SB Nation’s 2016 Ryder Cup Preview

Unless you're Davis Love III or Tom Watson, you only get one shot to captain a team in the modern Ryder Cup era. It's a prestigious honor with a waiting list that's usually plotted out for years, and it only comes around once.

There was never a question of if Darren Clarke would be a Ryder Cup captain, but when. The Northern Irishmen is a European Tour lifer, a devotee to that circuit who stayed loyal even when many of his colleagues moved to Florida to play more on the big money PGA Tour. The European Tour also happens to be the organization that runs everything for the European side, so that loyalty was going to be repaid. Throw in a major championship, a strong Ryder Cup history, and the general admiration, love, and respect of all his colleagues and players — this was a no-brainer.

Clarke played on the 1997, 1999, 2002, 2004, and 2006 European teams, all winners save for that '99 Brookline miracle. His most notable Ryder Cup moment as a player probably came in his last appearance in 2006, when he played at the K Club in Ireland shortly after his wife died from cancer. Clarke got a standing ovation as he strode to the first tee, then went unbeaten, was embraced by both teams on the final green of his final match, and walked off bawling before chugging Guinness and champagne in celebration. It was one of the better scenes in Ryder Cup history.

Now, he's back as a captain, after serving as an assistant in both 2010 to Colin Montgomerie and 2012 to Jose Maria Olazabal. That's the European system for this thing — you serve as assistant and know exactly what to expect through the process — and it's worked brilliantly over the last two decades. There's always debate over how much a captain can influence the matches. The Ulsterman comes up on the rotation for an away game and also gets a roster with a record number of rookies. It's not the easiest draw, but he knows how this works and will have his group ready to run through a wall.

Clarke is one of the most fun characters in this game — everyone on both sides loves him — but he'll be the enemy for three days in Minnesota.

Rory McIlroy, putting woes apparently behind him after a dramatic Tour Championship playoff win Sunday to capture the FedEx Cup and its $10 million jackpot, is the unofficial captain of Darren Clarke’s 2016 European Ryder Cup team.

With six players making their Ryder Cup debuts, Clarke will rely on the winner of four major titles and the final event on the 2015-2016 PGA Tour schedule to lead his 12-man squad into biennial battle at Hazeltine. Of course, he’ll have help from wily veterans Justin Rose, Martin Kaymer, Sergio Garcia, and Henrik Stenson, but McIlroy — back to No. 3 in the world after his September win in Boston and sneaking up on second-ranked Dustin Johnson — will likely take a couple of rookies under his wing as partners in the fourballs and foursomes competitions.

Until he scored his second Deutsche Bank Championship title, 2016 had not been a particularly stellar season for McIlroy.

Yes, he had seven additional top-10 finishes (through the BMW Championship) and that W at the Irish Open. But with only two birdies in Sunday’s finale at Crooked Stick, he slipped down to T42 at the BMW Championship as his balky putter let him down yet again. And, yeah, he missed a couple of shortish putts in the final round of regulation at the Tour Championship that could have nailed down the W without going into extra frames.

But with five birdies and a thrilling eagle-par-birdie finish to the pre-overtime 72 holes at East Lake, who needs to worry about flat stick woes, anyway?

For one, not cap'n Darren, who had no concerns about McIlroy’s ball-striking even before he smoked the Atlanta track to the tune of 68-70-66-64! The Ulsterman's work tee to green was "as good as it's ever been," the skipper told Golf.com. That’s for sure, as McIlroy leads the tour in strokes gained off the tee.

Though Clarke said prior to the Tour Championship that McIlroy seemed "a little bit lost with his putting at the moment," the chief Euro was likely breathing a lot easier after Rory moved up from 142nd in strokes gained putting to 135th. Not a seismic shift but progress nonetheless, and just at the right time for McIlroy et al to try and bring down the "best task force ever."

With that cheeky riposte to Davis Love III's remark about Team USA being "the best golf team, maybe, ever assembled," McIlroy heads up a European unit that heads to Hazeltine already with a 1-up advantage -- psychologically, at least.

Danny Willett may be remembered as the guy that won the Masters thanks to Jordan Spieth's fantastic implosion, but he's a world-class superstar deserving of a major championship without anyone else's help. The 28-year-old Englishman added a green jacket to his impressive list of worldwide wins over the past four years and the major win wasn't exactly a surprise to those who follow the game closely.

Willett has won five times since 2012. Besides besting Spieth, he has also taken down contemporaries like Rafa Cabrera-Bello, Andy Sullivan, and Matthew Fitzpatrick. All of those players were good enough to be in Europe's top 12 and will accompany Willett to Hazeltine.

The Ryder Cup will be the culmination of an amazing year for Willett, who can cap it by crushing more American hopes and dreams the same way he did back in April. It's safe to say he will probably be a fixture on this European roster for years.

