McIlroy, Westwood want change to Ryder Cup selection

[Jeremie Boop]

http://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/golf/westwood-joins-mcilroy-in-calling-for-change-to-ryder-cup-selection-process/ar-AAjKQ8q

Yeah, why should the people representing Europe have to play on the European Tour? Obviously that's sarcasm on my part, it seems to me that's what the competition is about isn't it? The best European Tour players vs the best PGA Tour players? I mean, maybe I'm missing something, but it seems to be a pretty straight forward and acceptable requirement.

[iacas]

5 minutes ago, Jeremie Boop said:

http://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/golf/westwood-joins-mcilroy-in-calling-for-change-to-ryder-cup-selection-process/ar-AAjKQ8q

Yeah, why should the people representing Europe have to play on the European Tour? Obviously that's sarcasm on my part, it seems to me that's what the competition is about isn't it? The best European Tour players vs the best PGA Tour players? I mean, maybe I'm missing something, but it seems to be a pretty straight forward and acceptable requirement.

Why?

They're still European even if they're playing more in the U.S., Asia, South Africa, Australia… etc.

[Jeremie Boop]

Just now, iacas said:

Why?

They're still European even if they're playing more in the U.S., Asia, South Africa, Australia… etc.

It has always made sense to me for it to be Tour vs Tour. Not sure why it's wrong for the European Tour to require the participants on their side to be active participants on their tour.

[iacas]

1 minute ago, Jeremie Boop said:

It has always made sense to me for it to be Tour vs Tour. Not sure why it's wrong for the European Tour to require the participants on their side to be active participants on their tour.

But… it's not tour vs. tour. It's country versus… region.

The European Tour has looser restrictions on what qualifies as "membership" so they can keep some of their players, but it's never really been "tour vs. tour."

http://www.europeantour.com/europeantour/players/playerid=34024/results/index.html

Rory's 11 tournaments on the European Tour include…

• 3 WGC events
• 4 majors
• 4 other events

Take away the seven events he'd have played anyway and he's up to four European Tour events, versus how many straight PGA Tour events? (He played 18 events on the PGA Tour in 2016, but those also count the seven WGC/Majors above, so… 11?)

[CarlSpackler]

Jeez. One loss and they go into a tizz. 

[natureboy]

13 minutes ago, Jeremie Boop said:

It has always made sense to me for it to be Tour vs Tour. Not sure why it's wrong for the European Tour to require the participants on their side to be active participants on their tour.

Don't know that it was about the 'tours' per-se at the start vs. U.S. vs. U.K. / Ireland PGA pros. I think both tours are now somewhat separate from the original PGA organizations that still partly run the Ryder Cup on both sides:

Quote

The event is jointly administered by the PGA of America and Ryder Cup Europe, the latter a joint venture of the PGA European Tour (60%), the PGA of Great Britain and Ireland (20%), and the PGA of Europe (20%).

Seems the European Tour is now a somewhat independent entity from the European PGAs which still have a seat on the Ryder Cup body.

Quote

The European Tour was established by the British-based Professional Golfers' Association, and responsibility was transferred to an independent PGA European Tour organisation in 1984.

 

Edited November 3, 2016 by natureboy

[Jeremie Boop]

1 minute ago, iacas said:

But… it's not tour vs. tour. It's country versus… region.

The European Tour has looser restrictions on what qualifies as "membership" so they can keep some of their players, but it's never really been "tour vs. tour."

http://www.europeantour.com/europeantour/players/playerid=34024/results/index.html

Rory's 11 tournaments on the European Tour include…

• 3 WGC events
• 4 majors
• 4 other events

Take away the seven events he'd have played anyway and he's up to four European Tour events, versus how many straight PGA Tour events? (He played 18 events on the PGA Tour in 2016, but those also count the seven WGC/Majors above, so… 11?)

Perhaps I'm confused then, who is the governing body of the European squad? Is the requirement solely to try to keep as many players in the European events as possible or is it because they believe that representatives of the European team should represent their tour as well? Either way, I still don't see the problem with them requiring this, seems pretty logical and fair.

[iacas]

3 minutes ago, Jeremie Boop said:

Perhaps I'm confused then, who is the governing body of the European squad? Is the requirement solely to try to keep as many players in the European events as possible or is it because they believe that representatives of the European team should represent their tour as well? Either way, I still don't see the problem with them requiring this, seems pretty logical and fair.

