The US Ryder Cup roster is coming into focus and Tiger Woods is going to be on it

UPDATE: With Labor Day come and gone, the first deadline for captain’s picks has arrived and Jim Furyk’s choices seems painfully obvious. That does not mean, of course, that it will play out as easily as it should. There is always potential for a curveball or political maneuvering with the Ryder Cup, but that just seems so remote this time around.

The four captain’s picks this year SHOULD be Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Bryson DeChambeau, and Tony Finau. Those are the guys that should round out this roster. It’s a mix of rookies and the two veterans who have overseen the overhaul of the USA approach to this competition. Phil and Tiger, if healthy, always have an argument for a spot, whether you think their play deserves it or not. Their importance to this match play event, their history with it, and their place in the game gives them a leg up compared to every other American golfer out there. It’s the rare exception, as with Sergio Garcia on the Euro side, where current form and season-strength can be discounted.

Furyk enjoys the convenience of both Tiger and Phil playing well enough to deserve a pick, too. Tiger has played like a top 10 to 15 player in the world this season. He didn’t even need to do that to earn a spot. But he did and he’s going to be a pick.

Even with a 2018 win, Phil’s season and recent form do not present as strong an argument as Tiger. But, again given his place in the game and in this process, he’s going to get a pick. Phil landed in 10th place on the points list when that closed on Sunday of the PGA Championship. So even after a spotty summer for Phil, it’s not like Furyk is going way down the list just to make room for the Lefty. Tiger and Phil will be picks and both should be picks.

That leaves the two rookies playing their way onto the team. DeChambeau blew up over his final five holes at the PGA to miss the cut and finish as the first man out in the auto-bid points race. Since then, however, all he’s done is go back-to-back to win the first two tournaments of the FedExCup Playoffs. That’s four wins in his short career, three this year, and two rolling right into the most important stretch of the season for Ryder purposes. This all comes after finishing 9th in the points race. So yes, Le Artiste is going to Paris. He’d already had a strong case, and Tiger has reportedly wanted to play with him. So winning the first two legs of the postseason gives Furyk no choice

That leaves Finau for the fourth and final spot. Finau finished 13th in the points race, behind Bryson, Phil, Xander Schauffele, and Matt Kuchar. But he’s a birdie machine, shown well at the majors this year, and now posted second-place finish and a T4 in the first two events of the FedExCup.

Unlike the other three, he’s not a lock but he should be the overwhelming favorite. There had been some reporting from No Laying Up that Kuchar had the inside position for a pick in the days after the PGA. He’s an elder statesman of the U.S. side and is malleable and gregarious enough to partner with any red-ass malcontent on the American roster. But this spot should, and seems likely to go for Finau.

That brings us to the matter of timing. Furyk will announce three picks on Tuesday, September 4th in a news conference at 5 p.m. ET. The fourth pick will be the following Monday morning. That brings one more FedExCup Playoffs event, the BMW Championship, into play. Would that change the status of Finau and bring someone else into the mix? It shouldn’t, no matter how dramatic things change at the BMW. It’s just one week. This scheduling breakup is a result of the “Horschel Rule,” which I explain below. So should he put Finau on the team now and leave one of those absolute locks, like Tiger, for the announcement next week? It’s an odd dynamic that Shane Ryan illuminated in these tweets too.

This will all be over soon, but Furyk’s path to filling out the roster seems pretty clear at this point. Now comes the order in which he does it.

There are a couple concurrent contests running Sunday at the PGA Championship. There is the obvious final round of a major, which Brooks Koepka leads by two and is the heavy favorite to win. And then there’s the Ryder Cup points race, the last dash to automatically qualify for Jim Furyk’s USA roster.

The PGA of America closes the points race, largely based on earnings, after their premier event, the PGA Championship. The majors are also worth double points in the qualifying process so there’s an opportunity, if you play well, to make a big move up the standings. As we start Sunday’s final round, Furyk’s qualifiers are largely set. The top seven of eight are locked in for Paris at the end of September, but there’s a possibility for some movement in that eighth and final spot.

UPDATE: Webb Simpson is your 8th and final qualifier. None of the remaining challengers could overcome his lead in the points race, so it will be Webb and Bubba rounding out the auto-bids for Paris. The first eight on the roster are as follows.

Simpson, on the back of his dominant Players Championship win in May, captured the eighth spot in the standings. Simpson is also did not exactly blow it in this final event before the standings closed. He started the final round in a tie for 15th place at 6-under. Here are the pre-PGA Championship standings:

This was supposed to be a weekend of Bryson DeChambeau battling Simpson for the last spot. But The Artiste booted it in the second round, making three bogeys in his last six holes of the second round to go from safely on the right side of the cut line to an early exit with no points. So DeChambeau will have to rely on a captain’s pick if he’s to make the roster and that’s not ideal for a personality that I think fans and content-makers (me) wanted in Paris.

The two primary candidates to jump Simpson on Sunday were Kevin Kisner and Xander Schauffele, and there was the longshot potential for Tiger Woods and Gary Woodland to shoot all way up to an auto-bid with a win. Tony Finau had a chance to jump into the final spot but he made the cut on the number and sits in a tie for 58th. He needed Webb to completely collapse and post some miracle round to shoot into the top five.

