Rory McIlroy said he wouldn’t be a Ryder Cup playing captain.
More than once.
“No. It’s been mentioned and I’ve just said, ‘No way,’” he said last July at the Genesis Scottish Open. “It depends — what do you want? If you want to be the best captain you can be, you can’t play. And if you want to be the best player you can be, you can’t captain. It’s one or the other. Especially with how big the Ryder Cup has become and how many things you have to do in the lead-up to the event, the week of the event.”
Why the thought then? Just days earlier, Keegan Bradley had been named the U.S. captain for this year’s playing of the biennial event — and, at the least, he’d have to consider himself for the team, if he’d show good form over the following 13 months. And he has. Which led to a follow-up exchange between McIlroy and a reporter at this year’s Scottish Open.
It was this day last year we were discussing Keegan and the Ryder Cup captaincy and you [said] that it’s impossible in this era to be a playing captain. Now a year on, it looks quite likely it’s going to happen.
“Hopefully it is impossible,” McIlroy said before laughing.
Ahead of this week’s BMW Championship, he then unsurprisingly repeated himself. He again said he’d been asked to be a playing captain and that he turned the spot down. He again said you can’t do both.
But, in an answer to a follow-up question, he defined why Wednesday, with four reasons.
“I just think the commitments that a captain has the week of — you think about the extra media that a captain has to do,” McIlroy said.
How much exactly? Take just Bradley’s PGA Tour schedule this season. He’s played 20 events and has been interviewed by just print and online reporters 20 times. Then there are TV requests. And radio requests. And podcast requests. And Ryder Cup requests. Also, the extra press conferences the captain has to do during Ryder Cup week.
“You think about the extra meetings that the captains have to do with the vice captains, with the PGA of America,” McIlroy said.
How much exactly here? Listen to this Bradley quote from May at the PGA Championship.
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“I think the hardest thing for me has not been thinking of the Ryder Cup when I’m practicing or my day-to-day when I’m home with my family. It’s constantly on my mind of how we’re going to go about doing this, the best way to go about doing this, how to run a proper meeting last week. I think that’s been the biggest obstacle is shutting that part of my brain off, which is interesting because, when I get inside the ropes in a tournament, it’s really the only time I can do that.
“Sometimes for us golfers, being inside the ropes is actually a peaceful place. I’ve had that at times this year, but there’s definitely been times where I’ve been practicing, and a thought will come into my head and I’ve got to write it down and then I’m thinking about it, and that’s a distraction. But it hasn’t affected my preparation or anything like that.”
“In Keegan’s case, preparing your speech for the opening ceremony — just there’s a lot of things that people don’t see that the captain does the week of the Ryder Cup, especially now that the Ryder Cup has become so big,” McIlroy said.
Really? Consider the speech of European captain Luke Donald at the 2023 event in Italy — which drew applause after he opened it in Italian. (You can view it below.)
