great stat, but that depends on how how close you hit it. Yeah. Um you can have total fewer total putts if you miss a lot of greens and you’re chipping it close. You have a lot of one putts. That doesn’t tell us the whole story. Strokes gains is is is proximity of the hole and how you’re putting versus the field. So what we saw unfortunately is for the week only two Americans were in the top 10 strokes gained putting among the 24 rider cupers. That is rough rough and and what was the total like nine strokes gain nine strokes 8 point uh eight and chain 8.43 strokes gained for the Euro European team over the course of the week. Um, I heard one of the announcers say because I I didn’t have this information, um, but they said that through two days there was only one American in the top nine strokes gained putting wise and I believe, if I’m not mistaken, it was Russell Henley. He played really good. Unfortunately, he missed those two putts on 17 and 18, which were both very makeable. Um, which really probably was the determining factor. you know, unfortunately he’s a he’s a rookie this year. I mean, obviously Russell’s been around a long time, but he just for whatever reason, he never could make a Ryder Cup. But, you know, it’s hard to say, you know, look at Chef. Chef, best player in the world. The points that I saw, Sheffler has played in singles now, um, the number one, the number two, and the number one, and the number two player in the world, uh, each year. So, like he’s catching he’s catching the very best from the other side. And the fact that he pulled that off, you know, he’s he’s he’s being on top means you’re you’re put in a situation where you’re you’re the draw. You’re the you’re supposed to be the rock and it’s even more pressure. They may put somebody with you that you’re bringing them up hopefully, right? you know, and so you’re you’re not getting you’re not getting Sheffler and uh who would be our next best performer, you know, you’re not putting Sheffler and Dashambo out together every every match, but you can’t put your one and two out. But, you know, maybe we should have done more than that. More of that, I should say. At the end of the day, it was close, you know, on Sunday, but we just set ourselves up terribly. And I don’t know what happened. Obviously, the Greens, we did not like the Greens. They were very slow. Everybody kept coming up short. Euros didn’t have no problem with the greens. They were making putts from everywhere. But to be fair, Greens speeds of that caliber is more likely going to be in their on their side of the pond because it’s just different weather climate, different different environmental cl uh different environmental factors. And so they they get used to that wetter kind of slower green. And they were just hammering them. They were just like, man, they were in their field day. They were making everything. Yeah, we see it at the Open Championship every year. Um, we get slightly slower green speeds um just because of the practices over there and and the fact that they get so much wind. So, I I know that I know that the folks at the PGA of America were disappointed in the weather leading up to the event, the amount of rain that Beth Paige took. Mhm. Um I I know that played a factor, but um you know, Paul Azinger, four-time Ryder Cuper, former uh captain, champion, winner, winner as a captain. Yeah. At he was already before this thing started, he was already questioning the decision to be at Beth Page to begin with. It’s a course that our players aren’t that familiar with. It’s a course that in his mind uh doesn’t doesn’t necessarily even suit our games all that well. Um and his point was the Euros don’t care where they go, but our guys our guys might in his words. Well, I mean, if you think about it, think about the team. I mean outside of Chef Duchambo, Cam Young, maybe Kentlay. I mean, we don’t really have long ball hitters on the team this year. And that is a beast of a golf course. Now, I could tell just from playing it on Sim where we played the ball, like they didn’t play the same TE’s. The way that they were throwing it darts in there, I was like, you did not play all the way back. So, they definitely moved it up a couple. Sure. On some. And I don’t even think we could cut I don’t even think we could carry that corner from the back tee on number one like most of them were doing. So, I would We’re going to have to test that out. Yeah. I’m curious to see uh based on the normal golf course if if some of the grand stands didn’t take up the very back part of the T- box, you know, and they and they got it up there close enough where they could bomb it on. Um but it is downhill. We did we did see that, you know. Definitely downhill. Yeah. Are we that long? Um, we certainly saw a setup that attempted at least to to do the usual setup for us, which is Americans hit it longer. So, we make the rough less penal close to the fairway and we make sure that when our guys spray it, they’re able to uh still control the ball enough to get it, you know, on the greens and do something. But the greens were so soft. And again, that’s not that has nothing to do that’s just unlucky how much rain they got. The greens were so soft, it almost didn’t didn’t matter where they were hitting it from. The only, you know, the only thing that came into play is if you’re getting a little bit of a flyer type lie to where the ball uh jumps and it carries a different distance than what you’re expecting. But there was no danger, you know, from from anybody missing fairways. Yeah. But what really didn’t make sense is soft greens produce a lot of birdies mo normally. You know, you’re just throwing darts at it. These guys are world class players. Like that’s what was so shocking. Like just watching uh just watching Dambo play, he was short on his approach shots almost every time. Almost every time. And I’m like, boys, the greens are soft. like why why are we not why are we not attacking? Now granted, you know, that’s that’s a view from the a view from the sideline making those criticisms. But I mean, you expect players of this caliber to be able to make those adjustments and I just don’t feel like we did. It’s like we stuck to a game plan and never adjusted whatsoever. Yeah. I think a back hole location, let’s let’s take a back hole location, especially at Beth Paige. There’s some blind There’s some blind shots. So, you got a blind shot coming into a green. You can’t see what’s going on. Then you got a back hole location. If the ball flies a foot too far, it bounds into the back collar and it doesn’t come back out of there. Yeah. And we saw that a couple times yesterday. Klay had a big one late. Uh 16 or 17, I want to say he did. he he had to be aggressive and he flew it