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PARIS – Phil Mickelson was standing next to the 14th green on Friday, holding hands with his wife Amy and seeming to have seen a ghost. How did he find himself here on the wrong side of the Ryder Cup? Was not it supposed to be a thing of the past? Did not he put his reputation in Scotland four years ago, did he say exactly what to say, precisely to avoid suffering through another scene like this?
Hazeltine was supposed to be an exorcism.
But the Ryder Cup has not finished yet tormenting Mickelson.
No, it's not Mickelson's fault that the United States were beaten Friday, as the Americans led a 3-1 morning in a 5-3 afternoon disappointment. But it was easy to see him, again, as the face of a new American crisis. With Bryson DeChambeau and himself, they ended up with 5 defeats and 4 defeats against Sergio Garcia and Alex Noren, a match that was part of the first European sweep in four, and it might be time for Mickelson to play cheerleader for a day.
The US team had control in the morning, but Europe swept the afternoon session to take a 5-3 lead on the second day of the Ryder Cup.
The United States is in trouble. Europe has a two-point lead and a strong momentum. Here's everything you need to get ready for Day 2 of the Ryder Cup.
All you need to know about the 2018 edition of the Ryder Cup biennial, which takes place at the Golf National de Paris, France.
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What else can you do with a notoriously ferocious player on a course like The National Golf, where water and thickness and roughness punctuate on almost every shot?
The captain of the United States, Jim Furyk, is clearly in the affair with Mickelson, but also with his choice, because he decided to add Mickelson to the position of captain, even if he did not play well these last month. Furyk wanted to use his best players last Friday in four balls, which seemed to be the shining wager of the door.
But then, what to do with Mickelson? Do you sit for the whole day? Rumors ran throughout the morning that Furyk was considering exactly that, but he finally sent Mickelson for another shot with DeChambeau.
It could hardly have been worse. The duo bogeyed three of the first five holes, did not make a birdie in the front row, and fell backwards on the turn towards Garcia and Noren. A minor rally reduced the US deficit to 5 points at one point, but it ended with a groan at the 14th green.
In fairness to Mickelson and DeChambeau, Garcia and Noren sometimes played sultry and sensational golf, making five birdies en route to building their big lead. But most holes have not even been competitive. He proved particularly ugly at the third hole, a 558-yard par 5, when Mickelson tried to play carefully off the tee with an iron – and shot in the water anyway.
"We thought it would be a good format for us, hitting a bunch of irons off the tees," said Mickelson. "We just did not play our best, they played phenomenal golf, and I do not try to take it away from them, we were not the best either."
It is time for Furyk to launch a call that could be controversial, but it should still happen. He needs to play against Mickelson until Sunday in singles.
Any match played Saturday afternoon removes an opportunity for a younger and more pointed player. (Furyk has already said that Mickelson would not play Saturday morning in four balls.) It could even annoy Mickelson to sit all day, to provoke something deep inside his competitors, who will prepare him for the simple. He has been an essential part of this team for two decades and has played well in the last two Ryder Cups, but it's also hard to dispute the facts: the defeat of DeChambeau and he at the National Golf now has more career losses ( 21) than any other player in the history of the Ryder Cup.
At this point, it would seem like a criminal offense if Brooks Koepka, Tony Finau or Tiger Woods missed another session because Furyk wanted to give Mickelson another chance in a format that did not seem appropriate to him.
"I have so much confidence in Phil in his ability to take a young player like Bryson and help him," Furyk said. "It's Phil Mickelson, he's a great champion, he has a lot of experience, I'll be honest, I'll do it again."
Mickelson has always been an easy target to criticize, especially during this event. He and Woods have been the Batman and the Robin of American golf for a long time (you can probably know what is in this analogy), and because the Americans have not won in Europe in 25 years, whatever. one had to bear the weight of the fault, and it makes sense that it be them.
Whatever you think of Mickelson as a player, he has always been a valued teammate, an enthusiastic supporter of his American compatriots. A party was on Friday as he was hanging around the 14th green after he and DeChambeau were defeated to offer words of encouragement to Jordan Spieth and Justin Thomas. He talked about strategy with Patrick Reed, with assistant captain Zach Johnson, and asked Thomas Bjorn to shake his hand when the day's games were over.
Mickelson has always been unparalleled on a golf course like this, the social graces, the work of the room, the tilting of his cap, the formation of friendships that seem both calculating and authentic. You could feel that he was immersed in the scene around him as European fans began to sing and applaud, and he approached his wife to try and get rid of the stink of disappointment.
He will soon be in charge of an American team. We enter the twilight of his career in the Ryder Cup. He may not be ready to play the captain role yet, but if he really believed in putting the team first, he could concede that his match was Is not very tight this week. He could take a little heat with Furyk with a self-sacrificing gesture and walk the course wearing an atrium, spraying words of encouragement on Saturday instead of unpredictable journeys.
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