The Presidents Cup is a match between the United States and the rest of the World minus Europe – Europe competes against the US in a similar tournament called “The Ryder Cup.” Every two years the Presidents Cup is held; the formidable U.S. team takes on the rest of the world in 4 days of team competitive golf. The host alternates between the U.S. and somewhere else in the world, for example, South Africa or Australia. The most recent was played at Liberty National just outside New York City. The format has gone through some changes over the years but has recently stayed with the following: Day 1: 5 foursomes; Day 2: 5 fourballs; Day 3: 4 foursomes in the morning and 4 fourballs in the afternoon; Day 4: 12 singles matches. A total of 30 points are up for grabs and to win, a team must win more than 15.5 points. Each round is in the match-play format, meaning that players are allowed to concede holes if they know they are going to lose because each hole is only worth one point, and for ties, no one gets the point (versus stroke-play where you can go down by multiple strokes if you have a bad hole). For those of you unfamiliar with the terms “foursome” and “fourball”, “foursome” refers to alternate shot style of play whereas each team of two only hits one ball; “fourball” alternatively, is more colloquially called “better ball” where each player gets to play his own ball and then the best score of the two is taken.
Golf, as we all know, is an individual sport. There’s no one to blame but yourself, and the glory is all yours when you succeed. In that way, it’s both the most rewarding and frustrating sport in the world. The Presidents Cup gives players the chance to play in the team environment – there’s camaraderie, shit-talking, and a general rowdiness that is often frowned upon in golf. Golfers are often foaming at the mouth for the chance to be able to participate in one of these Cups – both because it’s a great honor and it’s a whole lot of fun. Whereas usually fans are encouraged to be polite and quiet, these tournaments often provide golf fans with that oh-so-rare chance to pretend like we’re at a rowdy hockey game. People dress up, the fanatics come out – it’s a great time and often winds up with players from the away country calling their opposing fans inappropriate and discourteous. (This is mostly the case with the American fans, of course.) It’s given us some of the best moments in the sport’s long history.
This week, USA captain Tiger Woods and International captain Ernie Els will make the remaining picks for the two teams. Els is scheduled to announce on Wednesday November 6th at 9pm ET while Woods is scheduled to announce on Thursday November 7th at 7pm ET. We have some thoughts on who we think should represent both our team and the Internationals, and are excited to see what Els and Woods will do. The USA traditionally murders the International team during the Presidents Cup and I’m looking forward to that hopefully happening again this year. The Presidents Cup is being held at Royal Melbourne in Australia the week of December 9th.
This will not be the first time Ernie and Tiger face off in the Presidents Cup. In 2003, back when the rules of the Cup stated that there must be a winner – no ties allowed, Tiger and Ernie were pre-selected by their Captains Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player, to be the two to face-off in a sudden death playoff for glory. That year, the Cup was held at the Links Course at Fancourt Hotel and Country Club in South Africa, Els’ home country. At the time, Tiger was number 1 in the World and Ernie was number 3. That year, Els had won four points for the Internationals going 4-1-0 where Tiger won 3 points going 3-2-0. The two were poised to have an epic duel to the finish and they more than delivered – three playoff holes were played with each player making clutch putt after clutch putt. In a confusing decision, it was determined to be too dark after those three holes and the teams tied in the end anyway. With more than a little unfinished business between the two greats, it will be cool to see them face off again, this time as captains (although we all predict Tiger will be playing as well).
Now, let’s get into who we know will already be representing the United States and the Internationals. As a reminder, the rules of who takes the initial 8 spots on each team are slightly different. To qualify for Team USA, the eight American PGA TOUR members who have earned the most FedExCup points from 2017 BMW Championship (9/11/17) through the 2019 BMW Championship will qualify. Points are weighted in two different ways as follows: (1) 2017 BMW Championship through 2018 TOUR Championship: 1 FedexCup point = 1 point; (2) First event of the 2018-2019 season through 2019 BMW Championship: 1 FedexCup point = 2 points. To qualify for the International team, the top 8 players (excluding those eligible for the European Ryder Cup) are determined based on Official World Golf Ranking points accumulated in the time period from the 2018 Dell Technologies Championship (8/27/18) through the 2019 BMW Championship. Each captain then gets to make their four picks.
Current Rosters:
*World Ranking as of 11/4/2019
USA:
Team Captain: Tiger Woods
Assistant Captains: Fred Couples, Zach Johnson, Steve Stricker
Roster:
- Brooks Koepka (8,310)
- World Rank: 1
- PGA Tour Wins: 7
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 2017 (2-2-0)
- Justin Thomas (6,949)
- World Rank: 4
- PGA Tour Wins: 10
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 2017 (3-1-1)
- Dustin Johnson (6,643)
- World Rank: 3
- PGA Tour Wins: 20
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 2011, 2015, 2017 (8-4-2)
- Patrick Cantlay (5,898)
- World Rank: 6
- PGA Tour Wins: 2
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 0
- Xander Schauffele (5,753)
- World Rank: 9
- PGA Tour Wins: 4
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 0
- Webb Simpson (5,532)
- World Rank: 11
- PGA Tour Wins: 5
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 2011, 2013 (5-3-2)
- Matt Kuchar (5,520)
- World Rank: 22
- PGA Tour Wins: 9
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 2011, 2013, 2015, 2017 (6-8-2)
- Bryson DeChambeau (5,341)
- World Rank: 10
- PGA Tour Wins: 5
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 0
Europe:
Team Captain: Ernie Els
Assistant Captains: KJ Choi, Trevor Immelman, Geoff Ogilvy, Mike Weir
Roster:
- Marc Leishman – Australia (192.94)
- World Rank: 27
- PGA Tour Wins: 4
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 2013, 2015 and 2017 (3-7-3 record)
- Hideki Matsuyama – Japan (187.11)
- World Rank: 20
- PGA Tour Wins: 5
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 2013, 2015, 2017 (4-6-3)
- Louis Oosthuizen – South Africa (184.68)
- World Rank: 23
- PGA Tour Wins: 1
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 2013, 2015, 2017 (7-5-3)
- Adam Scott – Australia (180.30)
- World Rank: 17
- PGA Tour Wins: 13
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 2003, 2005, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2013, 2015, 2017 (14-20-5)
- Abraham Ancer – Mexico (160.39)
- World Rank: 35
- PGA Tour Wins: 0
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 0
- Haotong Li – China (128.63)
- World Rank: 61
- PGA Tour Wins: 0
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 0
- C.T. Pan – Taiwan (125.77)
- World Rank: 62
- PGA Tour Wins: 0
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 0
- Cameron Smith – Australia (124.17)
- World Rank: 49
- PGA Tour Wins: 0
- Presidents Cup Appearances: 0
Yikes just looking at the initial lists it already looks unfair… but that’s how the Presidents Cup has gone the last few years. Matt Kuchar represents the only American in the 8 who qualified who is not in the top 20 in the World Rankings as of this week – and even then he was only pushed out just this week by Hideki Matsuyama whose T11 finish at the WGC-HSBC Championship pushed him up from 22nd to 20th. The Internationals by contrast only have two representatives in the top 20; Scott and Matsuyama. Tomorrow, OFD will be diving deep into some of the candidates for the US Captain’s picks and on Wednesday, we’ll analyze the International Captain’s pick candidates.