Willett should be in the conversation to play all five sessions for captain Clarke. He's from that Chubby Chandler group of friends and rebel-rousers that includes Clarke and Lee Westwood. The rookie Willett and the veteran Westy seem like a natural pairing this weekend in Minnesota.

Henrik Stenson’s been here before -- but not like this.

The Swede’s made three Ryder Cup appearances over the course of a decade (2006, 2012, 2014), but always as a supporting cast member. But at 40 years old and coming off the season of a lifetime, Stenson will be one of the stars expected to lead the way for a younger European team at Hazeltine.

After a dominant summer, there’s every reason to expect a class performance from Stenson at Hazeltine. He’s already turned in the best major championship round of golf ever at the Open en route to victory in June — and then followed that up by contending at the PGA a couple weeks later.

Worried about the pressure of playing for country and Europe? No problem, he dueled Cup teammate Justin Rose to the finish at the Olympics, bringing home a silver medal for Sweden. Some would tell you stroke play and match play are distinct styles, and a season’s success might not be a great predictor of outcomes. Others, like the person writing this piece, might say the thought of a Sunday matchup with an in-career-form Stenson at Hazeltine would be the equivalent of stepping in front of a danged freight train for some poor American.

One concern for Euro fans? Stenson’s been nursing a knee injury — a torn meniscus — that flared up on him at The Barclays. He hasn’t teed it up since the Deutsche Bank on Labor Day weekend. Don’t be shocked if Darren Clarke saves Stenson’s legs for later into the weekend a bit. But they need the Swede.

Chris Wood arrives as a highly ranked rookie in the European team points race. Wood punched his ticket to his first Ryder Cup with one big win, the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth. That is the European Tour's flagship event. The European Tour is also the organization that runs the team and creates the points system. So, a win back there in May and Wood was good to go.

While he piled up a ton of points during the qualification process, he's not exactly been setting the world aflame coming into the Ryder Cup. Wood has been pretty shaky and injured all summer long. He's had a couple of middling finishes, but since that BMW win, he has had little influence on the European Tour — which, if we're being honest, is much weaker than the PGA Tour.

This is not to say that the lanky Wood will not find form in a hurry and start burying his American counterparts. It's just that, from the outside, he looks like a weak link that the U.S. can pick off at Hazeltine. Wood withdrew from his home major, the Open, back in July with a neck injury that was just too painful to play through. He's made just five starts since then and done little to inspire confidence in captain Darren Clarke.

Wood is a gregarious personality that will do well in the team room and he's got a ton of talent. But right now, he's a rookie you could see sitting two, and maybe even three of the first four sessions before the Sunday singles (when everyone is required to play).

Think of all those things your grandfather told you golf was supposed to be about. Civility. Honor. Integrity. Playing against the course — not your opponent. All those contrived tropes about good and virtuous things. Golf reveals character, they say. It’s a game meant for those most on an even keel, those that don’t show emotion. And for the most part, what you see in professional golf week in and week out validates this. Just not at the Ryder Cup.

This is a competition designed for the slightly unhinged. Professional golfers don’t play in hostile crowds, the primary goal of the vast majority of tournaments is not to beat the socks off the guy you’re playing with. Add in a touch of jingoism and the spirit of playing on a true team — and you’ve got something completely different than what most casual golf fans are used to seeing at the four major championships. One is best served at a Ryder Cup being a neurotic shitheel.

Thank God for Sergio Garcia.

For all of his quirks and faults and major championship stumbles over his career, the Ryder Cup has been Garcia’s stage. Other than missing a single appearance during a break from competitive golf in 2010, El Nino’s been a stalwart of the Euro team since 1999 — and he’s already assured of going down as one of the best in the competition’s history with a career 18-9-5 record in the event.

The same personality traits that have made him susceptible to implosion in big moments over the course of his career have made him a star in the Cup. His antics are famed (such as the screaming at Valhalla in 2008) and there’s no question it gets at some American players.

He’ll have no problem playing the role of heel in Minnesota — and there’s reason to fear Sergio once again if you’re an American fan. He’s coming off one of the better summers of his career, and there’s few better in the world at picking up shots tee-to-green than the Spaniard. At a big track like Hazeltine, that could be key.

Of course, if the Euros need a big putt to save the Cup, you can be certain American fans will remind him of the weakness that’s cost him multiple major championships over the course of his career.

Justin Rose has been around for so long it's easy to forget he's only 36. As a 17 year-old, Rose burst onto the scene at the 1998 Open Championship. He finished fourth as an amateur and was going to be the next star of British golf.

It didn't quite work out that way as Rose missed 21 consecutive cuts as a professional. It took a while for him to become a leaderboard regular, but over the past six or so years, Rose has finally lived up to the potential we saw at Royal Birkdale in '98.

