Scoreboards rarely lie, and the 18.5-11.5 scoreline screams. It wasn’t close – it wasn’t even remotely close – but despite the almost inevitable coming to pass, the Presidents Cup provided something that regular PGA tournament golf generally fails to do.
It brought excitement, it brought entertainment, and after all, isn’t that what sporting events are meant to do?
Friday night golf viewing is rarely an energetic endeavour, but I was up off my seat, punching the air when Si Woo Kim holed the winning putt against Scottie Scheffler and Russell Henley, meaning that he and Ben An rounded off a five-and-oh Friday rout for the Internationals. I can probably count the number of times I’ve been up off my seat watching professional golf in 2024 on one hand, and two of the others were with my head in my hands for Rory McIlroy’s missed putts on 16 and 18 at Pinehurst.
But I did it for the Presidents Cup. It was always unlikely to be the ‘touchpaper lighting’ moment that would propel the Internationals to overall victory, but it was a fantastic moment nonetheless.
24 hours later, Si Woo had me up on my feet again when he chipped-in on the 16th and did his Steph Curry ‘night, night’ celebration, even if the stone-cold killer that is Patrick Cantlay would have the final say.
Those might’ve been the only moments where I was actually airborne, but there were plenty others that came close.
His bitching about not being given a three-foot putt aside, Tom Kim was electric and added so much more to the event. He’s over the top, sure, but I don’t care. So was Ian Poulter, so was Patrick Reed, and dare I say it, so was Seve Ballesteros.
Seve was box office every time he played, so it’s no surprise that team competition brought it to a different level, but when you’re playing against a golf course and 150-odd other players, celebrating a made putt or approach to tap-in range, or treating a missed six-footer like it’s the end of the world just doesn’t happen unless it’s on the 72nd hole of a tournament that you’re contending in.
That’s what makes match play golf great, and team match play even more so. Top-tier players are so good that players always expect their opponent(s) to hit it close, to hole that lengthy putt or chip, so they have to be more aggressive themselves. And players playing aggressively makes it all the more compelling to watch.
Sure, making four birdies and going bogey-free in a strokeplay competition probably means you’ve worked your way up the leaderboard, but that could see you beaten 4&3 in matchplay to somebody that’s made four bogeys and eight birdies.
That’s why the outsider always has a chance, even if it’s a slim one.
The Presidents Cup has its problems, most notably the one-sided history to which 2024 is another addition, but the fact that I’m writing about it favourably the morning after the United States won 10-in-a-row speaks volumes. At least to me anyway.
Would it be a more competitive competition if we added women to the mix? With seven Internationals in the top 10 of the Rolex Rankings, it almost certainly would, but why could a mixed team event not be added to the schedule instead of replacing the Presidents Cup?
Why can we not have more matchplay golf, period?
I get that John Deere are longtime PGA Tour sponsors, but would they not get far more bang for their buck if it was the John Deere Matchplay Championship instead of yet another strokeplay event? And even more bang again if they had matches such as Scottie Scheffler and Nelly Korda taking on Hideki Matsuyama and Ayaka Furue?
I’m using John Deere as an example, but the same could go for a dozen other PGA Tour events that are largely forgettable because they get lost in the ether. We don’t need them all to change, but one or two would be a massive improvement.
So, s**t on the Presidents Cup all you want, but it’s one of the few weeks of a two-year cycle that delivers more often than not.
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