What Did McGinley Do Right?

[Sean_A]

What was so special about his leadership?  For those that think he was special and can cite why, were the characteristics, when combined with the perceived weaknesses of Watson, a decisive difference maker in the result?

Ciao

[Mark Bourgeois]

Sean, it will be interesting to see if anyone can point to specific moves that actually produced a point or a half. I suspect many responses will amount to the typical reply to quantitative analysis of sport: you can't measure heart!   

I say the biggest thing he got right was coaching the Euro team not the USA team, and I've got pre-competition betting odds and OWGR numbers to back up that assertion.

[John Kavanaugh]

You either believe leadership matters or it don't.  I think it do.

[Chris DeToro]

Apparently he had control of the pairings in Euro tour events and made sure to pair up guys that could be playing on the team.  I think this had to be huge in terms of getting them all acquainted and comfortable playing with each other. 

[Brent Hutto]

And apparently he got them to play Foursomes in quite a few Euro Tour events. Must have been the ones not on the Golf Channel though...

[Thomas Dai]

Nice thread, an alternative to the "what Watson did wrong" and "why was Azinger was wonderful" (I'm not sure he was - he was opposite Faldo!)) approach to the issue.

Some initial thoughts.

I'm not sure it's all Paul McGinley, though congratulation are thoroughly in order. Sure he's received a lot of plaudits from the players etc, but so have all the other recent Euro team Capts, except for Sir Nick.

To me it's the whole Euro team set-up. The backroom, the helpers and supporters, The Vice-Captains and all that.

I stand to be corrected, but I believe that with the exception of the genius that was Seve, only Bernhard Langer, who won away with a record score, and Nick Faldo, who was, let's be kind, not very good, all the Euro Captains the since the turnaround under Tony Jacklin have served as either Vice-Captains or on-site often behind the scenes helpers/supporters.

They will have learnt the 'tricks or the trade', or rather they learnt 'what not to do', watching others before them. To me this is key.

If the Euro's keep this back-up/support/training ground approach going, and it seems they will, then they'll probably continue to dominate unless the US adopt the same approach, and even if adopted immediately, that is likely to take a few years to come to fruition.

atb

[Craig Van Egmond]

He was picked to coach the team with the better players. 

[Martin Toal]

I think it is pretty simple, really. In the old days, pre Seve, GB&I just weren't good enough, so routinely got slaughtered. Once the quality improved, although it is only in recent years where the European team really matches the US team, especially in the bottom half, the Europeans simply play better as a team. That is because they are not defending the constitution, the american way of life, the flag, mom's apple pie, etc etc, they are simply playing for themselves, their team mates, captain and fans. They don't represent Europe, which is, at best, a rather amorphous entity, and at worst a hideous bureaucracy.

McGinley totally gets that, and fed and watered it.

I agree with the analysis of Azinger. He did a decent job but lucked out getting Faldo, who was clearly unsuited to the job.

A smart person said (before Medinah), that two things were certain, the winning captain would get too much credit and the losing captain too much blame. I think that happened at Gleneagles. And it will happen again next time. And the time after ....

[Pete_Pittock]

You either believe leadership matters or it don't.  I think it do.

Leadership doesn't matter when people don't want to follow no matter how good of a leader you are.

[David_Tepper]

"And apparently he got them to play Foursomes in quite a few Euro Tour events."

Brent -

McGinley did not set up his guys to play foursomes in Euro Tour events (as there are no Foursome events!), but (as Chris De Toro noted) he did have the Euro Tour adjust pairings in their tournaments so that his guys would play in the same groups and get to know each other.

http://www.geoffshackelford.com/homepage/2014/9/30/european-tour-allowed-mcginley-to-influence-tourney-grouping.html  

I wonder if a US Ryder Cup Captain could get the PGA Tour to do that.

DT

[A.G._Crockett]

He was picked to coach the team with the better players. 

This is no doubt true.  I think the McGinley could go into the event knowing that he had 6 or 7 players playing as well or better than anyone on the US side, and the math of that is that if each of the 7 scores just 2 points, the match is over.  His team was healthy and, with the exception of Gallacher, on form.  That's huge.

That said, McGinley didn't screw up, which is the essence of coaching talent, believe me, and much more difficult than it sounds.  Lou Holtz has said many times that you can't win without talent, but you can sure screw talent up.  I think it is more than safe to say that he had a clearly different relationship and rapport with his players than Watson. 

A good example is the story that Donaldson told on Sunday after his clinching win.  He said McGinley called him in late July and told him he needed to play in the Czech Republic and Italy to qualify, that he might not be a pick if he didn't qualify.  Donaldson went to the Czech tournament, won, qualified, and played great in the Ryder Cup.  More to the point, he seemed completely comfortable with the process and with McGinley, and not just because it worked out, I believe.

[Amol Yajnik]

Just look at what he did with Graeme McDowell.  Most of the pundits thought that McDowell would get paired with McIlroy in most, if not all of the team matches.  However, Graeme admitted in the days leading up to the event that it was hard for him to be in the "big brother" role of that pairing since McIlroy was now the #1 player in the world.  McGinley had realized that a long time ago and had a different role in mind: McDowell would be the "big brother" to Dubuisson, and that pairing played really well in both of the foursomes matches.  He also had it in his mind for 2 years that McDowell would be the #1 player going off for Europe in the singles matches, and that worked out really well after McDowell made his comeback against Jordan Spieth to win that match.

