Justin Leonard talks Presidents Cup, behind the scenes, organization

“He had a vision of how he wanted things to go,” Justin Leonard said about Jim Furyk. “If we could relieve him of some things, whether it was interviews during the week, those kind of things.”

They also were charged with keeping tabs on certain players.

“I have a good relationship with Keegan Bradley, and I thought, you know what, I told him (Furyk), I think that when he goes out, it would be pretty natural for me to be with him,” Leonard explained.

One important thing for the team and captains was consistency in communicating with the players.

“We want them to be comfortable,” Leonard added. “If they keep seeing different faces, for some players that's going to make a difference in how they perform, so we wanted to try and keep things as consistent as possible.”  

On Sunday, Justin Leonard went out with the first couple of matches

When those were done, he dropped back. 

Leonard gave some insight about what exactly the stats people do. He admitted that he did not understand their function until he saw it in action.

“They're analyzing all the strokes gained data and everything over the course of the last year and then more specifically this year. They can see trends in players' games,” Leonard explained.

What the stats group created was a better guesstimate about how the players would perform at Royal Montreal based on their games. The stats team then suggested pairings based on that, but those suggestions were not always utilized.  In some instances, the differences in golf balls, player to player, were too different for them to adjust to, so even though it seemed that they might play well together, the ball factor eliminated partnerships.

One example of the ball issue at past team events was finding someone who could play Tiger Woods’ ball successfully. In the end, it came down to Jim Furyk and Steve Stricker. Woods, many will recall, used a very soft ball compared to those used by most players at the time.  

In addition to equipment considerations, there was the task of juggling and meshing personalities.

“I went into it very skeptical as far as the whole stats thing, as far as getting our pairings from that,” Leonard said. “As the time went on, like the week even, I started to really warm up to the idea, and then after spending the week with these guys, I understand.”

He credited the stats crew as one of the reasons the US team won.

As far as Furyk’s captaining skills, Leonard was impressed.

"Jim and Tab both had a real clear vision of how they wanted the week to go,” he added. “As with anything when you're dealing with 12 individuals and you're playing against 12 other great players, some different things can get thrown your way. But I felt like we really stayed on point throughout the whole week, and that's thanks to Jim”

Furyk, according to Leonard, is extremely detail-oriented. This is coming from a guy who at one time organized his sock drawer by color. A guy who Brad Faxon called the most organized person in the world, who probably vacuums in straight lines every time. But as organizers know, getting the details taken care of frees up the mind to take on the other tasks.

Regardless of who is the most detail-oriented of the group, the whole experience of being a captain’s assistant was so positive that Justin Leonard said he would embrace being a captain in the future if he was offered the role.  

“I would love to,” he said emphatically. “If it's offered to me. I would gladly accept.”