Wyndham Clarks won the US Open

Shane Ryan at Shane Ryan here from Golf Digest is joining us on the Adam Gold Show among the many books that he has written. Also, the cup they couldn't lose about the run-up to last year's Ryder company joins us on the Adam Gold Show. All right, let's sing the praises of Wyndham Clark before we talk about what could have been with Rory McIlroy.

Do you think they're staying power there? Hey, first of all, I just want to say thank you for saying among the many books. There's only been two, but I appreciate you. I thought there were more than two.

Just two golf ones anyway, a million sitting on my computer that nobody would ever think to publish. But we had Slaying the Tiger, right? Yep, Slaying the Tiger, the cup they couldn't lose. And that is the end of the list.

It's not Chasing Legends also? That is the British version of Slaying the Tiger based on the fact that we forgot to tell them we were changing the title. Well, you're going to fool people who go to Amazon. You're going to fool people who go to Amazon. They're going to buy that book and go, didn't I just read this? Yes, that's the scam we're running to sell more British copies of his book.

All right. So yeah, Wyndham Clark was awesome. And actually, a little pat in the back here, I kind of thought he would win and I predicted it. Just because I watched him at the Wells Fargo in Charlotte and he, despite the fact that I'm a career golf writer, felt like I knew very little about Wyndham Clark, right? I was like, if you would put a gun to my head, I'm like, is he a 42 year old journeyman? Uh, but no, of course he's, he's young and he's a really elite elite elite talent that just took a long time to kind of figure out how to win and how to compete at the highest level.

And a lot of people were kind of laughing because he said, you know, I felt like the Wells Fargo was a major, but I won. And of course it's not, but he did play against an extremely good field. There was being chased down all day Sunday and held very tight and was very good under pressure. And so once I saw him go up there, I'm like, okay, Ricky Fowler has not been in this situation for a very long time. He never won in the first place, but you know, he's not been competitive in a PGA tour tournament, much less the major Rory.

We've seen what's happened to him for the last 10 years. And then it felt like Shepley was just a little too far back. He wasn't putting well and then everybody else was at the thing.

So the logical answer to me was Wyndham Clark. And it's just based on, you know, how well he played there and thinking that I don't think this guy's going to choke. And, you know, he has his Rocky moments for sure, but he did what he had to do.

And he made some unbelievable pressure shots at the end and a lot of short game magic and all that kind of stuff. And I just thought it was a really fun round and yeah, all praise to Wyndham Clark. He definitely deserves it. And I think we're going to see him win another major.

I don't think this is going to be his only one. Shane Ryan is joining us here on the Adam Gold show from Golf Digest. Just to Wyndham Clark, he felt like he had won a major because of the fields in those events. It was an elevated event and you have most, I mean, basically all of the top players on the PGA tour, you know, maybe there's five or six or maybe seven players who are playing at Live that would have also been in an event like this. So you are playing against an elite field on a very difficult golf course. So I understand why he's saying that. Now to Rory, do you think this one hurt more than what happened at the old course?

No, I'm with you. I think the old course takes the sort of, you know, number one spot with a button. It's the home of golf, you know, he's playing, not in his home country, but well, technically yes, it's home country. He's playing in the UK. But you know, in front of his home people, it would have been an unbelievably poetic storybook way to end that drought last year. And you know, probably that's harder. I read a comment that he said to his agent yesterday, this is just like St Andrew's same thing. So there are a lot of similarities there, but I think for sure losing the open has to have hurt more just because it's so that was so devastating. The fact that you lost to a guy who everybody knew was going to live, you know, a few weeks later, there was just a lot going on there that it was like one of those things where you're like, here's the storybook ending. Now, how do we reverse it and make it the opposite of the storybook ending, make it the most painful possible narrative.

And that's what you had in Scotland this year. What do you think is getting in his way? You're a man given to thought, maybe even overthought as I am. What do you think if you had to analyze Rory McIlroy from afar is getting in his way? Because obviously he didn't putt great on Saturday or Sunday, but he also didn't hit it very close to the hole either day.

See, after you correctly diagnosed me as an overthinker, I want to say something like, well, Adam, you just got to win. No, you know, it is, you know, it's it's this thing in golf where if you, if you have enough scar tissue built up and this happens as players get older, but it can also happen in cases like Rory, where things just go wrong for long enough. He said it before, it's like, he's trying to win his first major. You know, there is a version of Rory McIlroy that has won four majors, right? On his Wikipedia page.

That's what it says. But the guy who is going out into the course for the majors and putting himself in contention over and over again, I figured it out today, 19 since that last major win in 2014, 19 top tens and 33 majors, which is almost comical when you think about it with zero wins. So yeah, when he's going out there, he's like a, he's a guy who basically is Greg Norman or like Lee Westwood or someone, right?

Like a Montgomery. He's having, he has real, real trouble doing it. And he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's real, real trouble doing it.

And we've seen all kinds of different things happen to him. And what was so interesting about St. Andrews and about yesterday was that it's hard to pinpoint it as a choke, but it's like death by a thousand pars where you can't, you know, you're capable of shooting 66, 67, 68, and that would have worn yesterday, but you can't do it. You can't make the big putt. And it's just this steady procession where the best you can do is shoot 70.

