Recapping the 2023 Ryder Cup

Well, that stunk. As we go about recapping the 2023 Ryder Cup, we will go over the winners and losers from 3 sun-drenched days in Italy that ended with the European team waltzing to a 16.5 – 11.5 victory at Marco Simeone Golf Club. They took home the entire first session of foursome matches and never looked back, leading wire-to-wire over a United States team that didn’t wake up until it was too late. Needless to say, my predictions could not have been worse. There was also some caddy and social media-fueled fireworks that added some spice to the weekend. Here are your 2023 Ryder Cup winners and losers:

Loser: Endless Commercial Breaks

Man, the NBC broadcast was just brutal. From the opening session, key moments were consistently being missed when NBC went constantly to commercial breaks. If I had to watch that ad where Tony Finau chips with a driver for no apparent reason one more time I might have thrown a remote at the TV. C’mon – there were literally 8 balls in play during alternate shot and we are missing key shots? How we don’t have a Red-Zone style Octobox for this once-every-two-year golf feast in 2023 I don’t know. Paul Azinger, a legendary former captain and major champion, was giving analysis that was either odd or just wrong the whole weekend. The “Playing Through” segments had the graphics partially cut off, so you couldn’t even tell who was hitting. The new scoreboard graphic took some deciphering to figure out what all the numbers meant. Blow it all up and start over, except for…

Winner: Ryder Cup Theme Song

Hot take time: this is the best theme song in golf and up there in all of sports. Better than the Masters or the US Open. At least NBC is smart enough to keep this beauty around Cup after Cup because its been getting the adrenaline pumping 24 years and counting.  

Winner: Holes 16-18

Just a perfect closing stretch for match-play. A driveable par 4 with water, bunkers, and thick rough on 16, a nervy par 3 where missing the green in any direction almost certainly means a lost hole on 17, and a reachable par 5 also with water, bunkers, and thick rough on 18. It’s a shame so few matches actually made it to those 3 holes.

Loser: Rickie Fowler

One match that did was the decider on Sunday: Rickie Fowler vs. Tommy Fleetwood. There was about a 15-minute stretch on Sunday, following Max Homa’s par for the ages on 18, where an American comeback looked realistic.

Needing to win every match left on the course, when Rickie Fowler stepped to the 16^th tee, he was 1 down to Fleetwood. Yet elsewhere, the remaining matches saw Justin Thomas 1 up on 18, Jordan Spieth was 1 up on the 16^th green against Shane Lowry, and Wyndham Clark had the momentum after clawing his way even with Bobby MacIntyre. I was starting to believe in the most improbable of comebacks. Even though Lowry holed out to win the hole and pull all-square, Spieth was playing better and the Americans were in favorable positions in 3 of the 4 matches needed to retain the Cup. It was all down to Slick Rick to pull off some magic.

Stepping up to the tee first with the chance to put the pressure on the Englishman, Fowler sliced it into the one place he couldn’t hit it: the pond on the right. Fleetwood took a ballsy line of his own, but put his shot on the green and it was all but over; Fowler ensured it was when he conceded the cup with Fleetwood still having to make a putt that looked to be about 18 inches – no gimme!

As a former competitive golfer who played more tournaments that I care to admit growing up, one thing that was always hammered into me in match play was never to concede the putt that beats you. I admire Rickie’s sportsmanship, but I don’t think it’s poor form at all to make Fleetwood finish out. Make him work for it a little!

Winner: Europe’s Big Three

In my preview, I surmised that Rory McIlroy, Jon Rahm, and Viktor Hovland would be key if Europe would pull this one out. Each of them delivered all weekend long. Combined, they played in a role in 11.5 points; the only matches they lost were Hovland and McIlroy in separate Saturday afternoon fourball matches. In singles, Luke Donald put them out in spots 1, 2, and 4 in order to halt an American charge, and Rahm pulled out a huge half point in his match while Hovland and McIlroy won key points to leave the Americans with no room for error.

McIlroy was the clear emotional leader of the group: his “fight” with Patrick Cantlay’s caddy Joe LaCava fired him and the rest of their team up even more. Rahm was unflappable no matter the stakes. As for Hovland, his partnership with our next winner led to one of the most shocking moments of the tournament.

Winner: Ludvig Aberg

Credit where it’s due: Captain Luke Donald was a genius picking this kid. Fresh out of college with zero major experience, it was thought Donald would maybe play him once before singles to get his feet wet, but would try to hide him as much as possible. Nope – Aberg went out early in the first session and brought some his A-game.

Yet it was on Saturday morning that Aberg, alongside Hovland, provided the most shocking (and devastating if you rock the Red, White, and Blue) beatdown in Ryder Cup history. Going up against 5-time major winner Brooks Koepka and #1 ranked Scottie Scheffler in foursomes, the Scandinavian duo put on a clinic the likes of which the Ryder Cup literally had never seen before. They took 8 out of the 10 holes they played, winning by a record score of 9&7. It was a complete evisceration; they took the opening hole and never left the Americans an opening. Scottie Scheffler was driven to tears it was so brutal. Although he fell victim to Koepka’s revenge tour on Sunday, Aberg did himself proud and contributed 2 points and earned a place in the record books along the way.

