Internationals Have Great Chance to Win Presidents Cup
Let’s face it, the International Team has been beleaguered at the Presidents Cup. In the ten playings of the event, the Internationals have won just once and tied once with the US in a bizarre ending in South Africa. The Internationals have been a little like Charlie Brown trying to kick the football, which is difficult to understand because their team has had many great players.
But this time around, there are some important changes that can work to the Internationals’ advantage, starting with the format change. If the Internationals are smart, they will take a page out of the European Team’s Ryder Cup playbook and strategize around their best players instead of playing everyone more often, now that they don’t have to.
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In the recent past, Presidents Cup had six matches on day one, six on day two, plus five morning and five afternoon matches on day three, and 12 singles matches on Sunday. There were also years when it was five matches each of the first two days, 10 matches on the third day and 12 singles matches. No matter how you slice that, it’s a lot of golf played by most of the players on the team. Now there are only five matches on the first two days, eight matches total on the third day and the 12 singles.
With the previous formats, more players had to play more matches, even if someone was playing poorly. Now, it’s possible to hide a guy, like the Europeans did in Ryder Cup matches when their teams were not as strong, top-to-bottom, as the U.S.
With one less match on Thursday and Friday, and two less on Saturday, it gives the Internationals a better chance to lean on their stronger players just as the European Team does. If a guy is not playing well, he can be kept out of the lineup. Hidden, for lack of a better term. However, no one can be kept out of the lineup until Sunday. All players must participate in two of the first four sessions, so a guy with a problem game can’t become invisible until singles. In the past, all players had to play a minimum of three matches.
The European Ryder Cup teams have been masters of match strategy. They have successfully relied on their best players to play every match, sitting those lesser skilled or lower ranked players more often. For example, Seve Ballesteros, Bernhard Langer, Sandy Lyle, Nick Faldo, Ian Woosnam and later Colin Montgomerie knew they were expected to play every match no matter what, and they were expected to win their matches, or worst case, halve it. Today, based on current world rankings, Rory McIlroy, Henrik Stenson, Justin Rose, Sergio Garcia and Martin Kaymer would be expected to play every match.
Europeans also famously paired their strongest players with their least experienced, such as the recent duo of Graeme McDowell with Victor Dubuisson. The most famous one of these was the first pairing of Jose Maria Olazabal with Seve Ballerteros in 1987 at Muirfield Village. Ballesteros supposedly told Olazabal not to worry, to play his own game and Ballesteros would do the rest. He wasn’t kidding. After that, Olazabal was his partner. They went on to have the most successful record as a team in Ryder Cup history.
The challenge for Europe used to come with singles play when the bottom of the European Team faced the bottom of the U.S. team. Thirty-five years ago, Europe was not as strong in the 8th-12th position as the U.S. However, as the European Tour gained in strength, and as their lower ranked players came up in skill, victory was theirs again and again.
This week, the Internationals need a minimum of five players who never sit a match out. They need to be the stand up and take charge guys. The most obvious are Jason Day, Adam Scott (even though he has not had a great year), Danny Lee, Sang Moon Bae and Hideki Matsuyama. In addition, the only time Louie Oosthuizen should get a break is if his back needs a rest. So that’s six strong players, all of whom are PGA Tour winners and three of whom are major champions. Those should be the war horses for the International Team. For the Internationals to win, they must play and must play hard and win.
There is one other format change this time, and it is not yet possible to determine what affect it will have on the outcome. Matches that are tied at the 18th hole are halved. There is no playoff for the point. If nothing else, it keeps players from being overly tired and eliminates the kerfuffle of the South African Presidents Cup when the match was tied and Tiger Woods and Ernie Els were sent out for a playoff and it got too dark to finish. Hopefully having the match decided at the 18th will eliminate that kind of situation from all future Presidents Cups.