all the way back just just maybe a pace pass high and it bounded into the collar and and then he’s left with that. Whereas if it it was coming up short, the ball was spinning back. So So the the soft greens in in that instance kind of what you’re talking about the soft greens actually actually make it more difficult to a to a back hole location sometimes. Yeah. really does it because at the end of the day, you know, they’re not going to run off the green, like the greens were slow. So, like, yeah, I mean, even when he puted that putt, I mean, it just trickled down to the hole. I don’t even think he made it to the hole. Yeah, there’s no other the I guess the point is there’s no other play other than to fly it all the way to the hole. When you have firm greens, you’ve got different shots you can play. You can play it low. You can bounce it in there. You can you can play knockdown shots and and you don’t have to carry it all the way. But what you’re left with with such soft greens is that you’ve got to fly it all the way to hole to get it close. And then if the whole location is cut on the back at five paces from the back edge, you’ve only got about a three yard landing area to hit it in to to get it close. Yeah. Now, you saw the absolute opposite with some front hole locations, especially early on. Yeah. They’re hitting wedges and spinning it back down in there. Now, those are certainly easier. Yeah. Throwing them into the throwing them into the back stops and then they just kind of trickle back in. Yeah. But, you know, for the week, going back to the strokes gained, um, everything kind of statistically that we looked at made sense. Um, the Euros outputed us. Um, the individuals that that putted well tended to do better in their matches. Um, Xander Schoffley was one exception. He did not putt well all week. He did not putt well yesterday, but he ball struck John Rom to death. And John Rom was one of the worst putters yesterday on the on the Euros. So, I think Shoffley’s ball striking numbers yesterday strokes game were almost four shots uh TD to Green, which is which is um phenomenal. Um, so, you know, all in all, I think it kind of played out. I think if the Euros were going to win, it was going to be it was going to be tight. It was going to be kind of a kind of a miracle. We just we just didn’t get anything going soon enough. And and maybe it’s maybe it’s what Azinger talked about, you know, the course we played in Rome two years ago. Uh they had they had played all the players had played multiple DP tour events on that golf course, including I believe Marcos Simone’s the name of it. Y including that very year and a couple of our guys even tried to go play the DP tour event on that golf course just to get fresh the uh Beth Page. The difference is it’s been a while since they’ve hosted uh anything of consequence except the PGA Championship and there weren’t many of our 12 guys that even played in that latest PGA Championship. So some of those guys has had never played a competitive round at Beth Page. I find that to be a huge disadvantage. Yeah. Is there some kind of rule you can’t go up there and and practice on it? No. And they had plenty of sessions and and we’ll talk about that in a minute. Um preparation that goes into this. You know, they had plenty of team sessions to go up to Beth Page, but there is no there’s no preparation like playing a four round event where you’re coming in on Monday, you’re playing a couple practice rounds and then four competitive rounds on a golf course and with Marco Simone and Rome, you even had guys that had played there. They went there every year. What a what a huge advantage. They talk about how difficult it is to be a rookie on PGA Tour all the time because of that. Getting used to the golf course, getting used to the feel of the facility even and knows such a comfort level of just being there and and and knowing and so you know maybe it goes back to some course selection like Azinger. Um there have been several articles blasting the American crowd for for two reasons. One is going to be obvious to everyone. We were rowdy and downright rude. And it was almost embarrassing at times to see some of the crap. Have you ever been to New York? F-word is like the word ‘the’ in in the Northeast. Like they say it nonstop. Like it’s literally like me saying ‘the’ in the south. Like it’s it when I lived up there for a while, I it took me a while to get used to it. It’s like every other word. And it’s just like normal normal banter which I do agree that there was some things that but targeting of the wives and family. Yeah. I don’t I don’t agree. Royy’s wife got hit in the head with a beer bottle, beer can. Yeah. Point. I mean, I mean, it definitely crossed it definitely crossed the line in certain and and I and I I appreciate our our New York fans, but the uh the the thing about I’m not going to blast the entire region because they’re obviously passionate. Just look at some of their sports teams and everything like that. But for some reason, Jeremy, we’re just doing it all wrong. I know. I in general, I I just there’s no creativity. Yep. Um you know, we tried to have a I saw some videos. were trying to have an MC, a comedian that was trying to lead chance. She was getting booed and then ultimately she she led a tried to lead a vulgar chant about Rory dropping the fbomb in a chant with the MC and she lost her job and rightfully so. I mean, it was it was awful, man. But you you see the Euros and you you you see soccer matches and you see and you see the RDER Cup and I don’t know. I feel like my wife would kill me if I said something nice about Duke, but the Duke basketball cheering section, I think, is like a great example of what we need more of. They are they are cutting but creative. They come up with their cheers and their chance. And they’re not vulgar. Yeah. They’re they’re picking on something that’s, you know, in good fun, but still cutting. Yep. And and instead we just come up with fu. And then we go USA, USA. Um, you know, there were several folks that said the loudest cheers they heard were when they announced that the beer tents were open at 9:00 a.m. Oh my goodness. And so it was weird. It was it was weird all the way around. Like even the energy of the team was weird. There was no, how do I put this? It didn’t seem like there was very much patriotism this year. It was just more about how can we get everybody riled up. It was just a weird situation. Now, obviously, we were down early and and continued to be down and you know, players like Fleetwood were dogs this week, right? Like that cat is man, he’s gotten so good. And obviously great teammate, great player. Um, lost to Justin. I’m sure that felt like a second place like he’s been