It's not always good to be different, as Bubba Watson has discovered in – so far – failing to get a captain's pick from Davis Love III.
With Love opting for Rickie Fowler, JB Holmes and Matt Kuchar to fill three of his four 'wild card' selections for the Ryder Cup match against Europe at Hazeltine on September 30th to October 2nd, Watson, the world's number seven ranked player, has been left waiting in hope rather than any great degree of expectation.
Why doesn’t Watson’s face fit? He does things his way – so-called Bubba Golf – and, although he had a win in the Northern Trust Open and a runner-up finish in the WGC-Cadillac championship earlier this season, his failure to have a single top-10 on the board since March has apparently gone against him. It would seem like a convenient excuse.
On the reasoning why he – and his vice-captains – had overlooked Watson, Love skirted the issue.
He was asked what Watson would have to do at the season-ending Tour Championship at East Lake to get the last captain’s pick. Without naming names, Love responded: “Players who are in the Tour Championship need to try to win and not think about Ryder Cup points, that’s the thing I have told several players. It is not a scoring contest for who gets the Ryder Cup pick.”
Love said he would talk to “these 11 guys” who are already on the team before committing to his final player, adding: “We have got a game plan, a strategy to work on . . . and announce (the final pick) based on what fits best for our team, not really who shoots the lowest scores in the last tournament.”
And Love, who was also captain of the US team at Medinah in 2012, seemed to add further fuel to the flames in suggesting that his final pick would be based “statistically” and “emotionally” and also in learning from “mistakes of the past.”
In overlooking Watson – at least for now – Love went with Fowler, who is without a win since Abu Dhabi last January and who narrowly failed to make it to the Tour Championship, Holmes and Kuchar.
Of going for Fowler – who previously played in the 2010 and 2014 matches but who has yet to win a match in eight tries – Love explained: “We found no weakness in his game, he’s really confident on the big stage .... he brings a lot of intangibles to our team, he’s going to make a great team-mate.”
On his other choices, Love described Holmes as “steady, easy to pair” and Kuchar as having a “great attitude for matchplay, a great partner, consistent, easy to pair. They’re who we wanted.”
Fowler is ranked ninth in the world, Kuchar 17th and Holmes 21st. Yet, in ignoring Watson, ranked seventh, the message would seem loud and clear for the moment at least: a square peg into a round hole doesn’t fit!
