ATLANTA \u2014 There is only one way out of this mess for U.S. captain Keegan Bradley and that\u2019s for the Americans to win the Ryder Cup.<\/p>\n
Anything else will result in endless second-guessing of what Bradley calls the biggest decision of his life<\/a>. That starts Wednesday when he goes to PGA of America headquarters in Frisco, Texas, and reveals whether the captain is one of his six captain\u2019s picks.<\/p>\n Bradley could pick himself and become the first playing captain since Arnold Palmer in 1963. He already has said he would not hand over the job to one of his assistants.<\/p>\n Losing captains always get blamed, and they know that when they take the job. They didn\u2019t make the right captain\u2019s picks. They had the wrong pairings. One player should have sat out, another should have played more. The rain suits leaked. It could be anything.<\/p>\n But not this year.<\/p>\n If the Americans lose with Bradley as a player, he had too much on his plate between practicing and playing, making pairings and speeches and all the media responsibilities.<\/p>\n Or he could stick to being only the captain. And if the Americans lose, it was because Bradley didn\u2019t allow them to field their strongest team by trading in his clubs for a golf cart and radio.<\/p>\n Bradley can\u2019t win unless the Americans win.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m very well aware of that,\u201d Bradley said Saturday at East Lake<\/a> after he shot 63, which only strengthened arguments he should be playing. \u201cNo matter what decision I made, I\u2019m going to be defined by this decision. If we win, it doesn\u2019t matter what decision I make.\u201d<\/p>\n Rory McIlroy added to the conversation<\/a> two weeks ago with sound arguments on his belief that the Ryder Cup has become too big for anyone to be a playing captain. There are meetings with assistants and daily media briefings, and there are limitations as a player.<\/p>\n \u201cThe captain isn\u2019t going to be on the course all day, so really the captain\u2019s only going to be able to play one session on Friday, one session on Saturday. Would you rather not have a player that has the flexibility to go twice if he\u2019s playing well?\u201d McIlroy said.<\/p>\n But there\u2019s the other side that McIlroy noted two months ago when Bradley came into view as one of the top American players<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cIf he doesn\u2019t pick himself,\u201d McIlroy said, \u201cthen you could say America aren\u2019t going with their very best.\u201d<\/p>\n What a mess.<\/p>\n Bradley would be a lock for the Ryder Cup any year but this one. He has two PGA Tour victories against strong fields in the last 13 months \u2014 only Scottie Scheffler among Americans has won more. He is No. 8 in the world among Americans, Data Golf rates him the 10th-best American and he finished No. 11 in the Ryder Cup standings.<\/p>\n None of this surprised him. Bradley is 39 \u2014 the youngest since Palmer was 34 at East Lake in those one-sided 1963 matches \u2014 and he was No. 19 in the world the day he was introduced as captain.<\/p>\n \u201cI figured the likelihood of being completely out of the picture was pretty slim,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Where he painted himself into a corner was declaring when he was accepted the job that he would only play if he qualified for the team.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not going to pick myself,\u201d he said in July 2024. \u201cThe only way that would happen is if the team was insisting on it. But even if they did, I don\u2019t see that happening. I want to make the team on points, otherwise I\u2019m going to be the captain.\u201d<\/p>\n And then he won the Travelers Championship<\/a> in June.<\/p>\n \u201cThis changes the story a little bit,\u201d Bradley said. \u201cThis definitely opens the door to play.\u201d<\/p>\n He was one shot out of the lead on the front nine on Sunday at the Tour Championship<\/a> until he stopped making enough birdies and faded into a tie for seventh, his first top 10 since he won the Travelers.<\/p>\n It was an impressive performance considering he spent the previous Monday at Bethpage Black surprising the paying customers with free tickets. He didn\u2019t arrive at East Lake until Tuesday night to take to dinner the players who qualified for the team. He said he never stopped thinking about pairings or motivational words he wanted to impart, even while warming up on the range at East Lake.<\/p>\n And in the final round, he said he was exhausted. It was a lot. And there is more to come.<\/p>\n Bradley did drop a few hints during the week. He said he had a \u201cpretty good idea\u201d on the picks before the Tour Championship. He pointed out it was a two-year process and one week or one round shouldn\u2019t decide who plays. He also said hearing from players that he should play has been flattering but won\u2019t count toward his decision.<\/p>\n The Ryder Cup has always been more like the Hindsight Cup, especially this year.<\/p>\n \u201cThe only thing I care about is on Sunday of the Ryder Cup, that we win the Ryder Cup. Then I\u2019ll know I made the right decision,\u201d Bradley said. \u201cUntil then, I won\u2019t know. It\u2019s going to be pretty wild. Whatever decision we make, we\u2019re going to have to live with it.\u201d<\/p>\n There is one upside to all this drama about whether Bradley should play: At least no one is talking about the Americans getting paid<\/a>.<\/p>\n If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement<\/a> and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and\/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ATLANTA \u2014 There is only one way out of this mess for U.S. captain Keegan Bradley and that\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":112281,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71],"tags":[427,99],"class_list":["post-112280","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-golf","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112280","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112280"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112280\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/112281"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}