This Is The Official v2 Golf Board's Ryder Cup Thread: Please Post Here!

[pedro]

RCB was only mentioned as a potential pick in lack of alternatives.

[NedB-H]

Seems to be mixed messages about the Reed/Spieth split. The first thing I read suggested everyone gave Cap’n Jim two names they’d like to play with:, Jordan said JT and Reed, and Patrick said Jordan and Tiger. If that’s true then Furyk’s decisions are perfectly reasonable and Reed needs to grow up, those are two good pairings on paper, and every team member having a couple of possible partners is perfectly normal.

Do you remember where you read this?

NYT did the interview with Reed
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/30/sports/golf/ryder-cup-europe-united-states-egos.html

Sorry GPB, I’ve read too much over the past 36 hours to remember what was what! I had seen that NYT piece though.

Has anything been heard from Spieth since?



Re Fowler, “overrated” comes down to how much someone rates him to begin with. If you’re bracketing him at the same level as RCB then clearly he’s had a great career so far. I feel that more often he tends to be grouped in the Rory/Jordan elite category. As Kwini has noted Fowler has only four PGA Tour wins. His first was in 2012, in the same time period others have:
14 wins: DJ
12: Rory
11: Day
Spieth
9: Thomas
Tiger (!)
8: Bubba
6: Reed
Rose

I guess you can throw in his two Euro Tour wins too, but he’s clearly just below the top level. A good Ryder Cup record would make up for that somewhat, if he had one.

[Diggers]

He’s been mentioned quite a few times, the point is, why? Never read he’s underachieved.
You could easily flip Fowler’s record the other way, for a guy who has “only” won 4 times, 8 top 5 major finishes is excellent.
I love Tommy, he’s 28, how often has he won on the big tour? How many wins does Finau have, he’s 29 just like Ricky.

[super_realist]

He probably has underachieved, although he was a bit of a late bloomer, like Finau

Fair point on Fleetwood and Finau, but we can't trawl PGA stats for every single player who can be used as comparison, just so it doesn't look like we're "picking" on Fowler. We're talking about Fowler, so if you want to talk about other players, then start a topic about them.

I agree he's one of many players you could say haven't reached the top given their talent, but that doesn't mean that he's underachieved any less, and bringing up other guys who have also underachieved doesn't change Fowlers position as a relative underachiever.

[Diggers]

As long as we agree then, Finau, Fleetwood and Fowler are all career underachievers. Just so we know a benchmark of success. Of course we have to clarify that Finau and Fleetwood have achieved far less, so we have to agree they really are bloody useless.

[pedro]

(Under-)achievement is always in relation to the hype surrounding the player. However the hype surrounding Fowler seems to have subsided a bit since the coming of the Golden Boy.

And btw, in this context Rory is also an underachiever, despite his Majors etc.

Fleetwood is the reigning European no.1. He has not had hype surrounding him for so long so I wouldn’t call him an underachiever yet.

[kwinigolfer]

Never said Rickie wasn't a nice guy, or even a good golfer; apparently he's charismatic and he's certainly great to follow. Just hasn't done enough to deserve all the hype. Probably not so much over there, but he gets massive publicity/attention here.
Digs, Rickie's nine years removed from his first missed chance, Finau hasn't been in the bigs half that long but of course he's overdue some decent wins. And Fowler will be 30 before Tommy Fleet turns 28. Strange though that Rickie has two excellent wins in Europe.

And, yes, I still feel Rafa can rightly feel indignant that he didn't make the team - but thrilled it turned out alright on the night. Well done Thomas Bjorn on that.

This Reed/Spieth nonsense is getting a bit out of hand . . . . . . .

[Diggers]

Kwini, should the fact that Ricky was good enough to be competing and contending in majors, when other players like Finau and Fleetwood weren’t as good so young and needed time to mature, be held against him? Should the fact he’s been pretty damn good for a long time at a still young age be seen as a positive?