It's logical if you want to require people who hope to make the team compete in some number of European Tour events. It's illogical if you want the strongest team of European golfers.

[CarlSpackler]

1 minute ago, iacas said:

It's logical if you want to require people who hope to make the team compete in some number of European Tour events. It's illogical if you want the strongest team of European golfers.

The question becomes, how to you qualify as a European golfer if you aren't playing so many events in Europe. Is it a birth certificate thing? Residency for a period of time?

[Jeremie Boop]

3 minutes ago, iacas said:

It's logical if you want to require people who hope to make the team compete in some number of European Tour events. It's illogical if you want the strongest team of European golfers.

It's also logical if you want to try to increase the popularity of European tour events by having the bigger/better names in those events.

[iacas]

6 minutes ago, CarlSpackler said:

The question becomes, how to you qualify as a European golfer if you aren't playing so many events in Europe. Is it a birth certificate thing? Residency for a period of time?

The same way everyone does it… by the country in which they're a citizen? This wasn't a problem for the Olympics. The only doubt about someone like Rory was whether he'd be competing for Ireland or the UK… but both are European countries.

5 minutes ago, Jeremie Boop said:

It's also logical if you want to try to increase the popularity of European tour events by having the bigger/better names in those events.

That's just repeating my first thing.

[Golfingdad]

Agree with @iacas on this one.  It's not tour vs. tour, otherwise then we'd get to have Rory and JD and Adam Scott on our team.  That is, of course, ridiculous.

[turtleback]

4 hours ago, Jeremie Boop said:

http://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/golf/westwood-joins-mcilroy-in-calling-for-change-to-ryder-cup-selection-process/ar-AAjKQ8q

Yeah, why should the people representing Europe have to play on the European Tour? Obviously that's sarcasm on my part, it seems to me that's what the competition is about isn't it? The best European Tour players vs the best PGA Tour players? I mean, maybe I'm missing something, but it seems to be a pretty straight forward and acceptable requirement.

Your premise is wrong, it has NEVER been tour v tour.  It was US V. Britain until Jack (and others, I'm sure) convinced TPTB that it should expand to Europe.  But no one has ever suggested that, for example, Gary Player should have been playing for the US because he played on the US tour.  If it was tour v. tour, where a guy was born or came from wouldn't matter.

So yes, you are missing something.  The Euro tour is trying to make this into something it never was in order to strong arm top players into playing their tour instead of the premier tour.  Does the European tour think that if Rory and Lee are not members of the Eurotour but are members of the PGATour they should be playing for the US in the Ryder Cup?  I seriously doubt it and were that to be suggested I have little doubt they would cry foul.

[natureboy]

 

4 hours ago, Jeremie Boop said:

Perhaps I'm confused then, who is the governing body of the European squad? Is the requirement solely to try to keep as many players in the European events as possible or is it because they believe that representatives of the European team should represent their tour as well? Either way, I still don't see the problem with them requiring this, seems pretty logical and fair.

See post #6 above

7 minutes ago, turtleback said:

Your premise is wrong, it has NEVER been tour v tour.

See post #6. It was about U.S. PGA vs. U.K. PGA though at the start. Currently the Euro Tour is a significant sponsor / owner of the Euro 'stake' in the event.

[boogielicious]

16 hours ago, Jeremie Boop said:

http://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/golf/westwood-joins-mcilroy-in-calling-for-change-to-ryder-cup-selection-process/ar-AAjKQ8q

Yeah, why should the people representing Europe have to play on the European Tour? Obviously that's sarcasm on my part, it seems to me that's what the competition is about isn't it? The best European Tour players vs the best PGA Tour players? I mean, maybe I'm missing something, but it seems to be a pretty straight forward and acceptable requirement.

Nah. It's Floridians who formerly lived in Europe vs. Floridians were used to live someplace else in the US. 

[Jeremie Boop]

2 hours ago, boogielicious said:

Nah. It's Floridians who formerly lived in Europe vs. Floridians were used to live someplace else in the US. 

Rofl, that's pretty good right there. I have to admit.

[CarlSpackler]

3 hours ago, boogielicious said:

Nah. It's Floridians who formerly lived in Europe vs. Floridians were used to live someplace else in the US. 

Which means, the matches should always be held in FL. 

[colin007]

Westwood should be pushing for anything that keeps him off of that team…