DEALING WITH PRESSURE

he pressure dynamic has always fallen in favor of Europe. America is still the world’s most dominant golf nation, always has the most star players, and as such always resides as the favorite in the collective mind. It’s why the Europeans seem to enjoy the Ryder Cup more, and why—in the opinion of knowledgeable insiders—the Americans do more choking in the Ryder Cup than any other event.

How to get the pressure off, or make it manageable, is the primary challenge of the captain. Especially in the past two decades, all sorts of approaches have been tried, from 2006 captain Tom Lehman’s let’s-talk-aboutit group therapy to the Watson’s Darwinistic challenge:

Paul Azinger, harder than Lehman but more collegial than Watson, seemed to strike an effective middle ground on his winning team in 2008. “In the Ryder Cup, the players have to be ready to be more nervous than they’ve ever been,” he says. “If you think you’ll be able to pretend the pressure isn’t there, it will hit you even harder. I told them to accept all of it in advance, and get them to understand that if you’re thinking the right way, it can actually help you play better.”

Love’s approach to handling pressure has been more like Lehman’s—as a player and in his sounding-board roles as captain and former assistant. Will his players consider the loss when he was captain at Medinah something to avenge, or somehow an extension of the too many times Love didn’t close as a player? At the same time, the assistant captains at Hazeltine will presumably be more proactive, and one of them—Woods—happens to be the ultimate hardhearted closer.

One thing is sure: If the Americans lose, the cause and effect of the task force will be judged negatively. And the analysis—and the criticism—will be more intense than ever. golfdigestme. com september 2016