With his oversized golf bag slung over a shoulder as he closed the boot of his sport-utility vehicle, Henrik Stenson turned and walked towards the locker room with a smirk on his face.
The Swedish star had not been spotted at a tour event for several days, having been at home with his wife, who had just given birth to the couple’s second child.
Stenson smiled while reporting that a son, Karl, had been born at the Arnold Palmer Hospital complex in the family’s home base of Orlando, Florida.
The baby was fine, with 10 fingers and 10 toes, he said, pausing for effect. “Although, I’m not crazy about having a Yank in the family.”
The laugh-inducing line was delivered in 2010, and the familial ties between the European and American teams have grown only stronger over the past four years.
What once was a heated battle between players from distinct cultures and rival tours – the European and the US PGA – has steadily shifted towards an amicable derby between neighbours.
For decades, the cold waters of the Atlantic Ocean separated the players in the game’s most anticipated team competition. But, of late, the sea change in tour membership has softened the timbre and tone of an occasionally acrimonious event.
Changed it for the good, many believe.
“I would say that, because we do know each other so much better and we’re more likely to bump into each other during the following year, that the intensity on the golf course is better,” former world No 1 Lee Westwood said. “You don’t want to have to listen for the next two years about how you lost the Ryder Cup.”
Not long ago, players from the two tours rarely saw one another outside of the four major championships.
When Westwood played in his first Ryder Cup, in 1997, he had seen most of his US opponents – including Fred Couples, Lee Janzen and Scott Hoch – only on television.
“The Ryder Cup was one of the first times I had played against players like that,” Westwood said.
These days, thanks to multi-tour memberships, top players on each side are no longer strangers.
With the vast sums of money available in the US, the landscape of the game has changed dramatically and, for top Europeans, the Atlantic is hopped as easily as the tiny Swilcan Burn at St Andrews.
Consider the coalescence since the most recent Ryder Cup was played, two years ago.
A few weeks after Europe won in Chicago, Westwood, at age 40, uprooted his family from England, relocated to Florida, enrolled his two kids in school and joined the PGA Tour.
World No 1 Rory McIlroy set up his base a few miles away, buying a waterfront mansion.
Germany’s Martin Kaymer joined the US tour in 2013, too, then won the Players Championship and US Open this season.
Irish star Graeme McDowell, who played college golf in the US, married an American this year and last month the couple brought home their first child, born in Florida.
The line between the tours has not just been blurred, it has nearly disappeared. Of the 12 players on the European side this week in Scotland, 10 were members of the PGA Tour in 2014. It sounds like a battle between teams from the US and US East.
“In my first Ryder Cup, I didn’t know Darren Clarke or Lee Westwood very well, but they very quickly became friends of mine on tour and guys I knew from Europe very well,” said American veteran Jim Furyk, who will be playing in his ninth Ryder Cup this week.
“Now that list is growing each and every year.”
The Europeans have established so many American roots, they are hard to comprehensively catalogue. Like Stenson, European teammates Justin Rose and Ian Poulter also welcomed children born in the Arnold Palmer facility, conferring US citizenship on the new arrivals.
Given the mixing, the source of European inspiration seems in flux, too. Players once fought to uphold the reputation of the European Tour, which has wrestled with an inferiority complex over the years. Now, many top European players log the minimum number of tournaments in Europe required to retain dual membership in the tours.
Twenty years ago, the Ryder Cup was rife with gamesmanship. Players jingled coins in pockets, fidgeted within view of opponents as they hit shots and played mind games with regard to conceding putts.
Things often became personal, too. Spanish legend Seve Ballesteros once referred to the US team as “11 nice guys, plus [Paul] Azinger”.
When Azinger, who was the winning US captain in 2008, heard the remark, he practically stuck out his chest. “The king of gamesmanship doesn’t like me? Good,” Azinger said. “A feather in my cap.”
Back then, few players competed on both sides of “The Pond”, and animosity was ratcheted up. Months would pass before players would again meet. Hurt feelings were not an issue.
Some suggest the passion remains, and the Ryder Cup is properly adversarial, but in a more focused form.
“I think on the golf course, it’s still mostly the same,” Westwood said. “Off the golf course, at night, when we do Ryder Cup functions and such, you know the guys a little bit more, you know their partners and families. People are more likely to have friendly conversations, because we know more about each other.
“But the intensity is still there on the golf course. Going back to my first year, on the golf course, there has been no quarter given. It still feels the same way to me.”
First organised in 1927 as a friendly series of matches, the Ryder Cup for decades produced bitter confrontations. These days, the players’ wives often are friends, swing coaches work for players on both sides, and their alphabetised lockers in the US are sometimes separated by inches – see McDowell, McIlroy, Mickelson.
Some fans love the vitriol that the team event can produce, but familiarity has brought some needed context to the Ryder Cup.
“I think that it probably becomes a little easier when you know the people on the other side better,” Furyk said. “Afterwards, you shake hands, you congratulate the winner and you move on.
“Knowing them and being friendly with them probably helps the spirit of what the Ryder Cup is supposed to be about.”
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