Bubba careful to respect hosts after gaffes of 2011
Watson learnt from his faux pas about French and is embracing the culture this time round
As a chronicler of the Parisian scene, Bubba Watson is not quite in the league of Hemingway after a stroll through the shaded alleys of the Jardin du Luxembourg. The ungallant temptation to depict him as a reluctant tourist from Bagdad, Florida, springs largely from his sortie to the French Open in 2011, when he mistook the Palace of Versailles for a castle and described the Louvre, no less, as a building that “starts with an ‘L’”.
There could hardly be a better platform than Le Golf National on which to rebuild diplomatic bridges. Watson, in common with the other 23 Ryder Cup players here, has the luxury of staying at Versailles’ Waldorf Astoria, on the edge of the palace whose purpose once eluded him. This is one trip where he would like, evidently, to put his caricature as a bewildered small-town hick to bed.
“It was sad, but I learned from it,” said a croaky Watson, struggling with a throat infection. “It made me mature as a person and understand that I’ve got to be more careful in how I word things. This is a beautiful place. The first time I was ever here, my wife played professional basketball in the south of France. I love it. I’ve been here a few times because of Richard Mille, the watch company that I represent. It’s Fashion Week here in Paris, too. I might wear T-shirts all the time, but I have some high fashion in my closet. I just don’t ever bust it out.”
To portray Watson as a Southern good ol’ boy out of central casting, never happier than when blaring out Garth Brooks from a monster pick-up truck, is a touch wide of the mark. He has nothing like the narrow-mindedness of fellow Floridian Boo Weekley, the US star of the 2008 Ryder Cup at Valhalla, who once marked a visit to St Andrews by lamenting: “Ain’t got no fried chicken, ain’t got no sweet tea.” Plus, he plays his golf on a far more exotic canvas than many of his compatriots, having competed in China, Japan, Thailand and South Africa. As he put it after winning his maiden World Golf Championship in Shanghai: “I want to learn different cultures and try different courses in some new areas of the world.”
Culture wars are always illadvised at the Ryder Cup. Just ask Danny Willett’s brother, PJ, who found his caustic depiction of US crowds as “pudgy, basementdwelling irritants, stuffed on cookie dough and p---y beer” rammed down his throat by the home team at Hazeltine, who secured their largest margin of victory since 1983.
It is fairer to say that Watson is, during these weeks, the archetypal star-spangled tub-thumper, whose quotes at Medinah about
‘It’s Fashion Week in Paris – I might wear T-shirts but I have high fashion in my closet’
honouring the military and the flag could not have been any more heartfelt than if he was auditioning for a Top Gun sequel. “Team USA” is a concept that appeals powerfully to this most ardent of patriots. A pity, then, that he has proved so incapable of translating it into success. In three appearances as a player, he has lost all three, only to buck that trend in Minnesota two years ago, when he served as a vice-captain to Davis Love. “I’ve learned that this team is a lot better without me playing,” he joked.
Watson’s status with his team-mates as the resident goofball is assured. He arrived for his press conference wearing a turquoise rubber glove, apparently as a dare. He claimed that Tiger Woods had blocked his telephone, because of his propensity to “send dumb texts”.
If mathematically-minded Bryson Dechambeau is the mad scientist for the US, then Watson is, defiantly, the mercurial artist, capable of propelling tee-shots with his pink driver over 400 yards despite having never received formal golf tuition.
After being paired with Dechambeau for practice rounds, Watson said, in his usual torrential stream of consciousness: “Bryson’s looking at the numbers, I’m looking at the ground. He uses a lot bigger words than me, but it’s pretty impressive to listen to, because I couldn’t tell you the definitions of any of those words. I shorten it up, which gets me in trouble sometimes with the media. I tell him to do it to my level, and then we work it out.”
The only guarantee with Watson, when he is thrust on to a stage of this grandeur, is that he will cry.
Never mind his weeping upon winning the Masters, he is simply the lachrymose kind, a man known to dissolve in sobs even when the team repair to a nearby steakhouse for a bonding session.
The potential joys of winning in Paris promise to elevate such emoting to the next level. His billing on the tour as “Blubba” demands nothing less.