The Ryder Cup

This is text about the Ryder Cup in Wales in 2010.

Text about captains.

Text about possible teams.

Text about player qualification and wildcards.

Samuel Ryder was a wealthy British businessman and avid golfer who was born in 1858 and died in 1936.

The Ryder Cup competition came from Ryder's idea: The Walker Cup, pitting teams of British and American amateur golfers against eachother. This began in 1922.

A London newspaper report from 1925 states that Ryder had proposed such a competition for professional golfers. In 1926, Ryder commissioned and paid for the trophy that now bears his name, and the first official Ryder Cup competition was played in 1927.

So if you've got a few million, why not create your own competition and live forever?

Format

Four matches of foursomes and fourballs on Friday and Saturday, followed by 12 singles matches on Sunday.

Scoring

One point is awarded for each of the 28 matches. If it ends in a tie, each team gets a half-point. As the defending champion, Europe needs only 14 points to retain the Ryder Cup.

Foursomes

Also known as alternate shot. The two-man teams will select one player to tee off on odd-numbered holes, while the other tees off on even-number holes. They play only one ball, alternating shots until the hole is completed.

Fourballs

Also known as better ball. Both players from each team play their own ball until the hole is completed, using the lowest score from each team.

There are two wins by the U.S. over Great Britain teams that qualify. The biggest point spread between the winning and losing teams came in 1967 when Team USA defeated Team GB 23.5 to 8.5, a margin of 15 points.

The most dominating victory came in 1947 when the Americans beat the British by a score of 11 to 1.

The Europeans' largest margin of victory, a margin Europe achieved in both 2004 and 2006. The score in each case was 18.5 to 9.5.

The 1999 Ryder Cup held at The Country Club in Brookline, Massachusetts, caused great controversy. A remarkable comeback by the American team helped propel the U.S. to a 14.5-13.5 victory after trailing 10-6 heading into the final day. The U.S. went 8-3-1 in the singles matches to seal the first American victory since 1993.

The competition turned on the 17th hole of a match between American Justin Leonard and Spaniard José María Olazábal. With the match all square at the 17th hole, Leonard needed to earn at least a half-point by either winning one of the last two holes (therefore earning a full point), or finishing the match at all square (therefore earning a half-point) to seal an American victory. After Olazábal's second shot left him with a 22-foot putt on the par-4, Leonard hit his shot within 10 feet of the hole and then watched it roll away from the cup, leaving him with a 45-foot putt for birdie. While sinking a putt of this length is unlikely, Leonard had made putts of 25 and 35 feet earlier in the round. Leonard holed the astounding putt, and a wild celebration ensued with other U.S. players, their wives, and a few fans running onto the green. Had Leonard's putt sealed the match, this type of behavior would have been inappropriate but moot. Knowing that a made putt would extend the match while a miss would assure Leonard of a half-point and the U.S. a victory (the Americans needed 14.5 points to gain the cup due to the Europeans' 1997 victory at Valderrama), Olazábal tried to regain his focus. However, he missed the difficult putt, and the American team celebrated once again (although the second celebration was more reserved than the first one).

According to the "Best of the Rest" section of ESPN's Top 5 Reasons You Can't Blame program, NBC television footage and press photos prove that no official rules (Ryder Cup or PGA) were broken when the Americans celebrated after Leonard's putt (i.e. no one walked in or crossed Olazábal's putting line). However, the game of golf is upheld by many to be "the gentleman's game", and there remain a number of unwritten rules and codes of conduct which the European players believe were being ignored. Many of the American players believed the Europeans' response was hypocritical; they argued that European players - in particular Seve Ballesteros - had been guilty of excessive celebration and gamesmanship as far back as the 1985 Ryder Cup Matches, without attracting the same opprobrium from the European media. There was still considerable bad blood after the match, with some of the European players complaining about the behavior of the American galleries throughout the match. Sam Torrance branded it "disgusting," while European captain Mark James referred to it as a "bear pit" in a book recounting the event.[8] There were also reports that a spectator spat at his wife.[9]

Following the 1999 Ryder Cup, a number of members of the U.S. team apologized for their behavior, and there were numerous attempts by both teams to calm the increasing nationalism of the event. These efforts appear to have been largely successful with subsequent Cups being played in the "spirit of the game".