The burning question on many golf fans’ lips this morning is: can Keegan Bradley really act as a playing captain for Team USA at the Ryder Cup later this year?
Bradley‘s win at the Travelers Championship on Sunday saw him surge up the American Ryder Cup points list.
The Ryder Cup captain now sits inside the top 12 in the race to qualify for Team USA for the showdown at Bethpage Black in September.
In May, Bradley suggested he was unsure about his Ryder Cup duties, and whether or not he would be able to combine playing and captaining the side.
The Europeans will undoubtedly be hoping that he does perform both roles.
But what is the Woodstock, Vermont, native thinking about the prospect of playing at Bethpage Black after his incredible win at TPC River Highlands on Sunday?
Keegan Bradley had an ‘epiphany’ about Ryder Cup captaincy
Bradley has played so well this season that it is hard to envisage an American team without him as part of the 12.
In the modern era though, combining being the captain of the Ryder Cup team with playing as well seems like an impossible task.
However, Bradley did drop a hint that he could do exactly that at Bethpage, on the 18th green at TPC River Highlands on Sunday.
He simply said: “Go USA!”, when asked if he could play on his own Ryder Cup team.
And then during his press conference later on that evening, the Travelers champion was asked if the support he received at TPC River Highlands throughout the week felt different to any other week on tour.
Bradley said: “It does. It was louder, yeah.
“I’ve always gotten really great support here, but I don’t know, today was insane. It’s something that I didn’t expect when I got this job. It just never crossed my mind. I get it when I’m playing good golf, I get it when I’m pumping gas, I get it in restaurants, people are saying it, but I never expected this sort of support for the Ryder Cup captain. I had this epiphany at the PGA Championship when I was getting these loud USA cheers that I don’t think any player in the history of the game has experienced what I’m experiencing in that I’m a Ryder Cup captain, in my eyes still one of the best players in the world trying to win majors and tournaments, and not a lot of people have experienced coming down the stretch of a tournament as the Ryder Cup captain, of big tournaments, and I’ve tried to embrace that and tried to feed off the energy, but they were really loud this week.“
Bradley then responded when asked whether the atmosphere was similar to the one he experienced at Medinah during the Ryder Cup in 2012.
He said: “18 was really close to a Ryder Cup. You couldn’t get many more people on that hole and there was like an almost like when you’re in Fenway Park some, there’s like, it never got quiet, it was still people cheering and pretty incredible.“
Has there ever been a playing captain at the Ryder Cup before?
There have been 13 golfers who have served as playing captains since the Ryder Cup’s inception in 1927.
Eight of those golfers have been American.
Walter Hagen, Sam Snead, Ben Hogan, Lloyd Mangrum, Chick Harbert, Jack Burke Jr, Jerry Barber and Arnold Palmer.
Palmer was the last playing captain for Team USA way back in 1963.
So if Bradley does indeed perform both roles at the Ryder Cup in September, it would be a majorly rare occurrence.
Could he really act as a playing captain for Team USA for the first time in 62 years? It seems like there’s every chance that will happen right now.
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