Tiger Woods thinks “there’s too much at stake to think about a Ryder Cup.”
The PGA Tour has reached a critical juncture and Woods, a new addition to the circuit’s Policy Board, has stressed that he is too focused on finalising a deal with LIV Golf’s Saudi backers to start plotting revenge on the Europeans at Bethpage in 2025.
But while the Team USA captaincy seat remains unfilled and Woods remains coy, speculation will only intensify over his potential involvement.
Phil Mickelson has ruled himself out of the captaincy running on the grounds he is a “very divisive character”, while former vice-captain Stewart Cink admits his fate rests in Woods’ hands.
“I do want to be the captain and think I can be,” Cink said recently. “But with all due respect to Tiger Woods, I think it’s up to him.”
Whilst mounting his own comeback, Woods is now set to decide whether he should lead the Stars and Stripes in New York next year, or take on the ultimate challenge of winning away at Adare Manor in 2027.
Hunter Mahan, meanwhile, is utterly convinced that the 15-time major winner is the man to rise to both occasions.
“They should roll with Tiger for the next two and let it be a four-year commitment,” Mahan told bunkered.co.uk.
“You’re not too worried about the next one, being at home. The home ones are kind of easy because of the emotion and the crowd is on your side. The one in Ireland is going to be brutal. It’s not going to be the next one you’re worried about.
“I know players love Stewart [Cink] and said he was incredible in the team room so I could see him getting it – but I would have to roll with Tiger.”
Woods, of course, has a famously poor record in the Ryder Cup. In eight matches as a player, he has finished on the winning side just once – at Brookline in 1999.
As a result, some have expressed concern that Woods wouldn’t be a shrewd choice by the PGA of America to take on Luke Donald’s revitalised Europe, especially with the 48-year-old attempting yet another revival on the fairways.
But Mahan believes Woods the captain has the ideal skillset to lead the US team to back-to-back Ryder Cup triumphs for what would be the first time in 34 years.
“Tiger’s a great leader in his own way,” Mahan explained. “You’ve seen it in the Presidents Cup. With Tiger being in the leadership role, he’s a completely different animal. He has this military background which is all about groups and subsets.
“He would plan this thing all out and his preparation for everything would be off the charts so that when guys get there and the tournament rolls around, they would have plan. He’s going to have everything situated in a way that nobody’s really seen before.
“He’s going to be beyond prepared and learn from the past mistakes. You have to treat it differently, it’s night and day being at home and being on the road.”
Losing captain Zach Johnson faced huge scrutiny after his side’s 16-12 defeat at Marco Simone, and Mahan hinted that the grave errors made under the two-time major champion’s leadership may not have happened under Woods’ watch.
“Zach is an A+ human being in every way and everyone on the team would say that. But it’s very clear that the job can overwhelm you and it can just get away from you really quickly,” he said.
“There were too many cooks in the kitchen. There were so many assistants scrambling to figure out what to do. There has to be an alpha, but it felt like there were six alphas.
“If you just think it’s about those three days and that ‘we just got outplayed and outputted’ – give me a break, you don’t understand what’s happening. You don’t understand what’s going on.
“Europe were so well prepared and everyone on that team played that golf course multiple times. No-one in the US did. No one did anything, their preparation was really bad. Everything felt like an afterthought.”
