Worst Ryder Cup Captains?

Orikoru

Orikoru

Tour Winner
Joined
Nov 1, 2016
Messages
31,387
Location
Watford
Visit site
So, five days on I'm still buzzing from the Ryder Cup this year - I've been listen to some old No Laying Up podcasts summarising Ryder Cups from 1999 until 2016. There were some great stories in there, these were some of the highlights I picked up, but I wondered if some of you can shed some more light on some of these; or share some other stories of woeful captains.

1999 - Mark James
Seems like the main baffling decision he made - which I've never seen in any other Ryder Cup - was to not play three of his rookies in any of the pairs matches, and just threw directly into the singles - where they all lost quite heavily. He sent them out pretty early in the singles as well, so they came up against big name American players and got absolutely pumped. :LOL: What was his thinking here?? Just that we had a weak squad overall so wanted to build up a lead in the first two days with his stronger players?? Obviously backfired in the end.

2004 - Hal Sutton
Paired Tiger and Phil together, who didn't really get on at the time, plus he gave them no notice at all so Phil had a day to practice with Tiger's ball for the foursomes. They lose both matches together.

2008 - Nick Faldo
He seems to get a lot of hate, but on the flipside, Azinger is recognised as one of the best captains the US have had. Not sure what Faldo's biggest failing was? Was it because he declined to front-load the singles and left a lot of his big guns at the back end?

2010 - Corey Pavin
This is hilarious - apparently they had their waterproofs modified to have their names sewn in the back, but this stitching compromised the waterproofing and they all got drenched through. So they had to buy twelve new sets of waterproofs from the Celtic Manor pro shop. :ROFLMAO: Sounded like Pavin got his wife to do a lot of the work as well.

2014 - Tom Watson
He mainly seems to get slated for dropping people out who were in form. Speith & Reed won 5&4, then he drops them for the afternoon. The following day they win 5&3. I guess he had a plan he was sticking to. He also dropped Mickelson for the whole of Saturday, which funnily enough, Mickelson wasn't pleased about.


Any other bad captain stories?
 
I remember Mickelson threw Tom Watson under the bus in one press conference in 2014. It was not the work of a team-player and hard to listen to, especially as Watson seems to be one of the nicest men in golf.
 
LincolnShep said:
I remember Mickelson threw Tom Watson under the bus in one press conference in 2014. It was not the work of a team-player and hard to listen to, especially as Watson seems to be one of the nicest men in golf.
Click to expand...

That was one of the early signs of the true Mickleson


Most captains of the losing team you could prob say they were bad captains

But Clarke was dealt a poor team but they got stuffed , and Harrington was on the end of a US team on a mission

Faldo made a lot of poor choices
 
LincolnShep said:
I remember Mickelson threw Tom Watson under the bus in one press conference in 2014. It was not the work of a team-player and hard to listen to, especially as Watson seems to be one of the nicest men in golf.
Click to expand...

ASAP Sports Transcripts - Golf - 2014 - THE RYDER CUP - September 28 - Keegan Bradley - Rickie Fowler - Jim Furyk - Zach Johnson - Phil Mickelson - Patrick Reed - Jordan Spieth - Tom Watson

ASAPSports FastScripts, a system using state-of-the-art technology created to produce verbatim FastScripts of press conferences and player/team interviews at sporting events around the globe.
www.asapsports.com
In his defence I guess they asked him outright what was good about the last time they won (2008) that they didn't do this time (2014) and he answered honestly. Maybe came across as brutal if Watson was sitting there with him at the time. :LOL: Brutal honesty..
 
Darren Clarke - got the impression he didn't take it as seriously as others, was there for the dinners and drinks. Didn't seem to put in the level of planning and analysis as other recent captains. To be fair to him, he had a really weak team.

Faldo - so single minded, looked awkward trying to lead a team.

Mark James - this is a bit before my time, but I've heard he was very unpopular with his team, and caused a lot of controversies with his picks and strategies.
 
Last edited:
Harsh to include James and Watson, imo.

James very nearly got an unexpected win. He should have definitely given one or two players a rest and tried out the rookies, but virtually no one was saying that on Saturday night with the lead that they had. Fun fact - George W. Bush (future US President) gave a speech to the US team on Saturday night about the Alamo.

Watson won a Ryder Cup as captain in the nineties and he had to deal with Mickelson second time around.

