Presidents Cup 2026: Myth-busting the 12 most common tropes of team match-play golf

If you follow the Cups—we’re talking Ryder, Presidents, Solheim, even Walker and Curtis—you've heard them all before. These are the tropes that define the discourse, from "never pick rookies!" to "pair good friends together for chemistry!" to "Europeans just care more!"

By turns, they can seem informative or annoying, but the more important question is, are they true?

Jason Aquino is the head of Scouts Consulting, a strategic analysis and process shop that works with USA Basketball and worked with Team USA through multiple Ryder and Presidents Cups starting in 2016. As a kid, he was the rare Ryder Cup junkie who would watch VHS tapes of old matches, and he then spent the first part of his career as a military analyst consulting with the Department of Defense on long-term strategic warfare. It’s a combination that makes him uniquely suited to consider team golf in depth. He is, by far, the brightest Ryder/Presidents Cup mind I've encountered, and he's been through the highest highs and lowest lows of the last decade with the American team.

In other words, this man doesn't just know the tropes; he's studied the tropes, he's run the numbers and his BS detector is finely tuned. I jumped on a zoom call with him last week to go over the most common talking points, one by one, and figure out which have merit and which collapse with the slightest scrutiny. What follows is a transcript of his thoughts, edited for length and clarity.

Trope One: Always pick the hot golfer

Explanation: Captain's picks (six per side) should be used on players who have shown very good form in the past month or two.

Aquino's take: It depends on what you mean by hot. Are you just considering the last four weeks and the guy who won two tournaments in that stretch? In that case, the answer is no. With captain's picks, you're looking at a much larger body of work, plus fit for the golf course and fit for potential pairings. If you won on a course that bears no resemblance to the course you're going to play, how relevant is that?

And you have to be so careful, because some players can be feast or famine, and you don’t want to risk catching a guy at the tail end of his feast period. Lucas Glover in 2023 is a good example. (Glover had five top-6s, including two wins, in a seven-week stretch in July and August before the Rome Ryder Cup), where even before the end of qualifying it looked like he might be reverting to the mean.

For my team and most analytics professionals, we don't put a lot of stock in a flash in the pan, even if it's three weeks before the competition. Now, if you widen the sample size to at least a full season, even a little longer, and show me sustained form and consistency over that period, we can have a conversation.

Trope Two: You got to ‘load the boat’

Explanation: In Sunday singles, whether you're ahead, behind, or in a close match, you should front-load the lineup by putting your best players first.

Aquino's take: It's a reasonable strategy in most situations. If you're up big, you're going for the knockout blow. If you're down big, you need to get back in it ASAP. And if it's close, you're trying to get the momentum going. Ultimately, with “loading the boat,” we're talking about two things. Number one, you're shooting your shot. If the Cup is over and your best players are still on the golf course, you've committed captaincy malpractice. That's happened to both sides in the Ryder Cup.

Number two, it's a momentum play. I'm one of those people who thinks momentum is real. I've had people say to me, “why does it matter if every match is worth a point?” But that assumes players are not affected by what happens in front of them, and we know that's nonsense. Look at Brookline in ’99, or the Belfry in '02. You can't deny the effects a red wave or a blue wave can have on morale. You send your studs out front and hope the momentum they build lifts the bottom of the order." (For more on loading the boat, a shockingly rich topic, click here.)

Trope Three: If a team wins in the morning, put them back out in the afternoon

Explanation: Self-explanatory: A victorious partnership should stay together for the next session.

Aquino's take: I think the real question is, “Do you change the plan for the afternoon based on how it goes in the morning?” And I think the answer is “no.” You have to think of the cascading effect that has for the rest of your lineups in the competition. Now you're going to be scrambling to try to find a way to rest guys, and maybe you have to jostle pairings in the third or fourth sessions, and it gets very dicey. I'd be very hesitant to introduce that kind of disruption for the possibility that they might play well in the next session.

