Some wits once joked that the defining feature of American politics is the belief that someone gets something for less than the detail that by rights should come to you. It is a mercenary feeling which one could say also governs golf.
The impact of money in the sport since 2022 has been obvious to all except those incentivized to present it as positive, which requires a wary boldness that even Joel Osteen would struggle to muster. A professional tour was completely manufactured based on greed. Another disfigured himself in an excruciating effort to keep up. Still others lurk under the feast table in the hope of being temporarily useful to the well-fed. Once the virus of greed has taken hold, there won’t be a single corner of the game left untouched.
Contrary to the smug chatter often peddled as gospel, men’s professional golf is not a charity. Organizations and events are about making money. Some simply have goals beyond profit, long-standing obligations to the broader sport that require funding. These include expanding access to golf and underwriting junior, amateur and women’s games. The bodies responsible for the four major championships fall into this category. To some extent, so does the Ryder Cup.
The rise of the Ryder Cup as a marketable product is directly linked to the beginning of the American team’s defeat in the late 1980s. Today, it is a financial monster thanks to reliable ingredients that the we don’t see much in individual competition: the raw emotion, the playing for pride, the investment in the success of others, the camaraderie between rivals. The PGA of America operates on a four-year budget cycle because its operations are largely funded by National Cup revenues. It’s a similar situation for the DP World Tour on the other side of the ledger.
Money means a lot in the Ryder Cup, so it’s intentionally misleading to present it as a vestal beacon in a world increasingly populated by street slaps. But where previous generations of players saw participation as pure patriotism or a chance to give a little back, today’s stars apparently see, well, something going to others when they should rightfully theirs.
Forget about giving back. Let’s take more.
Arguments over whether Ryder Cuppers should be paid are not new. A quarter of a century ago, such a public debate stained several reputations and raised Ben Crenshaw’s blood pressure to levels not seen since he had to surrender his last gutta-percha bullet. Recent reports suggest that members of the American team could receive $400,000 to do with as they see fit. Currently, $200,000 is donated to a charity of each player’s choice. On December 12, Sports Illustrated’s Bob Harig revealed that a dozen former U.S. team skippers had written to the PGA of America to lobby against the idea. — a good majority of the 16 living former captains.
The contents of the letter have not been made public, but its very existence lays bare a deep generational divide between those who built golf’s biggest assets and those who feel entitled to cash in those assets for a dividend lucrative.
No potential member of Keegan Bradley’s team will be eager to appear in public with their hand raised on this issue, but it’s no secret that several players will view the payment as their due. In this particular moment, this is a staggering level of tone-deafness that almost demands new rallying cries for the age of transactional patriotism.
“Don’t ask what your country can do for you, ask what it can pay you!” »
“I only regret that I only have one tax to charge my country! »
Helen Keller could read the plays better than these guys.
It is important that former captains take a stand against paying players, because the PGA of America itself certainly cannot, even if it had a leader willing to do so (former CEO Seth Waugh left in June and the organization is apparently having difficulty finding a replacement who is both a PGA member and a seasoned global affairs executive, ranked in order of priority). PGA executives have ceded any pretense to higher ground by pricing tickets for the 2025 Ryder Cup at Bethpage Black at levels that would make bandits blush – $750 for tournament days and north of $250 on practice days, plus a few hundred dollars more in fees. Sure, tickets sold out quickly, but at what price? A New York fan will have to pay more than three times what it cost spectators in Rome last year. These prices run counter to the PGA of America’s mission to increase access to the game and even the ethos of the host venue.
The incessant layering of laissez-faire for players and administrators only reinforces a discouraging and widespread feeling among those who love this sport: it is invaded by fat cats benefiting from generous remunerations, none of whom would spare a Bucket of stale piss for fans. who actually pay for their product.
Only one group is profiting from this self-inflicted disaster: the European Ryder Cup team, whose players quickly made it known they were not seeking pay, with some even saying they would pay to participate. Thus began the psychological operations effort to defuse and perhaps even transform Bethpage’s notoriously noisy gallery by encouraging the perception of an American team that sees patriotism as another way to get paid. Captain Bradley knows how things are going to be on Long Island.
The refrain of “more” must be interrupted by the refrain of “enough”. A tsunami of entitlement has invaded this game. Eventually, a wave will wash ashore and turn fans away from even the biggest events. This could be it.
This article was originally published on Golfweek: Paying Ryder Cup players should be fed up with fans cashing in on golf’s greediest era.