I realize that's only talking about how McGinley used one player, but it seemed like he had a specific plan for all 12 players which was light years ahead of what the US has been doing for a while.

[John Kavanaugh]

You either believe leadership matters or it don't.  I think it do.

Leadership doesn't matter when people don't want to follow no matter how good of a leader you are.

You can make anyone follow, they just may not like the destination. 

[Tony_Muldoon]

Sean, it will be interesting to see if anyone can point to specific moves that actually produced a point or a half. I suspect many responses will amount to the typical reply to quantitative analysis of sport: you can't measure heart!   

I say the biggest thing he got right was coaching the Euro team not the USA team, and I've got pre-competition betting odds and OWGR numbers to back up that assertion.

Mark maybe the betting odds reflected the percieved worth of the Captains? Or the Euro's rwinning ecord? Or the fact they were playing at home?


No less than Miss Irvine personally told me that the US team had the lower OWGR average.  I no its true as she said it on the BBC.  Can you prove her wrong?


IN respect of this point you guys talked yourselves out of it.  Were you quaking at the prospect of facing Donalson , Bjorn and Gallagher?  And when you talk of form picks, Westwood and Poulter...really?



Sean he handled the realtively unkown, but  with a a reputation as  a  "difficult loner", Dubisson, beautifully even if it appeared he still didn't trust him, sending him out last when they had a big lead.

[Adrian_Stiff]

Europe just has slightly better players than the USA at the moment. McGinley and Watson are great people but it is down to the players and what happens on the day, a putt goes in or a putt misses. Europe would still have won if I had been captain.

And that's all she wrote.

[Terry Lavin]

He captained a team of grittier putters.

I have a solution for Ryder Cup malaise:  We suck and our PGA doesn't need the dough. I say cancel the event and watch the Euros go bankrupt.

[noonan]

He made much better captains pick than Watson did.

[Bill Brightly]

He was picked to coach the team with the better players. 

A good example is the story that Donaldson told on Sunday after his clinching win.  He said McGinley called him in late July and told him he needed to play in the Czech Republic and Italy to qualify, that he might not be a pick if he didn't qualify.  Donaldson went to the Czech tournament, won, qualified, and played great in the Ryder Cup.  More to the point, he seemed completely comfortable with the process and with McGinley, and not just because it worked out, I believe.

A.G.

Can you tell me the guy who would have made the team via the point system if Donaldson had not qualified via points?

[Bill_McBride]

And apparently he got them to play Foursomes in quite a few Euro Tour events. Must have been the ones not on the Golf Channel though...

How could they do that?   Practice rounds?

[Josh Stevens]

Beating the USA is that one great motivating force that Americans don't have access to.

Beating Europe doesn't seem to work quite so well in firing up the troops

[Brent Hutto]

And apparently he got them to play Foursomes in quite a few Euro Tour events. Must have been the ones not on the Golf Channel though...

How could they do that?   Practice rounds?

It was a joke, son!

Obviously the captain of the Euro team should get credit for their Foursomes dominance. Since we all know it isn't just about the Euro players hitting better shots than the USA players. Must be the captain.

[Niall C]

He was picked to coach the team with the better players. 

This is no doubt true.  I think the McGinley could go into the event knowing that he had 6 or 7 players playing as well or better than anyone on the US side, and the math of that is that if each of the 7 scores just 2 points, the match is over.  His team was healthy and, with the exception of Gallacher, on form.  That's huge.

AG

Was that the same Gallagher who played some great golf in the weeks before the cut-off date for qualifying, narrowly missing automatic qualification, and who though he was beaten by Mickelson in the singles scored well enough that he would have beaten most of the US team if you compared the scoring ?

The only reason he didn't get more than an initial outing in the very first game and then obviously the singles at the end, was that McGinley preferred to keep playing the out of form Poulter with mixed results. As I said before, if you're the winning Captain no-one notices the mistakes.

Niall

[Niall C]

Sean

I don't know I could point a finger at what McGinley did particularly right, but there is no doubt in my mind that he started at a huge advantage in that he had been picked/backed by most of the players to be Captain. Contrast that with picking the US captain which seems to be the reserve of Ted Bishop (?) or some such administrator.

Niall

[Jon Wiggett]

McGinley had a closer contact with his players and was certainly the shrewder captain but I would also add the following.

The PGA tour whilst still being the biggest in the world is in slow decline. It is no longer the most exciting tour and has become very monotone in the product it offers. None of the US team apart from maybe Phil have shown themselves capable of winning on a regular basis outside the US and none of the US players really seemed to like each other.

I believe the dominance of Europe in recent times is a much to do with the decline of US golf as it is of European supremacy. If the US want to be competitive they need to pick players who can win elsewhere than on the PGA tour and also ensure at least some of the players actually like each other.

Jon

[Paul Gray]

Until the Americans recognise that the contest is not about proving an empire to still be prevalent they will continue to destroy themselves. That may sound like grandiose yank bashing but it's really just recognition that it's a three day game of golf which has nothing to do with political philosophies.

We British are used to everyone wanting to beat the old masters and we're just about beginning to accept that fact and eat the appropriate humility pill while the rest of the world is beginning to get over it; not that an aussie is likely to hand The Ashes to us anytime soon. The Americans simply need to learn to deal with their position as disliked opponents without reacting to it with brute force and ignorance,  metaphorically speaking of course.