Shane Ryan, on how Keegan Bradley became up for consideration and why others weren’t.
What does Shane think about Keegan Bradley being the Ryder Cup captain? There were no interviews done, which came as a surprise. Why wasn’t Phil Mickelson considered for this position? Is it because of LIV golf or is there another reason behind this? How important is home field advantage for the Ryder Cup? How does Shane think the Americans will do in this tournament? Will there be any lingering effects for Rory McIlory in the Ryder Cup, after losing they way he did at Pinehurst?
#rydercup #golf #pga #livgolf #sports #rydercup #philmickelson
so earlier this week the PGA of America did a I think a crazy I don’t know if it’s not going to work out it might uh they uh announced that Keegan Bradley 38-year-old Keegan Bradley would become the second youngest Rider Cup captain like in modern Ryder Cup history the only one younger was Arnold Palmer who was a playing Captain uh like a half century ago Shane Ryan wrote the book The Rider cup the cup they couldn’t lose going into Whistling Straits also I like to mention this if you’re a Ryder Cup fan the Ryder Cup run podcast it’s like a 7 Series podcast was riveting and in-depth and one of my favorite listens and I go back and listen to it a lot he joins us on the Adam Gold show sir I just watched your or at least I saw it in the studio here when it was on you were on Golf Channel you did not like the process more than who got selected as the rder Cup captain cuz I guess two things can be true that the process could be flawed and they might have ended up at the right spot anyway but what is your overall takeaway from Keegan Bradley as the rider Cup captain yeah that would be the main thing is that you know this is something that has in the last 10 years at least on the American side been very carefully considered you want people who have been a Vice Captain beforehand all that kind of stuff and this time they just seem to have not only chosen a guy who’s never been a Vice Captain and you know who’s never been in any leadership position like this but a guy who wasn’t didn’t even know he was in the running didn’t have his hat in the ring had no idea he was being considered until they actually phoned him and said congratulations you’re the Ridder Cup captain and uh you know the process for doing it was the minute Tiger Wood said he couldn’t do it they got together this six-person you know little committee got together on the phone looked down a list of names and supposedly but according to what they said immediately chose Keegan Bradley uh as if it was an obvious answer when to everyone else it looks like kind of a staggering answer kind of a shocking answer so yeah the the process I think was really quick and really halfhazard and you know again maybe they’ll get lucky and Keegan will be a really good captain and that may be the case but you really have to wonder what they’re up to and what they’re thinking so I remember and you wrote the the piece in Golf Digest about how it all fell apart in 2014 at Glenn Eagles and that triggered that Ryder Cup task force did this reject all Notions that that was a good idea a little bit yeah I mean in terms of the people who decided it you know Davis Love III and uh Jim furick and Steve Stricker those have been kind of the guys you associate with the task force they were not involved in this at all so it was a little bit of a rebuke of them I think which is interesting to me because okay they lost in Rome and they lost in Paris but they did at least turn it around to the agree that they got their blowout wins at home at Hazel te and at Whistling straight so to kind of move past the system and to say oh it’s dead now it’s pretty questionable to me and what’s even more questionable is that one of the decision makers behind it was Zach Johnson so here’s a guy who you know by most by most accounts didn’t really live up to any kind of standard as the US captain in Rome and he’s got the power to make this decision so I don’t know I I think they are kind of throwing everything out that came before and I’m not sure that’s the smartest thing to do no uh yeah the truth is is that they’re two and two in Ryder Cup since the task force uh they at least now are winning on home soil here’s what I don’t understand and know we let me put this in college sports terminology to people uh that every good athletic director has a list in his desk of five coaches that he would call he would consider hiring if his coach left did anybody at the PGA of America not have that list and especially here cuz most of these people would be really not active players anymore at least seriously active players on the PGA tour did they not do any due diligence just in case Tiger Woods couldn’t do it and there was a pretty big probability that Tiger Woods wouldn’t be able to commit to it yeah I mean they had a list but I I think you’re right that there wasn’t a lot of thought put into it there were no interviews done I mean when I heard Keegan Bradley’s name you’re thinking well maybe they did a bunch of interviews and he you know he blew them away and he was really good and that would at least start to make some sense um but yeah he didn’t again Keegan Bradley didn’t know he was even being considered there were no interviews done they just they just kind of fired from the hip here out of nowhere so whether or not they had a list you know that’s sort of a different question than did they do any kind of due diligence did they you know look at who has experien look who might be good at this did they interview anybody the answer to all those questions are definitely not Shane Ryan is joining us here at Shane Ryan here on Twitter so here’s the what like kind of struck me because this Ryder Cup which is going to be at Beth Page next next September was always it wasn’t supposed to be tiger right you know you go back three years they weren’t targeting Tiger Woods as the uh captain of this Ridder cup they were thinking about Woods for the one coming up two years after that this was supposed to be Phil Mickelson’s Ridder cup captaincy the the way he is revered especially in the tri-state area in New York wh why why I mean maybe the answer is obvious but why didn’t they consider Phil Mickelson here yeah I think right now the live thing is just a nonstarter I think the minute you know you kind of you went there you kind of removed your yourself from consideration at least until there’s a merger there is a merger at some point uh then I think maybe all all that gets reset it’s the same on the European side you know guys like Lee Westwood or Ian pter Sergio Garcia they are at the moment out of the running and not in consideration for the same reason so right but that’s structural on in the European Tour Part it’s structural because it’s the European tour that runs the Ryder Cup right and those players had to give up European tour membership or at least they didn’t have to they chose to right to to avoid being fined in all of that uh none of that happened I mean they’re suspended from the PGA Tour but the PGA of America even at before the PGA uh oh maybe this was just Mike ju of the USGA suggesting that they would uh alter qualification process but I think all