ShareThisOh, golf. Sure. Nothing much else going on. Pennant races. Football nail-biters. No-hitters. NASCAR. The further veneration of Michael Phelps.Dropping into autumn, we find a little international spit and spite weekend centered on the silliest of games, Mark Twain's good walk spoiled, or as Paul Gallico concluded, if there is any larceny in a man, golf will bring it out.The guy who may or may not have started it, one Samuel Ryder, the guy after whom the Cup is named at any rate, was so enthralled with golf that he had his 5-iron buried with him. Really, the only sensible thing to do with golf clubs.The United States used to yawn and look at its watch during this thing, while foreigners showed the world how to lose, politely, gratefully and time after time.Since America has become the clubhouse foot wipe of Europe, we have not always been as cordial, bringing to the event some sulking animosity.The return of the Ryder Cup to civil insignificance would be welcome. Golf is not a shoving match, as this has lately become.As far as the Americans are concerned, it is barely a match at all, and the Europeans have tried gamely not to gloat.The last one, in Ireland, was a thorough rout, and say this for both Ireland and for the winners, they do know how to celebrate, Guinness being the liquid of choice. The mustache stain left on Europe captain Ian Woosnam has likely dried into indelibility. Got malt?One wonders if bourbon will tempt the same excess, this one being held in Kentucky, home of bluegrass and branch water.The Ryder Cup has become a biennial humiliation for American golf; something along the lines of what happened to the American basketball Olympians, except worse.Without a time-zone-away putt from Justin Leonard in 1999, the U.S. would have not won the thing since the early days of the Clinton first administration (1993), and the last two have been identical routs, Europe closing out things before the bar opened.Former president George W. Bush himself helped to raise the stakes in the last winning one, the so-called "Battle at Brookline," outside Boston, sending a letter to team captain Ben Crenshaw that recalled Col. Travis' letter from the Alamo. Victory or death. No, no. In golf, it is victory or you buy the round.And a reminder to all motivators who use the Alamo reference. Uh, the good guys lost.One Ryder Cup became known as the "War on the Shore" on Kiawah Island, S.C. Golf and war? That's like pairing muffins and lug nuts.This one has the spirit of Muhammad Ali invoked by U.S. captain Paul Azinger, that because Ali is from Louisville. Ali is certainly an inspiring figure, but not much of a golfer, and as for an example of patriotism, Ali became so disenchanted with his country, and not without reason, that he threw his Olympic gold medal into the Ohio River.The problem with trying to raise golf into some sort of definition of national character -- let's leave that to basketball, or stock car racing -- is that sooner or later you become a half-crouching figure with a crooked stick trying to hit a ball that does not move until you do, and not always then.This one has, as captains, cold-fish Nick Faldo on one side and the feisty Azinger on the other, old rivals who never liked each other then and only cosmetically tolerate each other now. Azinger was quoted in a British publication as calling Faldo a . . . let's see. How best to put this in a family newspaper?Can't be done. Let us say that it is football locker-room talk, or barracks insults, not quite clubhouse chitchat.With the greatest player of them all is shelved by a restructured knee, the Yanks would have a great excuse for losing this time. The lack of Tiger Woods may be an advantage to the U.S. since Woods has failed only at this in his career, losing more than he has won and generally being accused of not playing well with others.There is not, as maybe there should be, a cry to win one for Tiger.Why does the U.S. not win more? Golf may be the most individual of games, certainly the most internal, solitaire with sticks. It is unnatural to help or reveal yourself to people with whom you are in conflict week after week.Or maybe it is that Europe is just better. Try to care.(Contact Bernie Lincicome of the Rocky Mountain News at lincicomeb(at)RockyMountainNews.com.)
Kentucky bourbon for U.S. Ryder Cup pain
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