2018 Ryder Cup: Everything you need to know about golf's wildest weekend
The Ryder Cup is here! One of the finest moments on the sporting calendar is upon us. Here’s everything you need to know so that you can wave your flag with pride.
What’s the Ryder Cup?
Oh, we’re starting here, huh? OK, no shame, everybody had to learn for the first time sometime. The Ryder Cup is a once-every-two-years competition between the best golfers from the United States and the best from Europe. So Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Justin Rose and Sergio Garcia are in; Adam Scott, Jason Day and Hideki Matsuyama are out. It’s the only event on the golf calendar where the players work as teams, a strange and unfamiliar position for the ultimate individualists in sports. And for one brief, glorious weekend, the Ryder Cup transforms a golf course into an SEC football game, where raucous fans shriek and holler for their side in a very un-golfy fashion, and everybody’s totally cool with it.
In short, it’s one of the best sports events of the year, and you need to get on board now.
What’s the format?
Each side features 12 players, most of whom played their way onto the team. Each team’s captain gets a few extra picks to add hot players or good team influences to the mix.
Once the festivities begin, there are five match-play sessions: two on Friday, two on Saturday, one on Sunday. Friday and Saturday feature team competitions called four-ball and foursomes; Sunday is a set of 12 mano-a-mano singles matches.
There are 28 total matches, eight on Friday and Saturday and 12 on Sunday. The goal is to win more than half of those matches – or tie, if you’re the reigning champion (that would be the U.S. right now), since a tie means the Cup stays where it is – by the end of Sunday’s singles play.
What are fourballs and foursomes?
Briefly: every event at the Ryder Cup is match play, where you’re trying to get a lower score on every hole than your opponent. This is a deviation from stroke play, the standard format of tournament golf, where the goal is to get a lower score over 18 total holes. (Yes, we know you know this. Not everyone does. The Ryder Cup’s all about big tents.) Sometimes the match ends up even, and each team gets half a point; sometimes it ends up with one team walloping another by two, three, or more holes and the match ends on, say, the 15th hole.
Fourball is a better-ball match, where two teams of two players compete on every hole, and each player plays the entire hole. Whichever player’s score is lower is the one that counts for that team. Foursomes is an alternating-shot match, where players alternate shots on the same ball. (One player tees off, the other hits the second shot, the first hits the putt, et cetera).
The Ryder Cup generally starts with fourball, which has the effect of giving Ryder Cup rookies the chance to get used to the atmosphere without being totally exposed – there’s nowhere to hide on foursomes, where both players must play their best game.
Here’s a breakdown of how the captains select the best players for each format:
What’s the atmosphere like?
Drunken nationalism, except in a good, non-2018 way. Galleries are loud, often painted or costumed, and the cheering that accompanies every great shot – and the groans that accompany good shots by the opposing team – are unlike anything else in golf. Sure, sometimes there’s some ugliness – these are fans we’re talking about – but most times, the fans are respectful of the other side, even if they want to beat the living hell out of them.
Some players, like Patrick Reed and Rory McIlroy, thrive on this atmosphere, and that’s why they’re great Ryder Cup players. Some get broken by it, and that’s why they’re one-and-dones.
This sounds awesome!
It is!
Where’s this all happening?
This year, the Ryder Cup is going down at Le Golf National in Paris. Now, France isn’t the most golf-mad country, but it’s got one hell of a golf course here. L’Albatros (“The Albatross”) is the course the pros will play; it’s par-72 – not that par matters this weekend – and 7,331 yards from the championship tees.
It’s a very American course, in the sense that there are enormous fairways and water guarding holes. The final four holes, heavily water-fronted, will pose a challenge for any player trying to lock down a match, and there’ll be some serious moans from the audience as wayward shots find the water.
But the course favors the Europeans, in part because team captain Thomas Bjorn has set it up to do so. The fairways are narrow and the surrounding roughs are thick, which favors the more precise Euros over the bomb-and-gouge Americans. The fairways are mown back toward the tee, which cuts down on the ball’s roll toward the hole. And most of the Europeans play this course each year, while this will be the first time many Americans ever lay eyes on it.
Who’s playing?
Pretty much every major golfer in America – Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, Justin Thomas, Jordan Spieth, and more. The Europeans are a mix of familiar names, like Justin Rose and Sergio Garcia, and players who spend the majority of their time overseas rather than on the PGA Tour.
They’re all really, really good. It’s why most Ryder Cups ebb and flow throughout the three days, and almost always come down to the final few singles matches.
How do we watch the Ryder Cup?
Being in Paris, the Ryder Cup will run way early in the morning, American time. (Or late at night, if you’re on the west coast.) Here’s a breakdown of TV schedules and tee times, all times EASTERN.
Friday
Morning matches: 2:10 a.m., 2:25 a.m., 2:40 a.m., 2:55 a.m.
Afternoon matches: 7:50 a.m., 8:05 a.m., 8:20 a.m., 8:35 a.m.
TV: Golf Channel (2 a.m. – 1 p.m.)
Saturday
Morning matches: 2:10 a.m., 2:25 a.m., 2:40 a.m., 2:55 a.m.
Afternoon matches: 7:50 a.m., 8:05 a.m., 8:20 a.m., 8:35 a.m.
TV: Golf Channel (2-3 a.m,); NBC (3 a.m. – 1 p.m.)
Sunday
Singles Matches: 6:05 a.m., 6:17 a.m., 6:29 a.m., 6:41 a.m., 6:53 a.m., 7:05 a.m., 7:17 a.m., 7:29 a.m., 7:41 a.m., 7:53 a.m., 8:05 a.m., 8:07 a.m.
TV: NBC (6 a.m. – 1 p.m.)
Online offerings are a bit more limited. RyderCup.com and the Ryder Cup app will offer only two featured matches on Saturday and Sunday, but will go big on singles matches on Sunday.
Any final thoughts?
(Deep breath) U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!
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Jay Busbee is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Contact him at jay.busbee@yahoo.com or find him on Twitter or on Facebook.
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