of the major championships would like to get like the best fields and they’re unaffiliated with the PGA Tour uh if we’re going to have their players play why I mean I’m not advocating for Phil but I’m just curious as to like it was never a consideration yeah no it’s a good point right there will be you would think there will be lived players especially someone like Bryson the Shambo on the team they’re certainly eligible to play and they did last time so why can’t a captain be from Liv and I think the answer is just that you know the the power making uh or the decision-making body uh is composed all of PGA Tour people right so I mean now again it comes with a few PGA of America Executives but the real power lies in the former captains and the players like Jordan uh Jordan Speed and Justin Thomas who are on this committee to choose the captain and they are PGA Tour guys so yes it’s a separate organization but the PGA Tour blood very much runs through it and so you know you’re not you’re just not going to have a live guy at the moment it’s just the fact of life and and man I I don’t disagree with that by the way I don’t disagree with the reasoning uh it’s just it the whole it it seems a contradiction I agree I think it would be surprising to me right now if Bryson Des Shambo unless his game goes south isn’t on that team we forget I I think there are a lot of people that assume Brooks kepka made the team on points last time he didn’t he had to get selected I mean I think he was se you know missed by one spot or two spots and it was an easy one for him to get selected uh not to mention he no player uh does more to distance himself from live golf than Brooks Kea ever he doesn’t wear anything that says live on it and every other player has their their live team logo all over their uh you know shirts or hats or bags or anything like that Brooks goes the the exact opposite direction there um but I would assume that those two guys likely will be on the team if somebody else who’s American is playing at a high level on live I would imagine uh they would be under consideration because it would be foolish not to send your best team to the Ryder Cup because I think Europe uh might have a better team right now sight unseen when we get to Beth Page in a year yeah they may and I but I the only thing I would say to that is that I don’t think there’s any greater home field advantage in all sports than home course advantage in the Ryder Cup uh and I think that’s played out in pretty dramatic ways in the last four um and you could even go back you could even go back further than that really so I I think you know we talk about the captains we talk about the players and all that you got to be careful with that because in the end I think it’s like swamped by the overwhelming most important factor which is having you know 60,000 screaming New York on your side uh I think that ends up being um that ends up carrying the day just like it did in Rome just like it did in Wisconsin just like it did in Paris just like it did in Minnesota so you know we’ll see what happens but I would still I would still pick the Americans despite all of this if uh if you ask me right now all right one one final thing away from the Ryder Cup and by the way I I mentioned the uh the book The Cup they couldn’t lose about Whistling Straits uh really the lead up to it uh and the Ryder Cup run which is a phenomenal if you’re a Ridder cup fan there’s a lot of history in how this became such a big deal and you find out that Shane Ryan is the biggest Paul McGinley fan in the world um which is fine I am a big Paul McGinley fan too um Rory mroy uh peeled rubber out of the US open at Pinehurst after he completely gagged on a two-shot lead with five holes to play and lost to brys and to Shambo I don’t think it had anything to do with Bryce and I think it was just how did I not win this one he says this one was wasn’t as bad as the one he lost at St Andrews A couple of years ago who am I to rank uh to rank these I don’t know I felt like this one was worse um he I don’t know I don’t even know if you rank him it certainly wasn’t his best moment to not meet the media what are your thoughts on Rory now as we’re less than a week away from the start of the Open Championship yeah I think you know I think he was describing maybe how he felt in the aftermath of them because I’m you the the St Andre loss was not good and I’m sure he would have you know that would have been the perfect way to break his his major droughts to win there um but the Piner loss was far worse in terms of the you know the chokin of it um he definitely should have won that he played great most of the day and then he had these disastrous last few holes where he really booted it away so who knows what he’s thinking there but yeah I mean Rory if there’s something you give him credit for he throughout this whole drought which is a decade long now through all the near misses and the heartbreaks he keeps putting himself back there over and over so there’s got to be something resilient in the guy and I tend to believe him you know when he says I’m sure it’ll you know kind of wrankle and everything but I think he’ll come out I think he’ll still play well I don’t think it’s going to destroy him or anything like that it looks like I think he was five under today Scottish so he’s he’s right in the mix there and uh I’m sure you know I don’t know if he’s gonna you know win trun or or have a chance to win TR but I’m sure he’ll play well it’s just a matter of the really interesting thing will be you know the next time he gets in contention on a Sunday what happens does he the ghosts of these of these kind of near misses haunt him a little bit and are we going to see uh is that going to have lingering effects is there going to be more breakdowns all that kind of stuff and you know the answer is we’re not we don’t know until we see it so we’ll see we’ll see if he’s better we’ll see if he’s refreshed if he can take the positive from Pinehurst or if like I said that stuff is going to kind of dwell a little bit well uh I’m calling it right now Rory is gonna win TR I think he is going to win TR the uh the devastation at the Masters begat the US Open the next time out I think he is going to win TR um and it but in a way that maybe we don’t we don’t know maybe he will maybe he’ll go start he’ll go wire to wire uh I’ve always thought that Rory’s next major is going to be a little bit like uh how Payne Stewart had to win his first uh coming from well back with a spectacular final round who knows maybe he wins it like Phil Mickelson his his best friend uh won his Open Championship kind of surprising out of the back of the pack middle of the pack uh to to who who did he catch Adam Scott and uh some others at mirfield but uh who knows maybe I’m just rooting too hard for Rory uh Shane Shane Ryan here on Twitter the cup they couldn’t lose Ryder Cup run the podcast go check it out thank you so much my man thank you Adam always fun Shane Ryan self digest uh honestly if you’re into the rider cup that podcast is great it’s uh it’s I’m not going to even say it’s fast moving but it’s so it’s it’s a story and it’s I think a fascinating story all of it but I’m a Ridder cup geek so what what do I know
