I'm inside the temper for a rant approximately the Ryder Cup, much like each person else. But let's accept it -- a majority of these critiques are not anything but reviews. Is there a few manner to make my rant convey a bit extra weight?
Ah yes, I have it. I'll run another Ryder Cup -- no, wait, TWO more Ryder Cups -- to prove my point!
I know, that sounds silly... However I assume I can make it paintings. Okay, here are the floor regulations:
We have the results of each single suit that became played at Gleneagles -- in fact, you may find them right here. All you need to do is click on the little "details" button below every healthy to peer the scorecards. Of path, I doubt that maximum of you will take the time to click on on each of these little buttons to see each person scorecard...
But I did. And I came up with a way to use these scorecards to stage two more Ryder Cups. In the table below you'll see every match for all three days listed down the right side. Then there are three more columns, each one representing one of my Ryder Cups:
- Actual Results are what really happened.
- US Bogey-Free is my first test match-up. I simply replaced every US score (on every hole, on every scorecard) that was a bogey or Worse with a par -- Euro scores remained the same -- and then recalculated the results to see who won.
- Europe Birdie-Free is just for comparison to give me an extreme. I replaced every European score (again, on every hole, on every scorecard) that was a birdie or higher with a par -- US scores remained the same -- and then recalculated the results to see who won.
The Other Info column simply tells you if there were holes that didn't get played. (There were a couple of matches that didn't go the full number but my recalculations showed that those holes would never have been played in any case, so I didn't note the extra holes there.)
The results should be mostly self-explanatory -- eu5&4 means Europe won 5&4 while us1up means the US won 1up. If there are extra holes listed in the Other Info column, I had to make some guesses. Out of fairness, I assumed matches that were dormie or all square (as) were halved, and other matches were awarded to the leader at the last hole that was played -- if Europe was 1 up and there were 3 holes left unplayed, Europe wins the match.
All point totals list the US first, then Europe. I'll have my conclusions after the table.
| Match-ups | Actual Results | US |
Bogey-Free Europe
Birdie-Free Other
Info Rose / Stenson
Watson / Simpson eu5&4 eu3up as 4 to play Bjorn / Kaymer
Fowler / Walker halve us1up us4&2
Gallacher / Poulter
Spieth / Reed us5&4 us6&5 us6&5
Garcia / McIlroy
Bradley / Mickelson us1up us3&2 us2up
Friday Morning
Fourball Totals 2.5-1.5 3-1 3.5-.5
Donaldson / Westwood
Furyk / Kuchar eu2up halve us1up
Rose / Stenson
Mahan / Johnson eu2&1 us1up us1up
McIlroy / Garcia
Fowler / Walker halve us4&3 us3&2
Dubuisson / McDowell
Bradley / Mickelson eu3&2 us1up as 2 to play Friday Afternoon
Foursome Totals .5-3.5 3.5-.5 3.5-.5
Rose / Stenson
Watson / Kuchar eu3&2 eudorm as 2 to play Donaldson / Westwood
Furyk / Mahan us4&3 us4&3 us4&3
Bjorn / Kaymer
Spieth / Reed us5&3 us5&3 us6&5
McIlroy / Poulter
Fowler / Walker halve halve us5&4
Saturday Morning
Fourball Totals 2.5-1.5 3-1 3.5-.5
Donaldson / Westwood
Johnson / Kuchar eu2&1 as us2&1 1 to play Garcia / McIlroy
Furyk / Mahan eu3&2 eu1up eudorm 2 to play Kaymer / Rose
Spieth / Reed halve us5&4 us2&1
Dubuisson / McDowell
Fowler / Walker eu5&4 eu2up eu3up 4 to play Saturday Afternoon
Fourball Totals .5-3.5 1.5-2.5 2.5-1.5
McDowell
Spieth eu2&1 us1up eu1up 1 to play Stenson
Reed us1up us3up us2up
McIlroy
Fowler eu5&4 eu5&4 as 4 to play Rose
Mahan halve halve us5&4
Gallacher
Mickelson us3&1 us3&1 us4&3
Kaymer
Watson eu4&2 eudorm us1up 2 to play Bjorn
Kuchar us4&3 us5&3 us5&3
Garcia
Furyk eu1up halve us4&2
Poulter
Simpson halve us3&1 us2&1
Donaldson
Bradley eu4&3 eu3up eu1up 3 to play Westwood
Walker us3&2 us3&2 usdorm 2 to play Dubuisson
Johnson halved us2&1 us3&1
Sunday
Singles Totals 5.5-6.5 8-4 9-3
Final Points Totals
US-Europe 11.5-16.5 19-9 22-6
This table hints at some very interesting things. Let's compare the Actual Results with those of the hypothetical Bogey-Free US Team.
- First of all, the Fourball sessions aren't much different between the two. The BF team is slightly higher but not enough to make a stink over. In fact, many of the matches turn out exactly the same. Clearly the US Team didn't struggle in fourballs.
- But that certainly isn't the case in foursomes. In the actual matches the US won 1 out of 8 points. If they had merely eliminated the bogeys they would have won 5 of the 8 available points! You do realize that fourballs used to be a strength of the US team, don't you?
- Here's something you may not have noticed immediately. While the US Team's scores in fourballs are nearly the same, that's not the case when you compare the Singles results. But they're playing their own balls in both cases. What gives? Simple -- more bogeys start slipping through.
But perhaps the most striking thing to me is the comparison between the Bogey-Free US Team and the Birdie-Free Euro Team. Do you understand what I did? I created a Euro Team that was so bad that they couldn't make a single birdie on any hole in three days! And yet my rigged scores show that the US Team wouldn't have beaten that straw team much Worse with their actual scores than they would have beaten the actual Euro Team if they had just avoided making so many bogeys.
In fact, there are a few matches where the no-birdie Euro Team (vs actual US scores) actually got higher results than the no-bogey US Team (vs actual Euro scores). Consider the McDowell / Spieth singles match or the Spieth / Reed / Kaymer / Rose foursome on Saturday, for instance. The reason is simple. There were too many holes where replacing a Euro birdie with a par was still good enough to beat the US players' actual score. It's ALWAYS higher to make par than to depend on your opponent screwing up!
David Feherty probably said it best. "It wouldn't have mattered if you sent them out paired by height. The Europeans just played higher."
I think I've made my point. You want a winning system? MAKE PARS, NOT BOGEYS! That's a system that would have an immediate effect!
I'll take a little time tomorrow to rant about what I think should be done.
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