The tears were supposed to come Sunday, not on a Friday evening when the Ryder Cup already seemed lost. Keegan Bradley was about to cry as he sat by the green at Bethpage Black, and you are permitted to ask: How are Americans supposed to have confidence the next two days when the team captain can’t handle early crushes? Europe has a 5.5 to 2.5 lead when Scottie Scheffler didn’t inspire Team USA — was he arrested again? — with a dismal 0-for-2 klutz in foursomes and four-balls.
Was Bradley watering up because we keep comparing Scheffler to Tiger Woods? Don’t folks realize Woods was 13-21-3 in this spectacle when, oh, Scheffler is winless in his past six matches. In foursomes, he has played 41 holes and trails by 18 points. He has won four majors and might win 15. So why is he struggling now, when he must show his stripes for the red, white and blue? Bryson DeChambeau also went 0 for 2, while his so-called rival, Rory McIlroy, scored 1.5 points and grinned all day long. Weep, Keegan, weep.
“We’ve played the first quarter of a basketball game,” Bradley said. “They went out there and they played better than us today. They made more putts. But listen, we knew this was going to be difficult. We knew this was going to be tough. Our boys are in great spirits. I just spoke to them. They are really excited to get out there tomorrow.”
The hoop analogy didn’t work. He doesn’t seem to understand his players have a culture problem compared to the prim Euros, who are attempting to win for the fifth time in seven events and are classier at this tournament than our dudes. Consider the other night, when a gala was held at a mansion called the Hempstead House. The visitors wore suits, ties and fancy loafers. The Americans didn’t wear ties and sported white sneakers, which fits their preoccupation of being compensated when the opponents are not paid.
Why would they stumble when the crowd was so jacked, from 7 a.m. toward dusk, that fans saved every fat insult for the enemies? Why wouldn’t they grasp relevance when all eyes turned to President Trump, who sat in a box encircled by security people prepared for a golf course invasion? When Trump saw Scheffler, he was happy. When he noticed his friend, DeChambeau, he talked to him and stood a few feet away as he! teed off. He was talking to the wrong people. Blame Trump!
“We gave ourselves plenty of opportunities. It really just came down to me not holing enough putts,” said Scheffler, who missed his share. “We put up a good fight at the end. The guys just really turned it on on the back nine, but it really came down to us not taking advantage of the holes early in the match that we needed to.”
Is it time to bench Scheffler? He should have stayed in his hotel room when compared to Jon Rahm, who has lost only one of 12 Ryder Cup matches. Bradley spoke of basketball. Europe captain Luke Donald, who is close with Michael Jordan, senses garbage time is coming. “Incredible day,” Donald said. “To win this morning was huge for us, and we all know how important it is to get off to a good start. Guys grinded to win the session again this afternoon. That’s another tick in our box, and I’m very happy where we are.”
Scheffler will not be benched. “When you’re the No. 1 player in the world, you have a day that maybe it wasn’t his best, normally you bounce back,” Bradley said. “We are not worried about Scottie Scheffler.” A lookback at previous Ryder Cups might change his mind.
McIlroy finally won his career Grand Slam and turned on the media. Scheffler dominated the rest of the year, but as usual, who is ready to spar with another U.S. caddie? “It’s a great day for Europe,” McIlroy said. “We would have absolutely taken this.”
The Euros played through the nonsense. In Italy, the Americans did not play through the nonsense. It is reaching the point where their gentlemen are better than ours. When fans screamed through swings, the shot was spot on. When fans made fun of Tyrrell Hatton, he won his match. On the last hole, Justin Rose made his putt.
And he pointed at the crowd.
America reeks, he seemed to say.
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Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.