Losers: Americans in foursomes

For the last 30 or so years, the Europeans have an understanding of this format that just blows the Americans away. Is it the team spirit? Do they make fewer mistakes? I have no clue and the Americans don’t either. Luke Donald made a genius move to push these to first in the day, giving the Europeans that sweet momentum early, but even he surely couldn’t have predicted Friday morning. His team did not trail in any match at any point. The 4-0 lead the home side put up that morning would never be closed.

Counting Saturday as well, Europe went 7-1 in foursome matches; that’s the victory right there. My thoughts: America needs to find a way to spend one week just practicing this format in the buildup, especially when most of these guys had…

Loser: Five Week Breaks

9 of the 12 American team members hadn’t played a competitive round in five weeks building up to the Ryder Cup. Some R&R after a long season is surely deserved, but I also don’t doubt this led to the team coming out flatter than a tissue, which was something Scottie Scheffler needed come Saturday morning. It certainly wouldn’t have hurt to get some alternate-shot work in during that time!

Winner: Patrick Cantlay’s Hat-free Dome

Saturday evening saw the oddest rallying point of all time: Patrick Cantlay’s bare head. During the day, some jabroni from Sky Sports tweeted that Cantlay wasn’t wearing his uniform hat in protest of not getting paid to play. The crowd took that and ran with it, taunting the American by waving their hats around and mockingly tipping them at him. When Cantlay drained a clutch 40 foot putt to give his team a semblance of hope going into Sunday, the American team (and his caddy) responded by waving their own hats at the crowd.

Cantlay then explained he wasn’t wearing it because…it just didn’t fit his head.

Winner: Max freaking Homa

Speaking of clutch, how ‘bout Max Homa. His heroics at 18 on the final day will be a footnote in a blowout loss, but we cannot let them be forgotten. Needing to at least halve the hole with Matt Fitzpatrick to keep the American hopes alive, Homa sliced his second into some thicccc rough. He had was left facing a nearly impossible shot.

Here, he made a decision that was as ballsy as it was genius: rather than risk chunking it into the bunker or blading it into the water, he took an unplayable lie and bet on himself to get up and down from a decent lie. Giving himself a long but makeable par putt, Homa came up huge and stole victory from the jaws of defeat, giving the States another hour of hope with his win. One of the gutsiest pars you will ever see while carrying the hopes of an entire team (and nation) on his shoulders.

Loser: Zach Johnson in front of a microphone

Zach Johnson, two-time major winner and by all accounts a pretty respectable dude, struggled with the media all week. After the opening day beatdown, Johnson said that illness was running through his team. While he tried to backtrack and claim it wasn’t an excuse, it sure sounded like one.

During the second day, Johnson doubled down and said he wouldn’t change anything and that his team was the closest he had ever been a part of while his team was getting their booties handed to them. He seemed well-intentioned, but kept saying things at the worst time. It’s a shame this will be a large part of his golfing legacy.

In addition, he made some odd lineup choices: sending out Burns in the first match of the tournament, riding the struggling Spieth, Schauffele, and Scheffler too long, and sending out Scheffler, Morikawa, and Burns in the key singles matches early. Nothing was as wild as the hilarious train-wreck that was Woods/Mickelson playing alternate shot, but it didn’t seem to play to our strengths either.

Winner: Tommy Fleetwood

Going at the hole after Fowler put his ball in the water was either gutsy or stupid. He made sure it was the former with the most clutch drive of the week: driving the green in one and sticking the ball to inside 30 feet. Game, set, match.

FleetwoodMac is also the coolest partner nickname in a hot minute.

Loser: Nicolai Hojgaard

Hard to find a “loser” in camp Europe, but Hojgaard was the only one to not win a match; halving one and losing two including a singles match to a struggling Xander Schauffele. A good young talent who didn’t have the same impact Aberg did. He should be back though.

Loser: Away teams

I vote for a change to the hosting schedule: every third Ryder Cup should be played on neutral ground set up by an outside crew. Home teams tilting courses to suit their games has led to a lot of blowout recently; the last close one was in 2012, and even that featured a miracle comeback from Europe on Sunday. I think a totally neutral site every third Cup would add some sauce and prevent the Cup from becoming predictable.

Winner: Petty Drama

To my cousin who can’t stand the Ryder Cup, I ask you: are you not entertained? We had Hatgate, Rory fighting not one, but two different caddies, Shane Lowry acting as Rory’s bouncer, and fans hopping in ponds in addition to the usual chants, singing, clutch putts, wild drives, fist pumps, and atmosphere that feels more like a stadium sport than anything else in the game. The three best days in the sport; it’s a shame it’s so long from one to the next.

See you at Bethpage in 2025.