The one spot of pressure on Webb, however, was that he likely needed to make it on points. That’s because the competition for the four captain’s picks is stiff and he probably wouldn’t have been an option. It’s almost certain that two places will be reserved for two legends and players that have been integral in overhauling the USA’s entire approach.

With the first eight set, here are your most likely captain’s pick options from the standings above.

This is not up for debate. Unless he gets injured or wins on Sunday and makes it on points, Tiger is going to be a pick. And he should be. Despite his points ranking, which is diminished by not playing any of the majors last year, he’s played as a top 15-20 player in the world this season. So his game has been good enough and oh, yes, he’s also Tiger Woods and has to be on the team no matter how good or bad he’s looked.

This is the first time Phil will not be an automatic points qualifier since 1993. It’s an outrageous run that we probably won’t see ever again, from either side. Phil has not played well this summer. It’s a hard truth but he’s just not been a Sunday factor at any event since he won the WGC Mexico. But he’s got that legend status, is part of the clique that’s running this U.S. Ryder Cup operation these days, and is not THAT far off on the points list. The form has been underwhelming, but he’s still 10th on the points. He’s going to be on the team.

Here’s a third veteran that, from all indications, is likely a choice for Furyk. He’s got less of an argument than Tiger and Phil, who can pretty much reserve two spots on US teams whenever they are healthy. Kuchar was 12th in points heading into the PGA, where he missed the cut. While his record is underwhleming, he’s been on the last four Ryder Cup teams and is a mainstay on the Presidents Cup team. You can argue for his spot to go to another young up-and-comer, but Kuchar is malleable and can partner with anyone. Everyone on the team loves him. Maybe that shouldn’t carry weight for winning matches, but it does in this process.

Kuchar may get left off if he plays like garbage during the FedExCup Playoffs. But for this exercise, we’ll operate under the assumption that only one of the four captain’s picks is up for grabs. If Kuchar is left off, expect two of the names below to be the final adds.

Bryson DeChambeau — The last man out on points will be a controversial pick. Tiger, from all accounts, loves him and the way he thinks about the game. That backing matters. But he can also rub people the wrong way. There’s this narrative that has gained steam, based on recent range meltdowns, a choke finish in Europe, and a stupid handshake etiquette controversy, that he might not be well-suited for a team environment and the one that’s the most pressurized in golf. Whether that narrative is just dumb noise or matters to Furyk remains to be seen. He made it harder on himself with his late boot and MC at the PGA.

Tony Finau — The big hitter played with Furyk at the PGA and did not make a great first impression, hitting a shank en route to an ugly first round number. But then he showed his stuff on day 2, posting an absurd 10 birdies in one of the wildest major championship scorecards you’ll ever see. Birdies matter more at the Ryder Cup and in match play than anywhere else. Furyk had to love it but is there room for a guy who is likely to be a part of this team in the next decade? He posted top 10s at the first three majors of the year and his style is a strong argument for the fourth spot.

Kevin Kisner — He’s looked great at the last two major championships and was a darling of the team room at last fall’s Presidents Cup. That seems to be one of the stronger arguments for why he might make it. Mickelson may also lobby for him to reprise that successful Pres Cup partnership. As a fan, Kisner would be a great personality to root for but again, there just may not be enough room this time.

Xander Schauffele — The X-man is the reigning rookie of the year but this process can get political and both he and Finau probably have the least capital in that respect right now. If you’re a proponent of getting more young blood on the team, he’s arguably the best option. He continues to post in all the biggest and most pressurized events in the game. There’s just a lot competition for one spot right now. Of all the candidates, I could most envision him turning it on and balling out the next four weeks to make Furyk’s choice for him.

We can assess the roster based on points, which lock down on Sunday night for the American side. But it’s premature to get too wrapped up in arguing captain’s picks. That’s because so much can happen between now and the selections. Here’ the schedule:

Tues September 4th — Three of four captain’s picks are made following the second FedExCup event in Boston. That leaves three tournaments, including two playoffs events, between the PGA and the first round of picks.

Mon September 10 — The fourth and final pick is made. This adds the third leg of the Playoffs, the BMW Championship, as a potential last-minute proving ground. This is a modification to the so-called “Horschel Rule,” named as such after Billy Horschel became the hottest golfer in the world and won the FedExCup after Tom Watson had made his captain’s picks in 2014. The last time around in 2016, the Horschel Rule put the fourth and final pick coming after the Tour Championship. But that got too ridiculously close to the actual Ryder Cup, with the debate going into that Sunday night at the start of the matches week.

The roster universe feels confined to the options above but Horschel’s run in 2014 is a reminder of how much this can change. He was not really on the radar in 2014. So there’s still a chance the roster is filled out with someone not listed. It will come from that top 25 in standings, but it could be a name no one is discussing if he gets hot enough between now and the final pick. We spend an inordinate amount of time debating Ryder Cup rosters, but it’s one of my favorite biennial exercises and it’s going to consume the next month.