having a lot outside of the tour championship. But yeah, I would agree with you there. I mean, Euros don’t need a reason to come and be loud. They don’t they don’t wait for they don’t wait for good things to happen, you know? They’re just they’re just there and jovial and having a good time. There were lots of comments about people wouldn’t put their phone down, you know. It was it was cell phones and and and I heard I heard one of the commentators say, you know, they showed a guy hitting a shot and he said, “I was I was doing my best to find somebody standing behind the shot that didn’t have their phone in their hand.” Well, yeah, but that’s that’s the way it is. Like, if you don’t want that, leave the phones. Tell them no phones. Like, I mean, it is what it is. I mean, that’s the world we live in. Yeah. We can’t do anything about that. It’s the devil. These little phones have become the devil. I mean, it really has. It’s it’s it’s getting outrageous. You know, even outside of golf, it’s just absolutely mind-blowing. And that’s probably a little bit to do with the crowd. It’s because that’s that’s the world we live in now. People say whatever they want to say online. No repercussions, no consequences. Hell, you can’t even discipline your kids these days because there’s there’s threats of calling the cops. Like it’s just I mean this is what we’re teaching these kids and then we’re going to go and say oh well you shouldn’t really do that. Like really like I don’t even know why we have rated R movies anymore. Yeah. Like why? It’s the dumbest thing ever. My my kid called me the other night. Hey dad, I want to go watch The Conjuring. I’m like really? You know she’s 13 years old and I’m like they’re like yeah but we need a parent to get it. I’m like really? Why? Like just go pull up anything on the internet. It’s just so stupid. Certainly so easy to find. Well, the the phones have definitely changed the way we watch sports or don’t watch sports and concerts. Sports and concerts and things like this. What are you What are you doing with that video? You’re going to What are you doing with it? I’ I’ve always wondered that. Well, they’re probably looking at their swing. You know, that’s what a lot of people do. They’ll Oh, yeah. Absolutely. They’re taking it to see the swings. And then they’re going to go back and analyze the swings and be like, “Oh, what if I do that or what if I do this?” I think you’re giving these folks way too much credit. I think that’s one out of 20. I I really do think that that’s what they’re doing. I think that they’re wanting to go back and see the swings. Well, if you don’t have if you don’t have directly down the line, then it doesn’t matter anyway. Well, they don’t know that. They’re they’re just I just think we have I just think we have this habit of like that we think that somebody actually gives a crap that we were there and wants to see a video that they took just for just for pure clout. I’m actually shocked that we haven’t seen a meme of Rory turning back to the crowd and and basically tell them to f off. Like I’m really surprised that somebody hasn’t blown up a meme on social media because you know all those people were behind them. You know, they got that on camera. Sure. I’d be memeing that thing to death. Yeah. Yeah, that that would be that would be a good one. I’m sure there’s uh I’m sure there are quite a few catchphrases that might come out of that. Um but that’s but I’m not the biggest Shane Lowry fan because Shane seems to complain a lot when he doesn’t get his way, but then he seems to be just outlandishly like haha when it’s going his way. And so, you know, if you’re gonna do that, then you got to take the heat. Like, I I got no play. He’s a phenomenal player. Phenomenal player. And by the way, I was shocked that Rory was nowhere to be found when he made that putt. Even when he went through that whole hoopla of winning and all that stuff, I didn’t see Rory once. Interesting. That’s his best bud. Didn’t notice I didn’t notice that. I wonder if he was on the golf course supporting some of the some of the the the matches in the back. Oh, it could have been. I didn’t think about that because I would say that they could have easily divided up and they’ll do that sometimes cuz you know at at it came to a point to where hey, we just need a half anybody. Somebody got down tobody. So, so maybe if one of his boys that he felt like he could he could really help, you know, he could snake snake back to to one of the others. Um, you know, it kind of seemed like the way things were going that Lowry was going to be the deciding factor once he made that birdie on 15 or 16, wherever it was, and cut it to one. You just had that I just I just had that feeling that that he was going to be the one. He was hitting such good shots and uh Henley almost Oh, almost stole it from him, you know. He almost stole it from him and just couldn’t quite couldn’t quite pull it off. Yeah. Some of the young guys had a lot of those coming in down the stretch. Yeah. I’m like, “Boys, just hit it. What do you have to lose? Tough. But then then again, it goes back to, you know, different different types of conditions than we’re used to seeing. No, I agree. I wonder what they were rolling. Did you ever hear what they were rolling? They acted like they were like rolling eights. Yeah. Which I’m sure it was more like nine and a half, you know, or 10, but we’re used to seeing 11 and 12 consistently on tour. Lot of uphills, downhills, week in week out. A lot of slope on those greens. Yep. Um, and and there’s something about when they’re when they’re just so full of moisture that they that they get those bent grass greens just feel a little bit sticky. And I don’t know if you noticed like how deep green color they were. That’s always as a player as a player that’s a recipe for just that just looks slow to me. It’s like carpet. I know. But at the end of the day, if it was everybody playing bad, we there’s an argument there. Yeah. But the Europs just whooped it. They just whooped us to uh the except for Sunday obviously. Yeah, except for Sunday and and honestly the um it just sort of turned on a dime and somehow we caught some momentum and you know there’s really no no rhyme or reason just it started falling the the crowd finally got into it. You could argue um you know according to these are firsthand accounts that we’re reading coming out of New York. Yep. Um folks that were on the ground there kind of complaining about uh Americans not getting into it at first and all sudden all a sudden they became a factor later. But uh the lack of creativity and the chance and the lack of noise and the phones and no clapping and no chanting and none of this. It was just USA and then Fe Rory. So, right, which