Things look a bit tough for the American Ryder Cup team as Captain Azinger is a week away from four picks. On the other side of the spectrum, Captain Faldo has a tough time making a choice with so many good people to consider.
American Ryder Cup race
by Sal Johnson
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For close to two years Azinger has been planning and plotting about this special weekend in September in Kentucky, with the purpose of bringing back the Ryder Cup to America for the first time in this millennium. He has gone through a lot of trouble to change the way we pick the team to even changing the format of play, all in the interest of bringing home the cup. But as the clock ticks down with just 24 days till the first match tees off there are some ugly storm clouds gathering around that could spoil all of Azinger's work.
Those clouds are in the form of hurricane Europe whose team looks primed and ready to go. Since the British Open just about everyone on the European Team has played well, with Padraig Harrington winning two majors, Sergio Garcia being runner-up at the PGA Championship and The Barclays. and Henrik Stenson finishing third last week. Even one of Europe's possible wild card picks, Darren Clarke, was a winner on Sunday in the Netherlands so their top players are red hot right now.
So how about captain Azinger's merry men? Since Tiger Woods stunned the world with his announcement that he wasn't going to be able to play again for the rest of the year, team America has turned into team "I'm-in-trouble" as the eight men that earned the top spots hasn't played very well this summer. Since the U.S. Open only three members of the team, Stewart Cink, Anthony Kim and Kenny Perry have visited the winners circle but since the British Open only one player have seen a top-three finish and that is Ben Curtis who was runner-up at the PGA Championship. With events like the British Open, WGC-Bridgestone, PGA Championship and the Barclays being played our eight studs that are looking to bring home the cup have recorded only ten, top-ten finishes in the above events. With both Kenny Perry and Anthony Kim cooling down after playing great at the start of the summer, Jim Mickelson having problems getting it out of first gear and Stewart Cink missing two cuts and having a best finish of T38th since winning the Travelers the signs are that the Ryder Cup could turn into another messy affair for Americans again.
Captain Azinger, who lobbied so hard for four wild card picks, may be struggling just to find four players that are playing deceit right now. A perfect example has to be Scott McCarron, when he finished 2nd at the Wyndham after a T5th at the RSB Canadian Open you would of thought that Azinger was thinking, here is a good pick. But what did McCarron do at The Barclays? You guess it, he missed the cut. As for Rocco Mediate who stunned the world by taking Tiger Woods 19 holes before succumbing, he has struggled since leading in the first round of the British Open. He has finished T19th in England, T52nd at Bridgestone, 72nd at the PGA Championship and missed the cut at The Barclays.
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Even Steve Stricker, who would of been on the team if they used the point totals a week before the PGA Championship is not playing that great. Yes he was T7th at the British Open but has been T43rd at the Bridgestone, T39th at the PGA Championship and T19th at Barclays despite leading after the second round.
So what is Azinger going to do? Obviously he doesn't have much of a choice, things are so bad that he can't even pick the hottest amateur in golf Danny Lee because he is a native of New Zealand. So could Azinger be thinking of going off the PGA Tour list of players? First he had Fred Funk who was second in the Senior Open and won the Jeld-Wen Tradition. But that thought got crushed when Funk finished T30th at the Boeing Classic.
So what about the Nationwide Tour? Azinger did say that if a player was hot on that tour he would consider taking him. That's not even a choice because the three hottest players on that tour are from Zimbabwe (Brendon DeJonge) and Australia (Jarrod Lyle & Greg Chalmers).
So it looks like captain Azinger is stuck. What do some of the "experts" of the media think? Bob Harig of ESPN thinks that Azinger should go with the best putters, guys like Steve Stricker or David Toms. Steve Elling who is always good with ideas basically could be as stuck as captain Azinger as in this blog on CBS Sportsline he tells us about some choices and how they aren't very pretty choices. Wish I could give you some more thoughts but in the last couple of months there have been more golf writers either reassigned, fired or taking their company buy-outs that the opinions have been about as low as the golf ratings have been on TV.
So what do I think? If I was Azinger I would go on vacation. On a more serious note the fact is that at 7pm on Monday, Azinger is going to have to make four choices. If it was me, I would go for Funk, Stricker, Mediate and David Toms, guys that have experience in tough situations and guys that you hope will remember those experiences and help the team.
Now to be honest, no matter what my European friends tell me about how bad they are going to wip our butts, I have that Ben Crenshaw funny feeling (remember that from the Saturday night before the finals in 1999) that possibly our team can pull it out. Yes there is 24 days before the matches and in those 24 days these players could make a turnaround and play great again. Honestly how many times have you seen perfect days the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of tournament week and then have a stormy Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. I just hope that all of this bad play is like rainy weather the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of tournament week with all of it blowing away and producing great weather for tournament days. Golf is a fickle sport and you never know what could happen. So for all American's rooting for captain Azinger and the boys, lets hope for some better weather for the three days of the Ryder Cup.
