O Captain! My Captain['s Picks]
Maybe our captain’s selections need to hear Robin Williams' Carpe Diem speech. The performance of the US Captain’s Selections has had a devastating impact on the outcome. Since 2002, they are a less than noteworthy 26-26-18. That’s a full point merely 37% of the time compared to Europe’s .508 win percentage at 30-19-10.
From 2008-2012, they went 17-14-10, a 41% success rate. Conveniently enough, those years we won one Ryder Cup and had two narrow losses. The pattern? Each of those years went with four captain’s picks.
But Watson’s infinite wisdom decided three was a magic number. Who doesn’t like the number three? Given the 2-5-2 showing from the 3 picks this year, I don’t like that number. In fact, if the next US Captain uses any number other than 3, I’ll post a video of me doing the Ickey Woods shuffle like I’m next in line to get cold cuts.
To compound the performance issues, has anyone noticed we pick our team before the most important late season event on the schedule? That’s right, we pick our team before the Tour Championship and the end of the FedEx Cup playoff race. It’s a brilliant idea! In fact, we should tell the MLB to make their MVP selections at the trade deadline. It makes total sense… Had Billy Horschel not been expecting the birth of his first child, the deadline for selecting team members would have left the hottest player on the planet off the team.
So now that our fearful trip is done, the ship comes home with object lost. Another Ryder Cup… Another loss. And I with mournful tread walk the deck my Captain[’s picks] lie, fallen cold and dead. Against insurmountable odds, may the [task] force be with us.