makes me wonder the I I never saw this one coming, but here here we are 2025. The Euros in their preparation at Beth Paige, going back to talking about the teams going, they did a two or three day run on a Monday Tuesday um up in New York uh a few weeks before the Rder Cup and they actually invested in VR headsets and these VR headsets tell me about this they used to pipe in crowd noise and hecklink and and the idea was you know we we’ve seen this the closest example I could think of this was uh was football. So football is great. You know, they’ll practice in they’ll go in the stadium and they’ll pump crowd noise in over the PA to try to simulate a hostile road environment to where they’re down to having to call audles with hand signals because you can’t hear, you know, even heck, some of these SEC stadiums are so loud you can’t even hear across the line, much less much less a receiver taking a call, right? You know, you hope your you hope your home fans quiet down. you can actually make some calls when you’re on offense. Sometimes that doesn’t even happen um in the SEC, but but that’s the closest example I could come up with. And so they and almost like an Earl Woods thing like when he used to scream at Tiger in his back swing, you know, uh to try to prep him for everything that could come his way. You know, they got these VR headsets and they’re talking. I don’t know who was talking to him, if it was players talking to one another, but it was almost like a constant backoff challenge trying to get used to the vitriol and abuse that they were going to take. And I got to say something worked. I don’t know if now this is a veteran squad. Yeah, we talked about this when we did the show on on the captain’s picks. you know, uh, the the next six guys past the automatic qualifiers, the guys that finished seventh to 12th on the European squad were stone cold locks as rider cupers. I mean, it was it was the who’s who, the Havlin, the Lowry, the guys that you’re like, well, they’re obviously going to be on the team, right? So, you know, um, ours was the American side was not even close to that cut and dried. And I think it shows by Keegan’s selections, you know, he went all the way down to 17 or 18 points because he got passed up. Yeah, for that reason. It it really does shock me. I actually thought he would pick just straight up the line. Be like, hey, and take himself or take himself out? No, I don’t think he was going to take himself. Although, we could have used him to be honest with you. Well, Brian Harmon comes to mind as somebody that I I couldn’t imagine him picking. No, because he’s just not long enough. He was in the top He was in the top 12. Oh, he was in the top 12. You know, that comes You don’t hardly ever see him except in majors. The picks the picks made sense. If you really if you really wanted to get, you know, really wanted to get critical. Um, I think you’re you’re probably down to splitting hairs. You’re probably saying, you know, well, Shoff wasn’t playing that well. Uh, I heard more Kawa’s name keep coming up, but if you really look at who you gonna replace him with, it wasn’t like it wasn’t like we dro it wasn’t like we didn’t take a a a perennial rider cuper. Mhm. I mean like you what do you sit more for speed who’s who’s really not playing well? I mean think about the think about it though. You sit more for Keegan himself probably. Think about who we didn’t have on this team. DJ, Phil, um, Brooks, like Kepka is the name that’s come up and I don’t and I don’t care what I don’t care what anybody says and Phil’s a little bit older out, but still Pat if Patrick Reed if this live thing didn’t happen and somehow Patrick Patrick Reed didn’t get passed up. Yeah. In Italy, he would be on this team today and we needed Captain America. I know. I know. And I know there’s a lot of people out there that hate Patrick Reed because he might be a cancer scandals or whatever. He might be a cancer in the American locker room, per se. They may say he’s a cancer in the locker room, but we don’t have a locker room in America. Euros, they are so close-knit. I I think it it it it goes back to how they prepare in junior golf and um and university and things that they do over there in the DP tour. It’s much more close-knit. They travel more. Oh, yeah. They’re closer together. You know, you look at just geographically how much closer, you know, Spain and England are versus New York and California. All these things mean that they’re they have much more, which is remarkable because they’re from different cultures, different countries, and yet they have more of a kindered spirit because of the way they come up in the game um than the Americans do. So, you know, uh, you remember hearing about Tiger and Phil and the huge personalities that were in that locker room and how that we were not a cohesive unit when those guys were playing and and that it started at the top and that possibly, you know, there there was some blame there, but you wonder about a guy named like Scotty Sheffller. um he has he has worked so hard to become the number one player in the world and I’m sure he feels like he’s on an island and he’s not he’s not prepping for match play. He’s not prepping his game for for RDER Cup and team formats and team formats and things like that. And can you fault the guy? I know Ryder Cup doesn’t make a career. These guys would take any one of them, no matter what they say, they’d take a major victory over a RDER Cup win any day of the week. I I just almost although they didn’t express that this week, though. They didn’t. But they express they expressed this as this is the most important tournament we’ll play in our lifetime. And maybe and maybe that’s actually true. I I find that I find that, you know, find that a little difficult to believe the way we the way we weigh majors in terms of people’s careers and and things like Hall of Fame selections and things like that. Now, may, you know, maybe that’s true. I know they love it. Don’t get me wrong. I understand there’s a passion there that that that but when it comes down to it, they’re like, “Hey, man. You know, you want a Ryder Cup win or you want that Masters victory?” Well, they’re being 100% honest with themselves. I mean, oh, I agree. I mean, I I can’t I can’t fault you on that one, but I mean, this begs the question is, is this whole live thing starting to get to the American side? Like, are we starting to really see what’s the fallout, you might say? Yeah. Yeah. The results of all of this allowing all this to happen. Listen, nobody can blame people for taking the money. That’s a huge amount of money. You know, I I get it. And conversation for another day. Let’s let’s let’s go into what’s the result? What’s the fallout? We’re