There is one month and three days left until the European team’s qualification period for the Ryder Cup closes for the big event in September at Bethpage. The Open Championship, the last Major, has ended, and the truth is that it hasn’t decided anything at all. There is only one certainty, and it existed before the Open: Rory McIlroy is mathematically qualified. From there, anything can happen, and the combinations are endless for the next five spots. The FedEx Cup Playoffs will be decisive. Remember that six players automatically qualify by August 24th, that is, after the British Masters and the Tour Championship. The week of September 1st (the exact date has not yet been announced), right after the Omega European Masters of the DP World Tour, Luke Donald will announce the six picks to complete the twelve-man team.
There are eight tournaments left to complete the qualification process, three from the DP World Tour (Nexo Championship, Danish Championship, and British Masters) and five from the PGA Tour (3M Open, Wyndham Championship, and the three FedEx Cup Playoffs). A total of 16,500 Ryder Cup points are up for grabs, of which 3,500 will be awarded in the European tournaments and 13,000, almost four times more, in the PGA Tour. Of those 13,000 ‘American’ points, nine thousand will be awarded in the FedEx Cup Playoffs. In other words, these last three tournaments of the American circuit will ultimately decide which five players will accompany McIlroy.
Those five spots are currently occupied in order by Robert MacIntyre, Tommy Fleetwood, Tyrrell Hatton, Shane Lowry, and Sepp Straka. None of them have secured their place, although obviously, the higher you are in the ranking, the harder it will be to be displaced. In any case, even MacIntyre, who is second, must play well in the coming weeks to avoid the risk of being left out.
Let’s go with the broader and simpler calculations to understand how open everything is at the moment. The winners of the three FedEx Cup playoffs earn 500 Ryder points. The difference between MacIntyre and Rasmus Hojgaard, who is seventh, is 210.33 points. That is, the Dane could mathematically surpass the Scot by finishing tied for second at the FedEx St Jude Championship, as long as Robert has a bad week. This small example serves to realise that everything is still very open… for the PGA Tour players.
Those from the DP World Tour do not factor into these calculations. They have no chance of automatically qualifying for the Ryder Cup. Jordan Smith is the best-placed in the ranking, and his distance from Straka, the sixth in the ranking, is 534.54 points. If Jordan Smith were to win the remaining three DP World Tour tournaments qualifying for the Ryder, he would earn 586 points… A statistically impossible mission.
We return, therefore, to the PGA Tour, where the real battle will be fought. There is a gap among the top six that will inevitably be left open. Tyrrell Hatton, despite his determined efforts to make the team, will be left out because he will no longer be able to earn more points as he is in LIV Golf. It’s just a matter of time. The opposite would be a huge surprise and a big problem for Donald, as it would mean that all those behind him in the ranking have played terribly in the coming weeks. Something that, again, is possible but statistically very unlikely. As things stand, Hatton, who has a 144.22-point lead over Rasmus Hojgaard, could be surpassed by the Dane with a fourth-place finish in the Playoffs. Also with several good accumulated positions.
The great battle, therefore, will be between MacIntyre, Fleetwood, Lowry, and Straka, who are currently in, and Rasmus Hojgaard, Justin Rose, Ludvig Aberg, Viktor Hovland, Thomas Detry, and Matthew Fitzpatrick, those who come from the seventh place in the ranking. Between Detry and Fitzpatrick is Matt Wallace. We are excluding him from the battle for the moment because he is not even qualified for the FedEx Cup Playoffs, although he could still make it. This week, for example, he plays the 3M Open. None of those in the thick of the battle are playing it. Detry was signed up but withdrew on Saturday. Although they are somewhat further down in the Ryder ranking, Aaron Rai, Nicolai Hojgaard, and Harry Hall should also be included in this battle. It is true that all three are further from the qualifying spots, but all three are currently in the FedEx Cup Playoffs, and a victory could change everything. Besides Wallace, the other one who is not currently among the top 70 who will qualify to play the first Playoff is Rasmus Hojgaard. The Dane is in 80th place in the FedEx. Although it is not yet confirmed, we understand that he will play the Wyndham next week with the aim of qualifying for the Playoffs and keeping the hope of making it into the Ryder by points. If he does not play next week on the PGA Tour, it could only mean that he has had a conversation with Luke Donald and that he has assured him of his presence at Bethpage, something that seems really strange to us.
As things stand, there are five spots to be distributed among 15 players. The battle could not be more open and exciting and will be decided across the pond, relatively close to Bethpage. Another story will then be Donald’s six picks from September 1st, which will obviously be heavily influenced by what happens in this final sprint of the qualification. The likes of David Puig, Jon Rahm, and Sergio García can now only hope to be selected by choice.
