A Full Circle Moment for Keegan Bradley

In two thousand thirteen, when the PGA of America announced that the Ryder Cup was headed to Bethpage Black, Keegan Bradley was, to put it mildly, ecstatic. Not only was it easy for him to envision he might end up playing it — he was after all a major champion and one of the best Americans in the world — it was a place that felt personal. 

As a college golfer at nearby St. John’s, Bradley and his teammates would sneak onto the course on Mondays, parking behind the maintenance building near the third tee, and then they would have the course all to themselves. 

To play in a Bethpage Ryder Cup would feel like a full circle moment for him. He even had a captain in mind. His friend and mentor Phil Mickelson. 

That it played out SO differently, twelve years later, is a stark reminder that plans are written in pencil, but history gets written in ink.