The culmination of Rose's perseverance may have come at the 2013 U.S. Open. During that week at Merion, Rose became a major champion, holding off Phil Mickelson. It was a giant weight off the shoulders of Rose who was trending toward the label of "best player to never win a major."

Since that U.S. Open, Rose has added two more wins, which brings his career total to seven on the PGA Tour. He also has a handful of wins on the European Tour. Oh, and he won a GOLD MEDAL at this summer's Olympics. He keeps that thing in his golf bag and shows it off whenever he can, just in case you were wondering how much that meant to him.

So, what does it all mean for this year's Ryder Cup? Well, he's played good golf this year, and in the past he's been an absolute stud for Team Europe. His 9-3-2 record is fantastic and he has played a large role in Europe's most recent wins in 2014 and 2012. In 2014, he went 3-0-2 and collected four out of a possible five points. In 2012, his singles match win against Phil Mickelson is largely viewed as the ignition of that record European comeback.

On a team that is half-rookies, Rose is the rock. This will be his fourth appearance and given his past performances, he will be a tough out for anyone he faces.

If you’re a casual American golf fan, this will be a fair question as the Ryder Cup gets underway from Minneapolis next week: Who the hell is Rafael Cabrera-Bello?

The answer: a Ryder Cup rookie that might just be built for the competition like his countryman, Sergio Garcia.

The 32-year-old Cabrera-Bello’s never made a true team appearance as a professional, but he did make his first national team appearance playing for Spain in the Olympics in August. That moment wasn’t too much for RCB — finishing fifth in the tournament, just off the medal stand. But, of course, the Olympics were a traditional 72-hole stroke play competition.

But in match play? Cabrera-Bello’s been lethal. RCB has a 10-4-1 career singles record, and has reached the semifinals of two of the three professional match play event’s he’s competed in — including this year’s Dell Match Play at Austin Country Club. He hasn’t just breezed by lesser competition in those pairings, either. He picked up a 3&2 win over Rory McIlroy in Austin earlier this year.

Don’t be shocked if Cabrera-Bello sits during some of the foursomes and fourball competitions early in the week as a rookie, but he could make a viable partner for a veteran like Garcia later in the weekend. A longer hitter off the tee like fellow rookie Thomas Pieters or Henrik Stenson could be a fit, too — RCB’s 113th on the Euro Tour in driving distance, and he’s not exactly known for his accuracy, either. If he can’t get it in play off the tee at Hazeltine, that could present an opportunity on Sunday for the U.S.

Sullivan is the kind of Euro Tour mainstay that no one following golf in America has heard of, before he crushes their spirit in a Ryder Cup. The diminutive Englishman was a trendy pick all summer at multiple majors, a dark horse name that, given his 2015-16 form, could have easily hung with the best in the world at the most pressure-packed tournaments.

Sullivan now enters the most pressurized arena in golf as one of six European rookies. He's a lighthearted talent that could probably easily pair up with anyone else on the team. Sullivan and Rory McIlroy played multiple practice rounds together at some of this summer's majors, so that could be a high-powered partner to help break the rookie in at Hazeltine.

Like fellow rookie Chris Wood, Sullivan is a player who has been pretty "meh" over the second half of the summer. He put together a run of form in early July, posting three straight top 15 results, including at the Henrik Stenson runaway Open Championship. But there hasn't been much there to make you think he's coming to pour in birdies for three straight days in Minnesota. And yet, he's one of those unknowns that puts the fear of God into you if you're a USA fan.

Sullivan showed well when he was over in the States this year, which was more often as a WGC qualifier. If you're Davis Love III, you have to hope the pressure gets to some of these Euro rookies in hostile territory. Sullivan doesn't seem like an option for that.

The B1G star who wasn't, returns to the Midwest playing for the enemy. Fitzpatrick was hailed as an amateur stud, an English version of an up-and-coming Jordan Spieth after his low amateur honors at the 2013 Open and later winning the U.S. Amateur. He enrolled at Northwestern, where he was supposed to light it up, but only had a cup of coffee before turning pro and leaving Chicago.

Fitzpatrick is still just 22 years old (he looks 15) and will probably be a fixture on the European roster for many years. He's yet another one of the six rookies in this campaign, and it's never easy to make your debut at an away game Ryder Cup. While he's still so young, the Englishman has plenty of experience on both sides of the Atlantic and will be well-acquitted on a North American track like Hazeltine.

Fitz is also a subdued personality, who probably gives captain Darren Clarke some flexibility when it comes to partners. He won the Nordea Masters back in June, the second pro win of a career that's just getting started. The highlight of his year may have been that impressive T7 at the Masters, where he posted some of the best tee-to-green stats in the field in his second start at Augusta.

