Johnson Wagner believes that Webb Simpson and Brandt Snedeker are the standout options should Tiger Woods once again decide to turn down the Ryder Cup captaincy for 2027.
The golfing world is now waiting to see whether Woods will lead the American side at Adare Manor. The 50-year-old rejected the opportunity to be captain at Bethpage.
Of course, the European side have put the pressure on by announcing that Luke Donald will stay on for a third stint as captain in Ireland.
Johnson Wagner wants Brandt Snedeker as the next Ryder Cup captain if Tiger Woods rejects the role
According to the Associated Press, Tiger Woods has been asked by the PGA of America to make a decision before The Masters. He is currently serving as the chairman of the Future Competition Committee on the PGA Tour.
With the tour’s future still far from certain, it would not be a surprise to see the 15-time major champion decide that he has too much to do to be Ryder Cup captain.
And speaking on CBS, Johnson Wagner suggested where he would turn if Woods rejected the captaincy once again.
“I think we all said that we think Tiger Woods would be the next one. He obviously has been given the soft ultimatum of The Masters week. If it’s not him, I really think it needs to be one of two guys, that’s Webb Simpson or Brandt Snedeker. And for me, it’s going to be Brandt,” he said.
“He’s been a part of the US captain structure since the Royal Montreal Presidents Cup. He was there with Keegan last year, he’s the current captain of the Presidents Cup at Medinah this year. And I played a lot of golf with Brandt back in the day. He was the first one back in 2011 to really dive into analytics. He found this guy Mark Horton, an English sports bettor that broke his game down and was able to tell him, ‘hey, your short game’s so good that you need to push it up on every par five as close as you can’. And I think Brandt having that background, having done that for so long, he’s going to bring a different perspective to that US team as far as analytics.
“We need that Dodo Molinari, ‘we’re going to get psychologically into these guys, I’m going to break them down my way, not just what Data Golf says or whoever says’. So I think Brandt would be an excellent candidate.”
What Webb Simpson did in desperation to earn a place on the 2014 Ryder Cup team
There is a problem with appointing Snedeker. There is huge pressure on the American side to perform better than they did over the first two days in New York.
With the 2012 FedEx Cup champion leading the Presidents Cup team later this year, there will be plenty of criticism – fairly or not – should they then lose comfortably in Ireland.
The Presidents Cup is not run by the PGA of America, so Snedeker would presumably have to put the Ryder Cup to one side until Medinah is out of the way. Meanwhile, you can guarantee that Luke Donald will be spending the majority of the next 18 months preparing.
Simpson has had an interesting relationship with the Ryder Cup. He was on the losing side in all three events he played, with perhaps his most infamous moment coming when he skied the opening tee shot at Gleneagles in 2014.
Simpson only got onto that team after making a last-minute plea that persuaded Tom Watson to not pick Bill Haas, as reported by Golfweek. Unfortunately, he did not play again after the Friday morning until the singles on Sunday.
That does not mean that he will be a poor captain at all. The three American captains who have won the Ryder Cup this century had just two major titles between them.
What is for certain is that the American team’s already slim chances of winning next September are diminishing as each day passes without an appointment being made.
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