Point 3 needs to be a cover sheet for ticket packages moving forward. Along with a note that if your seen with poor behavior we will share you're information with Augusta to make sure you never get Masters tickets.

"You have become so desensitized by the internet and the fake life you live inside your phone that it would take years of therapy just to reset you to your factory settings. " This nailed it, sadly it's not just a Ryder Cup problem, it's a cultural and societal problem. People live on their phones and no longer in communities with personal connections. They see no difference between calling McIlroy a slur on twitter and yelling it out at the Ryder Cup.

Great piece, KVV. You nailed all three.

My guess is the US team looked at historic Ryder Cup data and didn't look at current team stats+historic Bethpage data. Extrapolating from 2016 and 2020 was very different teams and courses. Always have to ask the question before any analysis: What is the data generating process? And seems they forgot here

Wish I hadn’t made this exact same trip solo in March 2025 following the Broomsedge event! Anyone who attends is certainly in for a treat.

If the US wants to take the Ryder Cup seriously they need to approach this like a baseball front office (Andy said something similar on the Pod). You need a GM/President of Golf Ops who eat/sleeps/breathes this all the time. "Reporting" to them is setup team, data team and captain. And the captains main job is manage the players/lockeroom and communication. Not to be a great golfer who just so happens to also get at all this other stuff right. Truly what are the chances of that? And a key part of this organization is having people that can synthesize the analytics, parse out what is important for the players to know (and not to know) and get them to buy in and believe it puts them in the best position to succeed. Years ago the Padres hired Dave Cameron, editor of Fangraphs, to work for them. Not because he was some data scientist savant. But because he knew how to translate complex data topics into what matters and communicate that to the masses. They wanted that skill but to translate it to their players and coaches. Communication of the data is just as important as getting the data "right".

It sounds like Scouts works directly with the team to some extent. I found it surprising that the PGA of America doesn't have an internal data team/role for someone that understands golf and the data to work with Scouts to pull the right insights. I'm sure we'll never see it, but it'd be interesting to see what data and analytics they provide and the conclusions they drew.

You hit the nail on the head with the couple of paragraphs about trust. The European team trusts and knows that they are going to be put in a position to succeed and all they need to do is to focus on performing. I think it's very clear that the US team does not feel the same way and that they need to do more than simply play golf. If caddies are making on the fly suggestions about who should tee off on which hole, it shows a complete breakdown of that trust. And rightfully so, if the US team is going to be honest about it. Golf is a high variance sport - not unlike baseball. The players have to play and win the match or game. But captains/managers and data boys need to be putting the math in their player's favor as much as possible. The moment the players start thinking about the math and data while they're supposed to be playing is the moment they become incapable of playing at their highest level.

Man it's good to be reading your work again, KVV. Appreciate the entire FEGC team calling out everyone with a hand in this debacle.

To point 3, I agree. From a financial point of view, this event was a win for the Ryder Cup and team U.S.A. So why does it really matter if we win or not? To point 2, I think what Wagner said about the President's Cup was spot on. I think U.S.A players get fatigued by doing this type of event every year, while team Europe only has to focus on this event. I'm not going to repeat everything he said, but what you stated ties into that broader picture.