FARMINGDALE, N.Y. — The opening day of the Ryder Cup is in the books at Bethpage Black, with Europe grabbing a 5 ½ to 2 ½ lead. We call ’em like we see ’em around here. They are:
Ryder Cup Day 1 Winners
Jon Rahm: Won in the morning with proven Ryder Cupper Tyrrell Hatton and in the afternoon with rookie Sepp Straka. Lost a grand total of two holes between the two matches. He’s 8-1-3 in his last dozen matches dating to a win over Tiger Woods in Paris in 2018 and looks like a Man of the Match candidate, along with …
Rory McIlroy: Romped in the morning with his mate Tommy Fleetwood and gutted out an afternoon half-point with his best mate Shane Lowry. He’s two days away from bookending his green jacket season with a road Ryder Cup and it’s awfully hard right now to expect anything different.
Patrick Cantlay: Saved America’s bacon by flipping his morning match with three back-nine birdies, then battling McIlroy and Lowry almost single-handedly in the afternoon to a half-point that could loom large Sunday afternoon.
Matt Fitzpatrick: The Englishman needed three Ryder Cups to win his first point, he needed about three hours Friday morning to win his second. He and Ludvig Aberg were the longest shots on the board to win in foursomes yet never trailed in a 5-and-3 rout. Fitzy then got the afternoon off.
Cameron Young: Went out in the afternoon session and rang up three birdies on the front nine, reinvigorating his partner Justin Thomas in the process and setting up a stress-free victory. But why wasn’t a guy with so much course knowledge playing in the morning?
Ryder Cup Day 1 Losers
Collin Morikawa and Harris English: Considered by some to be the last man on the U.S. roster, Morikawa didn’t do much to dispel critics while getting boat-raced alongside an equally feeble Harris English. It’s possible we don’t see either guy again until Sunday.
Scottie Scheffler: Became the third No. 1 in Ryder Cup history, after Ian Woosnam (1991) and Tiger Woods (1999, 2001) to lose two matches on the opening day. That sound you hear ripping through the U.S. team room is a big, collective “Yikes.”
Bryson DeChambeau: Seems genetically engineered for the Ryder Cup, but didn’t mesh with Thomas in the morning and couldn’t quite carry rookie Ben Griffin over the line in the afternoon, capped by missing the green on the 400-yard 18th with his second shot.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Ryder Cup Day 1 Winners and Losers: Scheffler and DeChambeau Get Shut Out.