[kwinigolfer]

Yes!

[Diggers]

[NedB-H]

Yes absolutely. If you’ve been competing at the top for a long time, with few wins to show for it, that’s clearly different to someone who hit the big time late in their career. No one suggests Jimmy Walker has underachieved because he barely kept his card for the first five years.

I’ve said previously that Finau’s lack of serious wins is a gap on his CV, Fleetwood could be starting to go the same way. RCB certainly has that problem, as did Molinari for many years. It’s by no means only Rickie, Kuchar, Casey and Donald have all taken flak over the years for not converting endless top tens into more wins.

[Diggers]

Well I like Ricky, also think he’s better now than he was (he has had an injury this year I believe) so he’s hopefully still got his best years to come. Time will tell.

[kwinigolfer]

By comparison to Rickie, DJ has 17 wins since Fowler first made a Tour play-off, yet probably gets less ink. Even Jimmy Walker has 6 wins including a Major. (Incidentally, very interesting Feherty with JW.)
Plenty have more than Rickie's four wins. But he's good, just not great.

[Diggers]

Fair enough, I’ll bear in mind only great constitutes career fulfillment.

[McLaren]

I get that Ricky is (was) young, American, nice personality, marketable and so on, and therefore garnered some hype but when he first came on tour his game was nowhere near the level of Spieth, Thomas, DJ, Rory, Kopka etc.  Basically having the correct image meant more was expected of him rather than his golf game.  

But he has actually turned his game around and seems to have added length and more consistency (in theory).  His swing was a little quirky when he first came on the scene but he now has a pretty standard modern golf pro type action.

Given his improved swing and the positions he has put himself in, especially in the majors, it wouldn't be a surprise to see him win some big events but never have I thought about him as being in the very top group of players. Given the level of the players just above him he has done pretty well so far.

And I am not sure why we are just writing off 4 wins on the PGAT?  Not to go over old ground but most of the winning RC team would love to have that record.  For example the hero Fleetwood at 29 is well behind Fowler in career achievements, a point already well made by diggers.  

Although odd given his position in this debate kwini sums it up best "he is good, just not great".

But just remember what that means when interpreting the careers of some of this boards RC heroes!

[McLaren]

PS - I can assure fellow posters it will become tedious for all involved when I remind anyone that unless a player has 4 PGAT wins they can't even be described as good.  This mantra will become even more boring than my double dipper obsessions.

For sake of future pain can we agree the following players are not even good and have fell well short of career fulfillment.

Lee Westwood (3)
Monty (0)
Clarke (3)
Casey (2)
Molinari (2)
Gmac (3)
MAJ (0)
Poulter (3)

I am thinking maybe a sticky at the top listing all the board favourites not as good as Ricky.  More suggestions welcome. 


;)

[McLaren]

In other news the Americans were not the biggest losers from their wayward driving this week.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/golf/45714544

[kwinigolfer]

Mac,
You DO talk a load of b0ll0cks.

Rickie not only beat Rory in his own manor, RDC, in the Walker Cup, but came T2 in just his second Tour event as a pro (7th in his first). How can you therefore talk b0ll0cks about his game coming on Tour?

What did you know about DJ when he first came on Tour, just as a ferinstance??

Fleetwood is 27, as posted earlier, not 29 and I'm not going to waste anyone's time going over the number of events played by Europeans on the PGA Tour rather than Americans. (Not sure how you get 3 wins for Lee or DC though.)

Go back to your chequered flag and Man Utd shirt.

[NedB-H]

Mac why do you love to argue with yourself so much? Literally no one on this thread has said “Rickie isn’t good”. And we’ve all agreed that Europe also has some players who also don’t have as many Tour wins as maybe they should. You’re debating with thin air. We’ve also all said that Rickie’s two European Tour wins have to be considered too, which kind of weakens your Westwood (23) and Monty (31) arguments.

