Keegan Bradley tees-up opportunity for dual Ryder Cup role

The Herald Scotland

24-06-2025

In theory, sleeping should be a relatively straightforward process. All you have to do is lie on your back and close your eyes.
It's so easy, even a corpse can do it. And presumably, that's what I'll become if I don't change my bloomin' sleeping position.
Poor old Tommy Fleetwood will probably be having a couple of sleepless nights after his harrowing loss in the Travelers Championship on Sunday.
After 41 top-10 finishes on the PGA Tour, it looked like he would finally claim a maiden title in the US but, over a closing stretch laden with pressure, his three-putt on the last opened the door for Keegan Bradley.
Fair play to Bradley. He marched through it and sent the partisan galleries bonkers.
Another door opened for Bradley, of course. His win increased the world No 7's chances of becoming the first playing captain in the Ryder Cup since Arnold Palmer in 1963.
Leadership, like everything in these berserk and binary times of relentless, fist-shaking opinion, is a fraught business.
You're either an inspirational driving force who will save the world or a ham-fisted imbecile that has all the clout of a damp glove puppet.
It would be fair to say, then, that when the Ryder Cup skipper's armband was thrust into Bradley's hands last year, the response was predictably mixed.
The PGA of America and its wonderfully mockable Task Force were banking on Tiger Woods taking the position. And when he didn't, it seemed like they panicked and were dizzying around in their halls of power like Norman Wisdom pretending to be stuck in the revolving door of a hotel foyer.
The first time Bradley heard about the Ryder Cup captaincy was when he got a call to tell him the job was his.
So much for the Task Force's careful, considered approach which was supposed to mimic Team Europe's structured line of succession.
Bradley, somewhat contentiously, was left out of the USA team for the transatlantic tussle in Rome two years ago and his tearful reaction to that snub was caught on camera.
The 39-year-old also has an unopened suitcase sitting in his house which still has all his clobber in it from the 2012 Ryder Cup loss at Medinah. He says he won't open it until he's part of a winning team.
Imagine that? Bradley leads USA to glory at Bethpage Park and the TV cameras swiftly head to his hoose to document a ceremonial bag opening as he gingerly picks out a variety of stinking socks, soiled semmits and reeking shirts.
Given that the former US PGA champion hasn't served any kind of apprenticeship as a vice-captain, we have no idea what kind of captain, indeed playing captain, he will be.
Passionate? Certainly. But passion alone doesn't guarantee points.
If Bradley is as methodical over his foursomes and fourball pairings as he is lining up a putt with the AimPoint technique, his submissions between sessions could take bloody ages.
Ryder Cup skippers, of course, are ultimately judged on something they can't really control; how their players perform.
It's a pretty fickle measure to be analysed by. On one hand, a player can be a star, and the captain is viewed as a motivational colossus who has harnessed the ebb and flow of events with a shrewd tactical nous.
On the other hand, a player can simply not perform and be absolved of any blame as the skipper gets it in the neck. If Bradley is a playing leader and hitting shots too, the judgement will be even more intense.
Back in ye day, the captain's role seemed to be fairly straight forward. 'Boys, let me tell you something,' declared Ben Hogan to his US troops of 1967.
'You don't have to be a rocket scientist to do this job. I'm going to pair straight hitters with straight hitters and crooked hitters with crooked hitters so you won't find yourselves in unfamiliar places.'
The aforementioned Palmer, meanwhile, was just 34 and at the peak of his powers when he was a playing captain in Atlanta in 1963.
He pitched in with four points out of six as the hosts romped to a 23-9 win over an overwhelmed Great Britain. The Ryder Cup was a very different affair back then, of course, and the result of the lop-sided meeting was usually a forgone conclusion.
It's very even-steven these days. And the captaincy is a bit more scientific. Well, so it's portrayed anyway.
When Paul Azinger led the US to glory in 2008, for instance, his use of pod systems and perceived Eisenhower-esque leadership ended up in a book called 'Cracking the Code' in which the Ryder Cup captaincy was elevated to the kind of lauded cryptanalysis you used to get at Bletchley Park.
As the 2025 contest hurtles towards us, Bradley is certainly up for the cup. 'We're gonna go to Bethpage to kick their f****** ass,' he roared in a rallying cry last year. He's not quite Henry Kissinger.
To play or not to play? That is the question that will continue to be asked as the Ryder Cup build-up intensifies.
Now, excuse me, I'm off to work on my sleeping position.