we’re missing some worldclass players that we normally probably would have had. Now granted, would the results change? I don’t know because those guys haven’t been playing as much and they haven’t been playing as good. But again, that’s but to your point, that’s a lot the criticism of Liv that a guy like DJ was going to go by the wayside and he wasn’t going to work as hard because he doesn’t have to. The motivation’s not there. We see that with every big contract is that, you know, sponsor contracts, everybody. I don’t, you know, I don’t I don’t buy into that. I think that’s 100% for everybody. I don’t think you can blanket statement that, but I don’t know. But with DJ, with DJ, with DJ especially, I think we kind of saw it. You you wonder about a guy like Kepka. He’s he has certainly struggled to find his footing over there and trying to balance that with coming back and playing in majors. He he has not been in the form that that we that we expect from him. But then, you know, Dashambo after all the criticism that that you know, Shambbley threw his way and talking about he was just a YouTube star and things like that. I mean, he certainly brought it this week. Um, yeah, but he it was almost a debacle on Sunday. Yeah. I mean, it was amazing. I mean, I was looking at that as you were talking about this. I mean, we say that single that yesterday went good. Yesterday did not go good until the back nine. That’s true. It was unbelievable to be honest with you. And Bryson’s defense fits Patrick Birdie five of the first seven holes. Oh yeah. No, I I Hey, he made four in a row at one point to go five up. So, you know, match play has a funny way of uh nobody can stay hot for all 18 holes and you kind of got to ride those es and flows and it just I think Bryson didn’t play near as bad as uh everybody thought off the bat. You know, I think just Fitzy came out extremely hot. He did come out hot. Yeah, he went Fitz went birdie first. Par parie birdie birdie. Bryson was par par bogey birdie par par bogey par. Yeah. So, not a great start. He shot one over par on the front side. Not a great start. Coupled with what, five under for fits or something like that. Yeah. Oh, actually he shot even. Sorry. He birdie nine. So he was So he shot even par on a Sunday and yeah, most Sundays, yeah, we would take even par, but in a format like this, you can’t. Yeah, you got to come out firing. Now, he did redeem on the back because he had five birdies on the back. There you go. So he ended up with a No, he had four birdies on the back. Sorry, because nine. So four birdies on the back, which actually brought it back. And then Fitz just started tanking on the back. Yeah. I mean, he was really one putt away from putting that to bed and just couldn’t make it happen. Griffin probably across the board probably played the best on Sunday more than anybody. You know, he was consistently up, then he went down, but then he went up. So, that was good to see. Morocawa came out of the gate down through four. Just checking some strokes gain singles for you. Um, for two and a half days, we couldn’t do anything against the Europeans. Nothing. And then all of a sudden, I don’t know what triggered on 10, but we just turned on the afterburners on 10. It h it had to be Well, no, it would. I was thinking that it might have been Bryson that that got that spark going. Well, traditionally, we are we are better in singles always. We’re better in four ball. were better in singles and and and and ultimately I just feel like we are so bad at alternate shot forsomes format and the competition is always going to start with forsomes and we’re behind the eightball right off the bat and then we’re going to wake up Saturday morning and if we haven’t erased that we’ve we’ve been down as much as 40 after the morning session on Friday and and it without fail. This happens every single year. We’re down. Yeah. This year it was 3-1. It’s three and a half to a half, 3-1, even two and a half to one and a half. If we don’t have a really strong Friday afternoon fourball session, then we wake up Saturday and we do it again. Yeah. and and it seems like it never fails even when we win the RDER Cup that we are behind the eightball coming out of the Saturday morning foresomes and and we don’t we don’t play that format enough in the United States to be good at it. We don’t have enough cohesion as a team to be good at it to excel at it like the Euros do until we get a good core another another you alluded to it. DJ’s gone, Kepka’s gone, Reed’s gone, Phil’s gone. The Euros have had a few guys roll off, but they have not had the huge turnover that we have losing losing a bunch of a bunch of stalwarts on our on our squad that were there with five and six rider cups under because all of those that you just named, they’re all our fire guys. Yeah. They’re the ones that get that that let’s go, baby. But we just didn’t have that. That’s what I think that’s what the weirdest thing was. Even when Justin made the Even when Justin made the putt on 18, that was probably the most fire I saw all week, but it was still just weird. Like, it was just off. And we’ve got to figure out how to come back. We’ve got to figure out how to get that back and get that, hey, I’m playing for my country. We’re playing for this cup. We cannot go three down, you know, three in a row, which we’re going to have a tough test. You know, it’s home course for Lowry. You know, Rory knows that course very very well. So, I don’t know. Where do you think we go from here? I I I I uh I think we have to get the live thing figured out. I think we have to get all of our American players playing playing again together. Yeah. Um or at least count world points. Well, the world ranking points. We could we could do a whole show on um the official world golf ranking and how and how poor it is at actually determining who’s playing the best because because of the lack of, you know, any kind of credit given to live. Not getting into the semantics about why they’re not giving points. I I don’t think I don’t think under the current format, you know, there’s a I get there’s not a clear-cut way to to rate their tournaments, but at the same time, you know, I remember DJ was six months we were six months into the thing and DJ was in the 100s. Like he’s like he’s the 150th best player in the world. Like come on, man. You crazy. Exactly. You’re absolutely nuts. It’s all because they took away the points. It’s it’s it’s remarkable. It just goes to show you how I mean if Bryson was on the PGA Tour week in week out, I have no doubt that he would at least be challenging Sheffller as the number one player in the world. Not I’m not taking away anything from Sheffller. And I’m not saying that I’m not saying that Sheffller wouldn’t