If you really think Fowler is a player of comparable class to Jiménez and Poulter then we can all happily agree he’s in the middle of a fine career. But the relevant point is that he’s always been built up by the golf media as much more than that, as a top five/top ten player in the world, an equal of Rory or Spieth.

Now either you disagree with the prevailing media view of Fowler’s level, in which case you won’t think he’s an underachiever, but you have to believe he’s overhyped. Or you agree with the journos who think it’s “DJ, Rory, Spieth, JT, Day and Fowler”. In which case, as we’ve shown, he’s clearly underachieved relative to those peers.

[NedB-H]

DC has two WGCs and a major that I guess count Kwini? LW won in the states in his first coming and again when he beat Karlsson in a playoff a few years back. Is his third the China WGC? That would have been back when the tour were messing around with the status of that event, and Westwood was messing around with his own status on tour, so god knows if it counts or not.

For what it’s worth Clarke could be a good role model for Fowler. Only had 4 European wins by his 30th birthday and went on to get two WGCs and a major. Westwood on the other hand had 14 Euro wins and one in the states by the time he was Rickie’s age.

[kwinigolfer]

Agreed with DC, forgot about The Open. Duh.

[NedB-H]

I’ve just double checked and Westie never won the China thing. I think I was thinking of the year him and Molinari lapped the field. My bad.

[GPB]

Westwood has two PGATour wins, New Orleans about 20 yrs and Memphis back in 2010. Both relatively weak PGATour events at the time.

A few vague references to it, but Rickie does have two Euro Tour wins, OWGR 50 and OWGR 52. OWGR 50 or better tournaments are rare for an uncosanctioned EuroTour events.*

If I counted correctly, Rickie has only played 8 (uncosanctioned) European Tour events, and won two of them, since he turned pro in 2010.

Rickie has also won the Players, which arguably has the strongest field in golf.

Abu Dhabi is the only event so far on the 2018 ET schedule rated 50 or higher. BMW PGA would have been rated 48 if it were not for flagship subsidy.

[McLaren]

You would have thought the tone and smiley would have made it obvious that was a joke.

[McLaren]

DJ and Koepka face off at after party.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2018/oct/01/patrick-reed-hits-out-at-jordan-spieth-and-jim-furyk-after-us-ryder-cup-defeat-golf

[McLaren]

https://nypost.com/2018/10/01/patrick-reed-is-so-full-of-s-t-us-ryder-cup-fight-explodes/amp/


Patrick full of Poopie apparently.


Looks like team usa were more divided than we thought.

[beninho]

Fowler has 8 pro wins. He has a good career already when compared to tge vast majority of pro golfers. Its all down to expectations if you think he has underachieved. He is good but there are better. He got hyped because he was young, flamboyant and talented doesn't mean he is going to be tge worlds greatest.

Brooks and Dj getting in each others faces at tge after party. Muust have been sonething said about dj being a shagger

[beninho]

I see the lady hit by koepka is considering legal action. Do you not sign a waiver when attending a tournament?

[Davie]

I'm sure there are waivers in place but they aren't always legally binding if there is evidence of negligence

I've just seen the shot again on TV though as I was writing this and there were clear shouts of "fore" from the tee so unless she can prove some kind of negligence on the part of the marshals she's probably just unlucky

[Diggers]

You’d imagine a fight between Brooks and DJ would be a very laconic affair, hard to see either getting overly riled up.

[super_realist]

Westwood has two PGATour wins, New Orleans about 20 yrs and Memphis back in 2010.  Both relatively weak PGATour events at the time.

A few vague references to it, but Rickie does have two Euro Tour wins, OWGR 50 and OWGR 52.  OWGR 50 or better tournaments are rare for an uncosanctioned EuroTour events.*

If I counted correctly, Rickie has only played 8 (uncosanctioned) European Tour events, and won two of them, since he turned pro in 2010.

