OWINGS MILLS, Md. — A decision looms.
Keegan Bradley contends it is not an easy one. An answer to the question still forthcoming.
He hears the chatter about how he is one of the 12 best American players and that he should be on his own Ryder Cup team. Or that the demands of a modern day captaincy are too great to take on playing as well.
There’s not much Bradley hasn’t considered or vetted at this point as the Ryder Cup is now six weeks away.
This week’s BMW Championship is the last qualifying event for the U.S. team, and the six at-large picks will land after next week’s Tour Championship. Bradley says there is still much to contemplate.
“I certainly have a lot of concerns, as well as everybody else, but I have the most incredible vice captains, including Jim Furyk, who's been on these teams and been captain a bunch of times,” Bradley said Wednesday at Caves Valley, site of the BMW Championship which begins Thursday. “Quite frankly, I've been leaning on them more than any other captain ever anyways, even if I'm not playing.
“We're ready for this if it happens. I'm not sure it's going to. I can truly sit here right now and say I don't know what's going to happen. I have to look at myself just like any other player trying to make the team. I'm 10th in points right now, and that's not sixth.”
Bradley long maintained that he would only play if he earned one of the six automatic spots. But after winning the Travelers Championship in June, he admitted that it changed the dynamics.
Although he’s cooled off recently, Bradley has had a strong year. He is ranked 12th in the Official World Golf Ranking and 10th in Ryder Cup points.
The top six as of now: Scottie Scheffler, J.J. Spaun, Xander Schauffele, Russell Henley Bryson DeChambeau and Harris English. Justin Thomas and Collin Morikawa are generally considered to be good bets to be picked if they don’t move up this week.
That leaves at least eight players for four spots: Ben Griffin, Bradley, Maverick McNealy, Andrew Novak, Brian Harman, Cam Young, Patrick Cantlay and Sam Burns are next on the list.
“Things are definitely getting more difficult, but it is for everybody on the list of the Ryder Cup,” Bradley said. “This is when you really start to—you know, when you're trying to get a pick or trying to play your way on the team, you feel like every round's Q-School. It's not just difficult for me; it's difficult for everybody that's trying to make this team.
“I feel for them. I know what it's like. I know people try to act like they're O.K., but they're nervous every round, and that's the way it should be.”
Bradley would become the first playing captain since Arnold Palmer in 1963. After that U.S. victory, the PGA of America changed the rules to prohibit a captain from playing, according to the Associated Press. It then changed the rules again in 1982, although the only time it became a possibility was a year later when Jack Nicklaus would have automatically earned a spot on the team he was to captain if he'd won won the PGA Championship— but he finished second to Hal Sutton.
As time as gone on, the idea of doing both roles has been viewed as too problematic. Rory McIlroy said here Wednesday that he has already turned down the potential opportunity to do both roles in 2027 when the Ryder Cup is played in Ireland.
“The idea of me being a playing captain sometime soon coming up has come up, and I've shot it down straight away,” McIlroy said. “Because I don’t think you can do it.”
Asked to elaborate, McIlroy said: “I just think the commitments that a captain has the week of—you think about the extra media that a captain has to do, you think about the extra meetings that the captains have to do with the vice captains, with the PGA of America, in Keegan's case, preparing your speech for the opening ceremony—just there's a lot of things that people don't see that the captain does the week of the Ryder Cup, especially now that the Ryder Cup has become so big.
“If you'd have said it 20 years ago, I'd say, yeah, it was probably possible to do, but how big of a spectacle and everything that's on the line in a Ryder Cup now, I just think it would be a very difficult position to be in. So I just think for those reasons.
“Then the captain isn't going to be on the course all day, so really the captain's only going to be able to play one session on Friday, one session on Saturday. Would you rather not have a player that has the flexibility to go twice if he's playing well? There's a lot of different things that go into it, and that's why I think—look, it's just my opinion, but I think it would just be very difficult to do.”
And yet asked about Bradley’s viability as a player, McIlroy didn’t hesitate.
“I definitely think he's one of the best 12 American players right now,” McIlroy said. “That's why everyone is so interested and it's such a compelling case, and it's going to be—I'm just as interested as everyone else to see how it all plays out.”
Bradley seems to have the blessing of other players. Cantlay, for one, said if he were Bradley, he’d pick Bradley. So did Rickie Fowler.
“I think it would be hard to find really any or many Americans that would argue that point. We'll see,” Fowler said. “I know he's maybe getting to the area of the 10, 11 number on points of where he may think, like, is this a spot where I should not pick myself. I feel like a lot of times there's really only one or two that maybe fluctuate based off of people that were maybe inside the top 12 on points that maybe don't get picked.
“Like I said, I don't think you're going to find any or many Americans that are going to argue that he shouldn't be on the team.”
Bradley had not tried to argue for his inclusion, rather saying he wants the input of all of his assistants and players. He also said that McIlroy’s comments are fair.
“He might be right. We don't know. No one knows,” Bradley said. “Like everybody's telling me to start the year that a player can't be captain and have a good year. For me, I feel like this is one of my best years that I've ever had.
“One of the strangest things, what I've done throughout my entire career is really lean on other people for advice and calling people and asking them, how do you prepare for a major? What do you do with the last tee time? How do you deal with the media? How do you deal with corporate obligations? In this instance, there's no one to call. So nobody knows how this could work.”
Bradley clearly has a plan for it. Furyk, who was the captain at last year’s Presidents Cup and also at the 2018 Ryder Cup, as well as a vice captain in 2016 and 2021, has plenty of experience in team rooms. He also played on nine U.S. Ryder Cup teams and seven U.S. Presidents Cup teams.
Undoubtedly, some captain’s duties would be handed over to Furyk, whom Bradley has cited numerous times as someone he has leaned on.
“Thinking a lot more about it now,” Bradley said. “I'm laying in bed thinking about golf balls that the guys play, thinking about pairings, certainly amped up. I'm really proud of the way I've been able to get inside the ropes and be a player this year. I didn't know how this was going to go. No one knew how this was going to go. I think most people thought I was going to have a horrible year.
“But that's one of the things I'm most proud of. I'm proud that I won Hartford, but I'm also really proud to have been able to perform inside the ropes with everything going on. There's no reason why I can't continue to do that these next two weeks. We've got a lot on the line, and I hope to continue.”
This article was originally published on www.si.com as Keegan Bradley's Ryder Cup Decision Is Only Getting More Difficult.