be number one if Bryson was there. I’m just saying that he would actually be challenging him because he was able to qualify for the RDER Cup only playing in majors which is what a remarkable feat. Yeah. So just wrapping up the strokes gain conversation for one one last time. So in the singles looking at total strokes gained and again you know as far as data points this is the best thing probably we have in today’s game to say whose all-around game performed the best relative to the field. you know, statistically statistically, um, it doesn’t it doesn’t it doesn’t tell when those when those shots happened. You know, you can certainly say, well, down the stretch it wasn’t great. But overall, Russell Henley was leading the pack. Shane Lowry was in it second. No surprise that match probably had the most fireworks. Oh, for sure. Between the two of those guys, most fun to watch. It was certainly fun to watch. Coming in next was Shafle. Again, we talked about that because his ball striking was incredible. He did not putt well. Rahm also did not putt that well, but his ball strikinger and Ter Green was and we’re talking about just on the singles. Phenomenal. This is just Sunday singles. Just Sunday singles. Next, Dashambo, Thomas, Spawn, and Young. So, you know, again, ball don’t lie, stats don’t lie. As you said, I would love to see those stats for the other days, though. You know, this basically, oh, it’s it’s it’s dismal. It it’s it’s how bad it’s Can you do it for the entire week? It’s as bad as you think it is. So, event total overall, just to give you an idea. Yeah. Um, you know, believe it or not, Fleetwood was number one. I know that’s shocking. Not shocking at all. That dude is a machine. A machine. So, when you balance it out, you know, ultimately the point totals were relatively even. 15 13, right? So, you maybe would statistically would you get relatively even? Yeah, that’s what we see. You got Fleetwood leading the pack. You got Cam run. Cam Young right behind it. Uh, awesome. Really proud of him this week. Phenomenal player. Hometown kid. That was a lot of pressure on him. So, congrats to Cam Young for an incredible RDER Cup. You can’t you can’t you got to walk away with head held high on that kid. You got Rose and Fitzpatrick. They both won. And these are for all three days. This is total for all three total for the event. Okay. Um most of these guys at the top either played Rose was only seen in three sessions. Um a couple of those guys like Fleetwood and um the Shambo uh played all five. The Shambo comes in fifth in strokes gain for total for the week. A little surprising statistically because he was one three and one. But but again, you know, this this tells that wild this gives an overall picture. You know, it doesn’t necessarily say maybe we weren’t as bad as we thought. What did he run into the buzz saw that he ran into? We know he caught Fleetwood one time. I mean, you know, you’re not beating Fleetwood. So, kind of like uh kind of like that. So, then then Henley, which played very solid. Okay. Mroy, Rom, Spawn, Thomas, Sha, Sheffller. So, again, we got a very last, huh? We got a very, you know, uh, chef, among the ones I mentioned, you’ve got, you got half the field still below Shane Lowry coming in next in 12th, 13th. Um, but we saw a relatively um, relatively even matched. So Shane Lowry was statistically overall one of the worst strokes gained. He was 13th. He was middle of the pack. Okay. Out of the 24 players, he was the middle of the pack. Oh, so you just gave me top 10. Yeah, I was just kind of running through the um so at the bottom bringing up the rear you had Hoygard. Uh Burns, Griffin. Um not surprisingly, Griffin was one and one. Burns had a losing record. Hygard had a losing record. Aubberg was two and two. He was fourth from the bottom. Straa one and two, fifth from the bottom. Man, that’s a he’s an awesome player. 02 and one, you know, but again, just looking at statistics, they obviously don’t always tell the tell the whole story because it’s just telling against the field. But the most telling thing to me is I just kind of glance this this at this entire chart is as far as putting uh Lowry and Straa were the only outliers in terms of putting strokes gained relative to their overall totals. So when I look at this when I sort this record by save those two guys it did it did but when I when I when I sort this by total strokes gain for the for the entire event all your good putters are pretty much in still in the top Lowry was 13th but 2.84 on the positive side strokes gain and Straa was 3.63 63 strokes gained putting and yet overall he was he was 20th in the field in strokes gained total which is which speaks to how putting saved him for sure and and the only outlier the rest of them when you sort by total or sort by sort by putting they’re all in there. So again, as we said, I mean, we say it too often in golf, it it all comes down to putting or it’s just a putting contest or whatever, but truly we know course setup in America, RDER Cup, we have to make it not a putting contest. Yeah. Because we that’s where we just lose so many matches and Beth Paige just didn’t do it. No. something about the setup or the conditions or whatever. Does Keegan does Keegan have any blame in this? The one kind of funny maybe not funny is that uh there was one matchup uh during the Forsomes some data analytics which is you know that’s what what we’re doing now. We’re all about this data. Yep. And we’ve been talking about it here so we can’t fault these folks. But they ran they ran the 132 combinations of of partners that could pair up in the forsomes. Yep. And Keegan put out the 132nd possible. In other words, the absolute worst possible pairing based on data on Saturday on Saturday morning. Oh yikes. Shocking. Shocking. So, so out of 132 different possibilities, we picked his rank 132. We picked the worst one. Now, does he have access does he have access to those numbers? Is he looking at those numbers? Does anybody care? I don’t know. Sounds like next cup we need to have a data analyst. They don’t always tell the story, but golly. But that’s based on results after every sport out there is. No, that was based on before. That was based on that’s based on just data analytics analyzing that was based on how well they were playing coming poor performance everything like that in general and and how somehow how how the how the pairs would match up as partners and he picked the worst and not even realizing it not what maybe we don’t know you know we don’t know I mean I think if he would have got that he would have been like oh maybe let me check would he though I don’t know I don’t know because you know he’s a feeling kind of guy he’s a fiery kind of guy it you know it’ be hard I think that would be the last time that we have a guy that qualifies that could have played in the RDER Cup. Yeah. Be a captain. I I think that that first of all that was complete debacle anyway. Like I know Tiger turned it down, but why would we go to a guy who’s playing that good to take again we took Keegan out of the equation? He’s a like he has a lot of patriotism. I don’t think any number one I don’t think anybody expected him to qualify for the Ryder Cup as a player and technically he didn’t. Now, he played himself into the top, but he would have been picked. He played himself into the conversation. Yeah. Had he not been captain, but I don’t think anybody saw that coming. But if you’ll remember correctly, this whole thing going back with Keegan probably probably is a direct result of him being passed over by Zack Johnson on the squad in favor of what a lot of folks call the good old boy network to where we had to get the Golf Boys, Ricky and and Spe and JT on the team. And we passed over Keegan. we passed over Keegan when a lot of folks were critical of Zack Johnson passing over Keegan and then the PGA. It was it almost felt like right after the fact that to rectify that they made him they made him captain and I don’t think anybody was I remember his reaction. I don’t think anybody was more surprised than Keegan himself. Oh, I agree. I agree. So So you know my question goes back to you know the pipeline for captaincy. Tiger was quoted as saying he’s ready to lead if called upon, but who knows if that’s an at who knows if that’s a hollow. Somebody’s gonna have to step up. But who who we got? I’ve heard I’ve heard I’ve heard Keegan mentioned as actually getting another crack at it. I’ve heard who was a vice captain. I’ve heard Stricker getting another crack at it. Strick was captain hasn’t led yet, right? I’m not sure if I’m actually not sure if he has been um a captain yet. I think he’s been a vice captain. I’m not sure if he’s been a captain yet. Well, at the end of the day, we’ve got to figure something out because this is two in a row that we’ve gotten pretty pretty manhandled. So, where are we at now on on the last five years? Freddy has not been Yeah, I don’t think he has. Rder Cup captain. So it uh the RDER Cup until this year was really easy to to remember past past past winners because um no one has won on away soil since 2012. So you could just trace back basically the home team has been winning the last you know 12 12 years or so. Um, but now the Euros have broken that streak and I guess that’s why it feels so stingy because years it’s going to be a tall order uh for the Americans to not lose three in a row being that being that we lost the last one. Lost last year, lost this year and now we got now we got to go over there. Um I think the odds makers you know US team prior to the picks and then after the picks were made they were they were always minus 150. So that’s just a product of of showing the home team is has the better certainly has the better odds of winning. Yeah. you know, but but there were a lot of folks that were breaking down the the actual squads and and wondering if if the Americans could get it done this time just because there’s not not a lot of dynamic not a lot of dynamic players. Yeah. On this team. Um all of our all of our big big boys have kind of rolled off now. I know. And to be fair, we still would have lost even if Henley would have made that putt. So, you can’t put it on Henley either. It would have we would have had a chance. You know, who knows? It’s hard to say what would have happened. Well, yeah, because they probably would have we still had to pull. We had we still had to pull through as if as it came through. We still would have lost if he gets that. We, you know, we were back in the in the game. Everybody was up at the time, I believe. Yeah. Um so we had to hold we had he had to win that match and then us sort of hold serve because there because I remember thinking at one point I thought it would it may very well end in a 14 all tie. um you know what’s your kind of final takeaway? What what would you do if you were PJ of America and had to come up with a plan of attack to make sure this doesn’t happen again? Uh that’s that’s a heavy question. First of all, I would I would fix this live thing. That would be the first thing on the docket. We got to get Americans back playing. We got to get everybody back playing again. All right. So, devil’s advocate, you’re the P. We’re the PJ of America. You and I, you know, represent PJ of America. I’m throwing my hands up. I can’t do anything about it. That’s PJ Tour versus Saudis and versus, you know, so if that’s not an option, I’m picking I’m picking the fieriest guys no matter where they land. Okay. Like I’m picking the guys who are going to bring the most energy. All right. So you’re So what you’re proposing then you’re you’re taking your six automatic qualifiers and then you’re going to make sure your captain’s picks are are used wisely on guys that just bring it. Just bring it. Just get it everybody hyped. Hey man, so you’re making a case for my man Patrick Reed, Captain America. No, I I don’t disagree with that. I mean, he always he would never back down. He always fought to the end. Yeah. And I just like that. I just, you know, and not to take away from these guys, but the guys that were out there, they’re just very quiet guys. you know, they’re just not very fiery guys. You had uh and that’s just never been our team in the past. You got JT bringing the bringing the heat. Um you got Dashambo obviously bringing the heat. He was a great addition in terms of passion. But even Scotty Scotty’s so chill. He’s not a passion guy. So chill. He’s not a passion guy. Spawn so chill. Morau is so chill. Henley definitely so chill. I never even see him get highs or lows. Uh, Griffin. I mean, Cam was a great ad. I think Cam’s looking like he’s going to be on the team for a while, but he’s stoic. Yep. I mean, you know, the best always the best situation for us to happen is for whatever stable of players we start with that they start playing well enough multiple years to make multiple RDER cups. Yeah. And then you don’t have a team full of rookies. No, I mean that I mean that Well, that was probably a bigger problem. We had a huge amount of rookies on Yeah, I think the I think the captain’s picks for the Euros, like I said, they were just when I remember looking at the list and just thinking, man, like remember Matt Wallace? We talked about him in our show. Yeah, because Hogard was the only was the only rookie, right? Oh, no. Uh Oberg was too, was he? Or is he a captain’s pick in before? Uh I don’t think so. I don’t even think he’s been around that long. Yeah, he hasn’t. But I was thinking