Rickie has also won the Players, which arguably has the strongest field in golf.

Abu Dhabi is the only event so far on the 2018 ET schedule rated 50 or higher.  BMW PGA would have been rated 48 if it were not for flagship subsidy.

FFS, we're talking SPECIFICALLY about Fowler. He's underachieved for his hype/ability. I don't care about bringing in any other golfer into the equation for comparison, because it isn't relevant. They might well have underachieved too, but we're talking about Fowler, not them.

[pedro]

RC 2020 should be interesting.

Reed is blacklisted, Spieth has taken over the dressing room, and DJ and Koepka proved they could get their pulse over 40.

And with Strick as probable captain he will call for Woods and Mickelsons ‘leadership skills’ (!) to oil the waters.

[beninho]

https://www.sporcle.com/games/pancakes188/rydercupsquads

Bit of light relief, I got 82%.

[Diggers]

Westwood has two PGATour wins, New Orleans about 20 yrs and Memphis back in 2010.  Both relatively weak PGATour events at the time.

A few vague references to it, but Rickie does have two Euro Tour wins, OWGR 50 and OWGR 52.  OWGR 50 or better tournaments are rare for an uncosanctioned EuroTour events.*

If I counted correctly, Rickie has only played 8 (uncosanctioned) European Tour events, and won two of them, since he turned pro in 2010.

Rickie has also won the Players, which arguably has the strongest field in golf.

Abu Dhabi is the only event so far on the 2018 ET schedule rated 50 or higher.  BMW PGA would have been rated 48 if it were not for flagship subsidy.

FFS, we're talking SPECIFICALLY about Fowler. He's underachieved for his hype/ability. I don't care about bringing in any other golfer into the equation for comparison, because it isn't relevant. They might well have underachieved too, but we're talking about Fowler, not them.

Oh belt up, Super. Get off your high horse, you constantly make comparisons (as does everyone) in arguments to try and prove/disprove a point, don't suddenly tell people they can't do the same just because it suits your case not to.

[Guest]

I see the lady hit by koepka is considering legal action. Do you not sign a waiver when attending a tournament?

Only going down that route, because Koepka is not footing the bill for the medical costs? Shocking if he’s just ignored the situation. This would just play on my conscience, especially given the extent of the injury.

[Diggers]

I see the lady hit by koepka is considering legal action. Do you not sign a waiver when attending a tournament?

Only going down that route, because Koepka is not footing the bill for the medical costs? Shocking if he’s just ignored the situation. This would just play on my conscience, especially given the extent of the injury.

Agreed. Only doubt in my mind is that he's being told if he pays, he then has some form of ongoing liability from admitting culpability? Cant think of any other reason, the decent thing for a multi millionaire to do.

[kwinigolfer]

https://www.sporcle.com/games/pancakes188/rydercupsquads

Bit of light relief, I got 82%.

Very interesting ben, Thanks!

[raycastleunited]

https://www.sporcle.com/games/pancakes188/rydercupsquads

Bit of light relief, I got 82%.

haha good one Benny.

I struggled with the US team from 2006... guys I had never heard of (Brett Wetterick?), and then US teams before that.

[navyblueshorts]

Despite Bjorn’s horrible picks and pairings throughout, Europe have won. If only OwenOzzy was in charge this would’ve been done yesterday

[pedro]

https://www.sporcle.com/games/pancakes188/rydercupsquads

Bit of light relief, I got 82%.

haha good one Benny.

I struggled with the US team from 2006....

They also struggled with their own team....

[GPB]

Westwood has two PGATour wins, New Orleans about 20 yrs and Memphis back in 2010.  Both relatively weak PGATour events at the time.

A few vague references to it, but Rickie does have two Euro Tour wins, OWGR 50 and OWGR 52.  OWGR 50 or better tournaments are rare for an uncosanctioned EuroTour events.*

If I counted correctly, Rickie has only played 8 (uncosanctioned) European Tour events, and won two of them, since he turned pro in 2010.