There's more room for that kind of flexibility on Saturday, but to me, flexibility means that you have developed your contingency plans, your branches and sequels, depending on what happens. You've got your Plan C and your Plan D, and you've briefed the players. The U.S. military isn't the best military in the world because we wing it and let the body bags fill up as we figure it out, but because we rehearse and we plan and develop contingencies. We had to switch it up with a couple of pairings Saturday at Montreal in the Presidents Cup, but Jim (Furk) had already looked ahead and laid the groundwork, and we felt very comfortable calling that audible.

The phrase "recency bias" is one I wish I heard in golf more often. I will die on this hill: No one knows for sure how a pairing is going to play from one round to the next. We saw this variance with the Europeans at Bethpage. Bob MacIntyre and Viktor Hovland were by far Europe's worst foursomes pairing on Friday morning. They shot one over and lost 2 down. A day later, they were Europe's best and shot six under to win. Then there's Ludvig Aberg and Matt Fitzpatrick, who shot seven under and won 5 and 3 on Friday morning, and a day later they shot one under and lost 4 and 2. I don't know how anyone can look at these swings and still believe they can assess who “has it” after one round.

Trope Four: Winning partnerships should stay together

Explanation: Across sessions, formats, and even across multiple Ryder Cups, two partners who win should stay together.

Aquino's take: I think of foursomes and fourball as two very different games, so to keep guys together between formats reflexively without any regard to what wins in either format is foolish. I remember when we got criticized for splitting up Patrick Cantlay and Xander Schauffele in '21 after foursomes, and sending Xander out with Dustin Johnson in fourball. They ended up rolling, so the criticism died down quickly, but people get anxious for some reason when it comes to splitting guys up between foursomes and fourball. But they're so different, and, also, from a practical standpoint, you have to split them up at some point if you plan to rest guys.

We've realized it's better to get guys into the matches early, get them feeling that pressure, because the longer you wait, the more the pressure builds. It doesn't help their preparation to keep them off the field. Add in the fact that guys need rest. Why even have a bench of any depth if you're afraid to use it? Another thing I can tell you is that we found a pretty firm relationship between a stressful match in the morning and not playing as well in the afternoon. I'm not going to define what we mean by a "stressful match," but you can kind of guess. And it makes the argument for having a rotation, which means splitting up even successful pairings to get fresh legs in.

I would never be dogmatic or axiomatic about whether one team's success in one format will translate to the other. It can, but you have to do the analysis.

As for keeping winning partnerships together cup to cup, it sometimes works out that way and it’s a great bonus if we can do that, but again, you have to do the analysis. Analytically, partners won’t necessarily be the same players they were two years ago any more than they will be the same players two years from now. Their fit together changes over time and as venues change. So it’s no surprise to see pairings work for a while—until they don’t.

Trope Five: Experience matters/rookies struggle under the pressure

Explanation: Captain's picks should be used on veteran players and lineups should go light on rookies.

Aquino's take: On the Ryder Cup side, the answer is, it depends if you're an American or a European. Since 1983, American rookies are 128-117-43, and Europe's are 83-109-39. (In both Rome and Bethpage, despite big losses, American rookies went 13-11-3 to Europe's 5-8-2.) I think Europeans produce weak rookies because they have an almost paternalistic system. They can't do anything without permission from a senior veteran, and especially after Brookline, I don't think there's much trust in rookies, which is why you'll often see a European veteran paired with a European rookie. Part of that is strong mentorship and indoctrination in their system, to be sure, and that’s not a bad thing, but it can slip into overprotectiveness. Even when you read accounts from European rookies, they often talk about how the veteran would do everything. And I think that manifests in results. When they get out on their own, they're a little less sure of themselves.

Americans tend to be more free range with their rookies. They give them more latitude, whether by design or not, and I think we're rewarded for that. Even with rookie-rookie pairings on the U.S. side, where both guys are new, since 1983 they're 12-7-5. I don't even know if on the American side we appreciate that enough. From where I sit, I never, ever worry about our rookies.