for some reason that they picked him. Um it was very few rookies. Yeah, he was a controversial pick a little bit because he hadn’t really proven himself, but they kind of had in mind that he was going to be the future and so they they made him a selection for that purpose. I can remember I don’t I don’t think in America we have any any sort of lead pipe locks to guys to lead the future. We don’t we don’t know from one year to the next who’s going to who’s going to stay strong, who’s going to peter out. And I don’t know if it speaks to do we just not have the talented guys or is it just kind of the way way it goes over here where they run hot and co so hot and cold uh from year to year. But um we talked about Matt Wallace. He was very dejected when he didn’t qualify on merit uh at the D at the final DP tour event that qualified and there was some speculation and we talked about it how he didn’t seem to think he had any chance of making the field and I was surprised because I said well here’s a guy that’s played well he’s going to finish you know he’s going to finish in number seven on the on the Euros uh list like surely a guy that finishes seventh has a chance and then I remember pulling on that list up the first time and seeing that the names were lined up behind him and it was just shocking. I was like no wonder he he knows he knew if he wasn’t an automatic qualifier. It was like a it was almost like a Brian Harmon situation over here making the team. He knows if he’s not top six that he’s not making the team. Yeah. You know, but it was more even more uh evident with the Euros that that that Wallace was not was not getting picked. So um kind of a shame. I I can’t answer my own question. um about what I would do if I was the PJ of America, but really give trying to give me an honest answer of what would you do? I’m going with uh I’m going with Freddy couples. I don’t know why everybody loves Freddy, you know. I I don’t really know why he hasn’t been. He hasn’t been. That’s that’d be interesting to see. Who knows? I suppose that’s that’s because it doesn’t sound like I’m pretty sure Tiger’s going to be the next captain, though. My boy Brandt, uh, my boy Brandt Senker, Nashville boy. Um, I would love to see him be captain. He is such a great guy. Yeah. Um, he would certainly bring a different dynamic. Yeah. But he’s kind of on the softer side, too, right? He is. You know, is that good or bad? And that and and and only the folks that are in that locker room that are part of the selection process know what they need. and and I think I think that’s just going to be that’s going to be up to them to come up with. So, um back to what we talked about um the European side going down after the six automatic qualifiers, seven was Lowry, eight was Straa, nine was Aubberg, 10 was Havlin, 11 was Fitzpatrick, and then throw in John Rom. It was a no-brainer. Yeah. As well. Well, 24th, but obviously I’m going to guess Donald would have probably wish that he would have if he had known. Did Havlin always had the neck injury or is it just something that you know I saw varying reports that maybe slept wrong on it and just had kind of a crack in the neck? Yeah, crack in the neck which which we’ve all seen. Yeah. But no, and they hurt. I’m still calling foul on that extra half point. I agree, man. I agree. I think that’s uh something that needs to be like, hey, if you can’t make if you I mean, we would disqualify him in the in any other tournament. He would have to play or he’d have to withdraw or withdraw. Um now, nobody else would get a point, but that’s but in match play, you would lose the match if you couldn’t tee it up. As large of an event as this is, um you know, it would be nothing to have an an alternate picked. Well, I that actually does surprise me that we don’t have one alternate. seems like a normal situation, but and it could be a playing vice captain, you know, you just you bring a guy along like like the Euros had um his name escapes me. Crap. No, you’re Well, not Molinari. had a guy that actually is was better like in form like you know you had an outside shot not you know given this superstar lineup had an outside shot of actually being picked and they and they Alex oh Alexander play yeah good player just hasn’t had the best couple years didn’t qualify didn’t play well enough to justify but could have certainly stepped in yeah and maybe that’s a solution going forward now that this has happened because because like I said, “If you’re in that team room in Euro, if you’re the captain, if you’re Donald and you say, “Hey, Victor, can you go tomorrow?” And Victor gives you any any even a remote like, “Uh, I don’t know, man. I might be well, you’re sitting because I get half a point and that puts us half a point closer because we’ll take all halves tomorrow. It doesn’t matter.” Yeah, they didn’t need, you know, it just put them that much closer. So, it’s definitely a unique situation and I hope that there’s a better situation than you know, a half a half. Yeah. Yeah. I don’t know if I love that, but it is what it is. Hey, Ryder Cup, you can’t argue sometimes with u with uh traditions and and that’s what makes our game great. And uh it’s why we’re able to argue and debate all these things, right? Because if you if you set this thing up tomorrow, if you if you built the RDER Cup tomorrow, you didn’t have any his history to build it from, you know, I think it would look a lot different than it does today. Sure. Certainly wouldn’t be GBNI. It might be look more like the President’s Cup to be honest with you. Yeah. It might be US versus the world or, you know, some form of maybe four um like hockey plays. Uh they divide they divide their internationals into four different groups. They have four teams, you know. Interesting. Next week we’re going to take a break. We’re going to shoot a couple more episodes this week. So, we’ll have something for you for sure. So, keep an eye out on YouTube. If you guys could subscribe and like and comment, that really helps our channel grow and obviously get out to more people. Obviously, we’re we’re new at this as a team and uh but it’s so it’s been great having Matt with us and uh and we’re getting a lot of good insight and we’re getting better every day, buddy. Hope so, man. Having having fun. It’s what uh it’s what this game’s all about, so may as well. Absolutely. It’s always a grind, right? Try to get better at the podcast, too. [Laughter] Well, if you guys would subscribe on our socials and uh like we say all the time, please send us comments and uh we’ll be happy to kind of incorporate some stuff into the next show. But as always, thanks for watching. I’m Jeremy Lee, Matt Vic. Thank y’all. We will see you on the tea. See you next week. Take care.