The worst European captain must go down as Faldo. The US team wasn't that great in 2008 but Europe never really looked like winning, despite having won the last 3 Cups pretty easily. And many of that Euro team have come out subsequently and criticised Faldo's management.
 
Orikoru said:
1999 - Mark James
Seems like the main baffling decision he made - which I've never seen in any other Ryder Cup - was to not play three of his rookies in any of the pairs matches, and just threw directly into the singles - where they all lost quite heavily. He sent them out pretty early in the singles as well, so they came up against big name American players and got absolutely pumped. :LOL: What was his thinking here?? Just that we had a weak squad overall so wanted to build up a lead in the first two days with his stronger players?? Obviously backfired in the end.
Click to expand...
His argument, which I understand, was that if you offered him a 10-6 lead away from home on the saturday night by not playing 3 rookies, he'd take it every time.
 
The losing Captain always gets the blame irrespective of team, circumstance, luck etc.

However, you should always give an away losing Captain far more of a pass. The US have only won one away cup (in 1993) in the past 44 years.

Losing at home can certainly be laid at the Captain”s door.
 
Orikoru said:
2008 - Nick Faldo
He seems to get a lot of hate, but on the flipside, Azinger is recognised as one of the best captains the US have had. Not sure what Faldo's biggest failing was? Was it because he declined to front-load the singles and left a lot of his big guns at the back end?
Click to expand...
Faldo should’ve been a great Captain, pedigree, competitiveness and legend of the game.

However he was terrible didn’t pay attention to finer details made it more about him and didn’t communicate well with players often coming across as aloof. Azinger gets recognition as a great captain but in truth it was because how poor Faldo was in setting out his team made the cheat that is Zinger seem better than he was.
 
kp17 said:
Sunday probably saved him from being top
Click to expand...
You could argue that Sunday made him look even worse.
When not playing as a team with the ‘wrong’ partner, the Americans actually showed as individuals, they were more than a match for Europe and could actually play well in that atmosphere and on that course.
As poorly motivated, badly paired team players they were poor, as individuals they were good.
 
CountLippe said:
His argument, which I understand, was that if you offered him a 10-6 lead away from home on the saturday night by not playing 3 rookies, he'd take it every time.
Click to expand...
If he really didn't rate them that much though, might as well fully commit to the bit and send them out much later on Sunday instead of 3rd, 4th and 5th. 😂
 
Orikoru said:
If he really didn't rate them that much though, might as well fully commit to the bit and send them out much later on Sunday instead of 3rd, 4th and 5th. 😂
Click to expand...

He talked about it in his book. Because they hadn't been involved, he wanted them involved early in the singles. His argument for not playing them, on face value is sound... his fourball and foursomes pairings were playing well and kept winning. I don't necessarily agree with him but he makes a compelling argument.
 
CountLippe said:
He talked about it in his book. Because they hadn't been involved, he wanted them involved early in the singles. His argument for not playing them, on face value is sound... his fourball and foursomes pairings were playing well and kept winning. I don't necessarily agree with him but he makes a compelling argument.
Click to expand...
I was only half joking to be fair - his plan might have actually worked if he buried them later in the order and his better players had picked up 2 or 3 points early on. But they were doomed to failure making their debut in a high pressure singles environment. Hard enough debuting in a four-ball match with an experienced player by your side, let alone on your own up against a Phil or a Tiger!
 
Last edited:
Can’t believe Zach Johnson not mentioned - team underprepared, jet lagged, no leadership and questionable pairings and tactics
 
Keegan Bradley must be the winner.
Set up the course totally wrong.
Got pretty much all pairings wrong (including putting the worst pairing statistically together twice).
Rambled on in press conferences about a set plan.
Even lost it with a rules official during the singles.
He looked to me like a man who was doing the job 10 years too early.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

mikeb4
Ryder Cup Query
2
Replies
38
Views
1K
sunshine
S
N
Golf Licence
3 4 5
Replies
95
Views
2K
D-S
D
N
Intelligent Golf / Club Systems Mobile App Merger
2
Replies
21
Views
690
jim8flog
jim8flog
N
Northumberland Golf
2 3
Replies
44
Views
3K
Old Colner
O
3offTheTee
New General Manger appointed
Replies
12
Views
591
kp17
kp17
Top