The rookie missed a bunch of cuts in the States but had a really strong August and September on the Euro Tour. The bottom line: he's a top prospect who has already played on the biggest stages and this is his first opportunity to start putting points on the board in what will be a long Ryder Cup career.

Lee Westwood may never capture a major championship, but he has certainly been on the winning side when it comes to Ryder Cup play.

A starter in each biennial event since 1997, Westwood has earned 23 points and helped his mates lift the Cup in seven of the nine matches he’s played. He has 23 European Tour trophies but his most recent win was at the Malaysian Open in April 2014. He also owns two PGA Tour victories, with his last U.S. triumph at the St. Jude Classic in June 2010.

Westwood, who may or may not have dissed Tiger Woods with recent pre-Hazeltine comments about the U.S. vice captain having an "adverse effect" on the Americans, also has the distinction of going almost unbeaten against the former No. 1 in Ryder Cup matches. Woods’ futility against the Brit began in Day 2 fourballs in 1997, when he and Mark O’Meara lost to Westwood and Nick Faldo, 2&1.

Westwood and Sergio Garcia teamed up to defeat Woods and Mark Calcavecchia, 2&1 in foursomes in 2002, but he and Garcia suffered Westwood’s only loss to Tiger and Davis Love III in foursomes. It was nothing but Ws for Westwood from then on, including Day 1 foursomes in 2004 when he and Darren Clarke outlasted the ill-matched team of Woods and Phil Mickelson.

Of course, beating Tiger Woods in the Ryder Cup is not exactly a badge of honor, since the former world No. 1 pretty much stinks against the Europeans, as his 13-17-3 record would indicate. Still, Westwood will forever own bragging rights over the golfer that outgoing PGA Tour commish Tim Finchem recently called the greatest ever to play the game. So, there is that.

You know, we really don't give Martin Kaymer enough credit for what is, indisputably, a Hall of Fame career. Perhaps it's the wild fluctuations in form. You may not hear from him for a couple years and then, boom, there he is winning The Players and U.S. Open by a record margin in the span of a month. He's been No. 1 in the world and he's also lost his PGA Tour card.

Despite the ups and downs, Kaymer has delivered in so many of the biggest moments in this game. He's got two majors, that Players, and made what is arguably the most pressure-intense putt in the history of the Ryder Cup. It was Kaymer, who buried the putt in 2012 at Medinah to clinch that record European comeback and stun the American crowd. That kind of nails experience is why he was chosen by captain Darren Clarke this year.

Clarke made it clear he wanted to go with experience with his three captains picks. Five rookies had already qualified automatically through the Euro points system. Thomas Pieters' excellent finish forced Clarke's hand to take on a sixth rookie. That only enhanced the profile of guys like Kaymer and Lee Westwood (and almost Luke Donald!) for the wild card selections.

The German has six top 10s in Euro Tour events and showed out back home in the Porsche European Open, the event preceding the Ryder Cup. So, despite his disappearances from the top levels of the game at times, Kaymer is in form, has a history of breaking American hearts, and will be relied upon all week by Clarke and his teammates.

The hottest player in the world heading to Hazeltine might just be a young Belgian you probably haven’t heard of — and the 2016 Ryder Cup might be his springboard to superstardom.

If you’re a casual golf fan, you’d be forgiven for not knowing Thomas Pieters’ name. But the 24-year-old has a pedigree that’s led European captain Darren Clarke to put him in the same category as Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy already. He’s won three times on the European tour since Aug. 2015, but his last two months of golf leading up to Clarke’s captain's selections helped him make the roster.

Pieters played his way onto the biggest stage of his career, starting Saturday in the final group during the Olympics representing Belgium. A third-round 77 took him out of gold medal contention, but he bounced back nicely on Sunday for a fourth-place finish. Still, Pieters was well out of the conversation for a Ryder Cup spot. He’d need wins in his next two starts at the Czech Masters and Made In Denmark to make the Euro roster on points — most thought his only shot to be at Hazeltine.

Then, he almost did it. He followed up a one-stroke defeat on the 72nd hole and solo second place finish in Prague with a win at the Made In Denmark, leaving him just outside the roster on points. His run of form was too much for Clarke to pass up, placing the young breakout star on the roster ahead of veteran Luke Donald and U.S.-based Scotsman Russell Knox.

Hazeltine plays right into the hands of the long-hitting Pieters’ strengths, so don’t be shocked if he sees lots of playing time early in the week with a shorter-hitting veteran. And despite only making a handful of starts in the U.S. as a professional, Pieters is more than familiar with American courses and playing in the Midwest in the fall. He won a NCAA individual title for Illinois in 2012. Oh, and he’s a huge Chicago sports fan