Trope Six: The Europeans just care more

Explanation: Winning the Ryder Cup matters more to Europeans, and the results reflect their greater passion.

Aquino's take: I know it's a question about the Europeans, but I can't read it as anything but an implicit criticism of U.S. teams. First, let's just dispel the notion that we don't care. It's bullshit. Speaking as an American, I get very defensive when I hear that, because I've been inside seven of these team rooms and I know how much it means to everyone—captains, vice captains, players, caddies, backroom staff. I've been there when we were on top of the world and I've been there on the flip side when it all comes apart. I've seen tears from a lot of people I never would have expected. These guys care.

But asking whether we know how to win, and questioning what the “USA way” is? That's a fair question. You can care but fail to apply that energy in productive ways. And if we're being honest, I think we move in fits and starts. And there's some work to do on the institutions and the infrastructure that prop our team up. I think Europe benefited from Tony Jacklin running four Ryder Cups from '83 to '89, and then Bernard Gallacher, who was basically his assistant, did the next three, so right away they had management continuity that allowed them to build what Paul McGinley calls the template. Dare I call it a culture? It's more than that. It's an institution. So what people see as not caring on the U.S. side is more us still trying to figure it out.

Trope Seven: The Europeans just get along better

Explanation: Similar to the above, the prevailing sentiment is that Europeans are friendlier with each other, the Americans are individualists, and the camaraderie helps them win team events.

Aquino's take: Historically, some of Europe’s top players couldn’t stand each other! I think we overstate the need to be friends or get along to play well together. I think some of the Europeans would never go out for a beer with each other outside of the Ryder Cup. But for a week, they seem to set differences aside and play together under their system.

Are they better than us at that? It's a great question, but I don't think so. But maybe we don't do as good a job at working on relationships, or on teammates who could be problematic heading into a Ryder Cup. Look what Paul McGinley did with Victor Dubuisson and Graeme McDowell at Gleneagles McGinley paired the two together in European Tour events and cultivated a relationship between them. You've got two years to prepare, more than that in the case of someone who will be on multiple teams. I’ve always told captains that if we get to a Ryder Cup or a Presidents Cup and we have a situation where we can only pair one guy with one or two others, interpersonally, we've failed them.

Trope Eight: You should always pair friends together

Explanation: Close friends will have better chemistry.

Aquino's take: Just because you are friends doesn't mean you have chemistry, so I would never equate the two. There are examples of friendship pairings that didn't work out. We've been told explicitly by some players not to pair them with friends because they have a hard time getting fired up. It's too familiar for them. When it comes to personal fit, I don't think we should be asking whether they get along. These guys are adults. They've been in pairings where they didn't necessarily like the guy they were playing with or couldn't relate to them.

What we should really ask is, do they bring out the best golf in each other? And that opens up an entirely different class of questions, more about their styles of play and communication. As an example, if we’re looking at a possible foursomes pairing that works analytically but one guy likes to charge his putts while the other is known to be very uncomfortable with the putt coming back, that’s a relevant consideration. Psychological questions enter the discussion, too, like if one partner is very hard on himself and another doesn't respond well to that kind of energy. It all factors in when captains look at compatibility.

Trope Nine: Pair a great driver with a good wedge player in foursomes

Explanation: Combine complementary attributes to make a successful team.

Aquino's take: It depends. It often works out that way when we actually run the simulations, but you have to be really careful. You can't lean on shorthand axioms or cliches. With modern analytics groups like ours, you're usually doing some form of simulation analysis, playing these matches out on paper and seeing that, well, this guy tends to hit it this far from the pin, and therefore needs a partner who is good from that range. Guys get it done in different ways, and simulations allow you to see that in ways that cliches blind you to. Who wins at Harbour Town, for example? In your head, you think a steady Eddie, straight driver, really keeps it in play. Guys like Furyk, Matt Kuchar, Luke Donald come to mind, and of course they’ve done great out there. Well, who's won more at Harbour Town than anyone else? Davis Love III.