Rickie has also won the Players, which arguably has the strongest field in golf.

Abu Dhabi is the only event so far on the 2018 ET schedule rated 50 or higher.  BMW PGA would have been rated 48 if it were not for flagship subsidy.

FFS, we're talking SPECIFICALLY about Fowler. He's underachieved for his hype/ability. I don't care about bringing in any other golfer into the equation for comparison, because it isn't relevant. They might well have underachieved too, but we're talking about Fowler, not them.

One sentence, and one sentence only talked about another golfer in this post. Someone above had said that Westy won 3 PGATour events. Westy has one two and I named them.

The rest of the post was about Rickie, and his accomplishments. In particular, his two wins on the EuroT out of 8 tries in uncosanctioned events. Both of them OWGR-50 (or above) events, commonplace on the PGATour, and very rare on the Europe.

I agree that Fowler has underachieved to his ability/profile. But IMO, "Hype" is a two way street. I mainly ignore it. Its not a guarantee, and if you think hype is guarantee, that is on you, not Rickie.

[navyblueshorts]

RC 2020 should be interesting.

Reed is blacklisted, Spieth has taken over the dressing room, and DJ and Koepka proved they could get their pulse over 40.

And with Strick as probable captain he will call for Woods and Mickelsons ‘leadership skills’ (!) to oil the waters.

[raycastleunited]

Despite Bjorn’s horrible picks and pairings throughout, Europe have won. If only OwenOzzy was in charge this would’ve been done yesterday

Funny how these random people appear and then disappear so quickly.

[navyblueshorts]

Re. RC - great result (if you're European); who saw that coming?? Certainly, not that many. Really pleased for Molinari (what a year he's had) and for Bjorn and his picks. Great venue and setup too. Need to back it up in two years time.

Team America - some excellent players, who for some reason, couldn't produce over the three days. Seems to have been a good atmosphere between the teams as well, which was great. Loved the Reed 'shush' at the end - he seems to get it, for all that he's clearly not an easy guy to get on with. The post-result recriminations (to put a positive spin on it) at least seems to suggest they take it hard and therefore care about the event. No idea what a fix would be, but not sure another 'Task Force' is it.

Fowler - overhyped? Maybe. Not his fault though. Think it's a matter of time until he wins a Major, and then he might win a bunch. Seem to recall Mickleson near missing quite a bit before he won one, and he's gone on to do all right (still an A-grade prat though). Fowler's clearly got the game.

[GPB]

https://www.sporcle.com/games/pancakes188/rydercupsquads

Bit of light relief, I got 82%.

Zack Johnson played in 2014 for the US Team
Zach Johnson played in 2006, 2010, 2012 and 2016

[Roller_Coaster]

You would have thought the tone and smiley would have made it obvious that was a joke.

I got it, unusually for me and your posts admittedly, but I did. I may even have chuckled!

[McLaren]

Roller

I most often fail to get this across but I try to post a large majority of my posts in a certain irreverent persona.

[pedro]

I try to post a large majority of my posts in a certain irreverent irrelevant persona.

Fixed it so it makes sense.

[kwinigolfer]

A number of reports now suggesting the barney involving DJ & Koepka began on the US Team flight from Atlanta to Paris. Nice touch; apparently Capt Furyk had to intervene.
Another report says they were also arguing on the Team bus which led Furyk to split up their pairing on the first day.
It seems their respective significant others were also involved, although with Dustin that could be multiples I'm sure.

Bombs bursting in air . . . . . . .

[super_realist]

The fake bonhomie of the US team is pretty apparent. From the stage managed photo of everyone in their shades coming off the plane, the writing was on the wall. I'm sure some of them are mates, but there's just too many egos on that "squad" (I can't call them a team)

You can tell the Euro's actually like one another, or at very least make the effort to get on during the event.

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