And it's just not going to do it in this case. And so that's, yeah, I just think scar tissue built up is really the full explanation for it and the insane amount of pressure that everybody puts on him and that he definitely puts on himself. This is my, my thoughts on Rory are, and I just, I'm curious what you think about this is that his next major, whenever it comes, and it may never come obviously, but will be one where he comes from off the pack off, you know, well back in the pack, maybe he goes out an hour, hour and a half before everybody else and post a ridiculously low score. Like he almost did it Augusta a few years ago.

I think it was the Patrick Reed masters. He posted a huge, I mean, credit like a 64 final round and post a score and then the leaders fall apart in front of him. But if he ever wins another one, I think that there is a run.

He's, he, he, he's probably playing better today than he ever has, except when it matters the most that I think he'll win a bunch more if he can crack through and win one. I saw a tweet yesterday that was especially brutal that said, you know, one of these days, somebody's going to sign an incorrect scorecard and Rory's going to win a fifth major. Well, kind of feels true, right?

It feels like so brutally honest and accurate, but no, I think you're right. I, you know, the problem is we've seen, it wasn't the Patrick Reed major. That was the one actually, he was right in the final group with him and he kind of, okay. But there, there have been a couple, not just in Augusta, but other places where he makes these Sunday charges. The problem is that he seems to know when he gets too close to the lead, then come the bogeys, then come the, but right now, like that's another, we talk about just by a thousand parts that like the false charge, the false Sunday charge is another classic genre of the, of the Rory close call at majors. So yeah, I mean, it is hard to say how he's going to win.

Like yesterday felt like almost the blueprint, right? Like there's nobody like Fowler can't cut it. Sheffler's too far off and he can't put nobody else's clothes. All he's got to do is beat Wyndham Clark. Who's never won a major before. I've never been in contention at a major and Wyndham Clark got shaky, like even par. So all Rory had to do is shoot two under and win. That feels like, you know, it's never easy, but that feels like as easy as it's going to get for him. So yeah, you're almost kind of, if you're like a scientist trying to write a formula for how Rory wins the major, you're almost befuddled at this point.

Like there's no cure for whatever this is. Shane Ryan is joining us here on the Adam Golger from Golf Digest. Final thing, and I'll bring it back to something that I know you love. And not only was there the book, The Cup They Couldn't Lose, there was also, if you're interested in the Ryder Cup, there is a great, your podcast series. I've, I've gone back and listened to basically all of the episodes multiple times, including the Palm, your Paul McGinley episode. You have several, you, you, you wax poetic about Paul McGinley, who I thought was very good when he did like earlier in the day coverage.

I enjoy listening to him. So you don't seem like you're a lock for Ricky Fowler to be on this Ryder Cup team as I am. Oh, that's interesting. Yeah.

I don't know that I thought too much about it. It's I think if he keeps playing well, he gets close to being a lock there. I just, you know, no laying up had a tweet where it kind of goes through the guys who were automatically qualified and then the picks and it's boy, it's tightly packed. You know, you're going to leave some really, really good players off that list. Whether it's like someone like Justin Thomas, who it's hard to imagine him not be on the Ryder Cup, but if you keep shooting eighties, there's a world in which you can see that, Oh, well, okay.

If you can't break 78, we can't have, right. So yeah, it's, but you look at the names and it's like someone like Fowler is definitely right on the edge. It's going to matter so much, you know, it's all speculation. What happens in the next three months is so important.

What happens at the open, especially and in the playoffs, it's, it's tough. It's tough because he's coming from out of nowhere right now. And yeah, I, right now I'd say yes, but it's a, it's, it's a really, really, really tenuous. Yes.

Yeah. I think I, well, he certainly has to continue to play well. If he continues to play well over the next, you know, two months, I think he's on the team. I think the interesting thing, I assume Kepka is going to be there cause he's automatically qualified. And he is a member of the PGA of America, uh, through, uh, through winning PGA championships, DJ Dustin Johnson. I'm, I'm going to guess that DJ will be on the team when they get to, uh, get to Italy, unless either tell Zach Johnson, he doesn't want to be on it or he's playing poorly.

Yeah. A lot depends on the appetite for, for taking the live call first to which Zach Johnson really hasn't tipped his hand. Uh, the only thing I think about is that, you know, in terms of the guys who are vice captains, we're going to be in his ear. You've got Fred couples, you've got Davis love.

These guys have not been sympathetic to, to the whole listing. So, you know, you got Brooks captain almost certainly going to automatically qualify, but after that, you know, if you're, when it comes down to the human choice, where it's like, okay, Sam burns just want to play off of that. And he's playing really well. And it's him or DJ, uh, how do we call Sam burns and tell him he's not going to be on the team? Right.

It's just those little things I think get tough when like the push comes to shove. So DJ it's, yeah, he just went five and Oh, he's been a terrific writer cup player. Um, there's obvious good reasons for taking him, especially, you know, the way he played this past tournament, he had a good U S open. So, but again, all you're seeing these guys is four times, right? Because they're not going to come back to the PGA tour.

So you'll see him again at Hoylake and I guess you can judge his results and live and things like that, but I can see him being left off really, really easily. And again, we don't, it's hard to mind me Zach Johnson, but I don't know if those guys in the captaincy sort of tight inner circle are super sympathetic to the whole, this thing, Shane, Ryan at Shane, Ryan here, uh, author of two books, a third, if you're not paying attention, uh, on golf from golf digest, man, I appreciate your time. Uh, enjoy, uh, enjoy the rest of the major golf season. I'll talk to you very soon. All right. Thanks, Adam. You got it. Shane, Ryan here on the Adam goat show.