There’s so much more nuance that goes into a foursomes pairing. A good example is Montreal at the 2024 Presidents Cup. In the pairing with Collin Morikawa and Sahith Theegala, we needed Collin's driving accuracy more than his iron play, so that's why you didn't see him tee off on the odds, which had all the par 3s. But when we sent him out with Sam Burns, we wanted Collin hitting off the par 3s with his iron play, and we wanted Sam's long driving on the evens and his putting.

Trope 10: More captain's picks are always better

Explanation: Teams should give themselves as many captain's picks as they're allowed, because those players will perform better than the guys who make it in the standings.

Aquino's Take: Yes, but not for that reason. It’s more about flexibility. When we first went to six picks, it was in the middle of COVID. Tournaments were getting canceled, we had no idea what was going to happen to purses, and the captain needed more flexibility if the qualifying system got distorted. But from there we decided the captain should keep that flexibility so he can choose guys who are good fits for the course and for pairings. It's just a fact that with automatic qualifying you run the risk of getting players who might not be a good fit. Course fit in particular was one of the biggest lessons of 2018.

I’m with most analytics people on this. They’ll say, “the more picks, the better,” and if you let them, they'd just take 12 picks. But I’d qualify my support. I actually think you should have a qualifying system where a segment of the team is chosen by results, because I think there is something to be said for guys knowing what they have to do to make the team. If you remove that, you lose something special and important about how these teams come together. It's hard to characterize it specifically, but you lose something when you lose the horse race dimension and the transparency it brings. By default, you're going to a more opaque process when you have a system with lots of captain's picks.

All that said, I love that we have at least six picks. When we first went to six picks for the Ryder Cup at Whistling Straits, what Scouts recommended to Steve Stricker was "ask for 12, hope for six." We told him we'll make T-shirts if we have to.

Trope 11: Woods, Scheffler lose more often because there's too much pressure on them

Explanation: The poor records of Tiger Woods and Scottie Scheffler, especially at the Ryder Cup, are in part because of their No. 1 world ranking and high status. Woods’ record in the Ryder Cup is 13-21-3 and Scheffler’s is 3-6-3.

Aquino's take: It's hard with Tiger, but I suspect there was always uncertainty as to who he could pair with analytically. What I do think is real is that opponents get up to play Tiger and Scottie. After Rome, it became clear to me that Scottie gets everyone’s best, at least in the Ryder Cup. And that's certainly a compliment, but it also makes it harder for us. Back in the day, Europeans would talk about how getting a point against Tiger was somehow worth more than a point, that it had cascading effects. Once you see you can beat him, you think you can beat anyone.

You could extend this to Team USA generally, and it's the same with USA Basketball. America will always get the other team's best shot, because it's the biggest game of their lives. It's the same with Scheffler. For the other team, that's the biggest match of their lives.

Trope 12: Analytics are overrated

Explanation: People think too much about the numbers; ultimately, it's about how the guys play on the course

Aquino's take: What do you think I'm going to say? [Laughter]

Look, it's not overrated. But it does get both too much credit when we win and too much blame when we lose. When analytics make a projection of a player or a lineup, it's an assessment of potential. It can't take the place of proper preparation and management. For example, if a 10-man Presidents Cup lineup pencils out in the 99th percentile, is it really in the 99th percentile if the guys are tired, maybe dealing with a virus, or distracted? Is it really in the 99th percentile if the players and caddies aren't confident about their pairing or if they haven't practiced all that much together, or were thrown together at the last minute? Analytics isn't “set and forget.” People think that's what it is, and it's not.

We're angling for a few percentage points on the margins. That can mean a great deal at the highest levels, but there's a lot of other things that have to go right, too. Let me put this in perspective: Even the very best foursomes and fourball pairings might, when we run the projections, have around a 55 percent projected win percentage. Like I said, too much credit, and too much blame.