Ryder Cup Day 4

OMG. The Ryder Cup actually came down to the last singles match. What a helluva comeback by the US. But still, Europe 14½ - USA 13½ - Europe is taking the Cup home.

Here's a commentary, on the US losing, again. These are the best players on the PGA tour. Great names. Great players. Why can't they dominate the Cup? In fact, why are they dominated? Let's look the the best player, not just on the PGA tour but in the world. Tiger Woods is 3-1-0 in this Ryder Cup, bringing his overall record to 13-14-2 and 9-13-1 in the foursomes/fourballs in seven cups. That's a terrible record for the world's best player, and the team is still 0-7 in Cups he's competed for.



This is not all on Woods (though, let's face it - Francesco Molinari should lose to Tiger Woods; if he doesn't, there's something very wrong somewhere). Michelson's no better here - in fact, he's worse. The world number two player is 1-3-0 this year, 11-17-6 total. Jim Furyk - probable Player of the Year - is 8-15-4. All three of them are perfect illustrations of why the US tends to lose to Europe. They - not just those three, all of them - aren't able to put aside their competitive habits and cooperate. They can shine in the singles, but they can't play together. Even in fourballs, they can't cooperate and strategize to make the best of their pairing. Johnny Miller was just wondering why Corey Pavin wasn't at the crucial final match, and it's because Pavin, like other US captains, doesn't know how to run a team. Remember Seve at Valderama? Monty (and Darren Clarke and Sergio and Jose-Maria) has been all over this course, giving talks when needed, not saying as Pavin did that "they're professionals" and "don't need an inspirational talk". But it's not that the US players don't need an inspirational talk. It's that they don't want one. They aren't a team, they're twelve golfers. Twelve very good golfers, yes, but just twelve guys wearing the same shirt.

And until winning the Ryder Cup is actually important to them, that's all they'll be. They can sit at a table and tell us about how much they care - and most of them do care, few call it "having to play" - but they don't care the way the Europeans do. They care, as they play, individually.

And that's why they lose, collectively.