Tour Guide: Wyndham Clark vs. Le Golf National

It’s an Olympic-level Tour Guide, as we get set for the golf world to return to Le Golf National. In honor of that, Joseph takes a look at why Wyndham Clark is a player to watch this week (even if it’s for trainwreck potential.) We also take a trip down Memory Lane to one of the strangest strategic calls in recent Ryder Cup history in 2018.

What’s in Store for the World No. 5

By Joseph LaMagna

There is much to be written about both qualification methodology for the 2024 Olympics, using the Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR), and the OWGR itself. I have my issues with both, though I also find the “Bryson should absolutely be on this team” argument that’s circulating on social media right now to be very unconvincing, unless it’s accompanied by a fleshed out solution showing how qualification should work.

Do I think Bryson DeChambeau is one of the four best American golfers? I do. Do I think OWGR should be the qualification metric for the Olympics? I don’t. What’s the answer, though? Some kind of points system based on performance strictly at the major championships? Leaving team selection to a committee from each country? How many golfers would each country get to send under a revised system? It’s a legitimate problem I’d prioritize solving in advance of the 2028 Olympics, but for 2024, we have a field of 60 golfers based on their standing in the OWGR.

One of the golfers receiving the most scrutiny for his performance so far in 2024 is Wyndham Clark, who is ranked fifth in the world and… not playing to anywhere near the level that warrants a top-five ranking.

He is ranked fifth for a variety of reasons, one of which is the exclusion of LIV events from OWGR points. Another reason has to do with how the OWGR weights majors, one of which Clark won last June, but that’s a subject for another day, perhaps.

Clark’s 2024 has been a roller coaster. He won a weather-shortened Pebble Beach Pro-Am, was runner-up at Bay Hill and Sawgrass, and finished T-3 at the RBC Heritage. He also missed the cut at three of four majors, and missed cuts at Muirfield Village and Riviera, not easy to do given those are limited-field events that cut just a small portion of the field.

Clark is an erratic golfer with a ton of firepower and a tendency to spray the golf ball off the planet. When one of your advantages is speed and you have trouble controlling the golf ball, there are few golf courses that will keep you up at night like Le Golf National. That course is nightmare fuel for players who bomb it inaccurately. Though, as I wrote in today’s Fried Egg newsletter, the setup at Le Golf will be much less punitive than it was at the 2018 Ryder Cup.

Clark’s rapid ascent up the world golf rankings in 2023 following wins at the Wells Fargo and U.S. Open have not been backed up by a level of consistency you’d expect from a top player in the world. Frankly, I think there’s quite a bit of skepticism in the golf world that Clark is actually an elite player, which is a difficult reality for a player who has experienced as much recent success as he has.

To solidify his position as a top player in the world, Wyndham Clark eventually needs to steady the ship, a seemingly unlikely proposition on a golf course like Le Golf National. Every golfer teeing it up on this week’s stage has reasons to feel nerves, but Clark might be dealing with the most difficult range of emotions of any player in the field. He tends to be unwavering in his confidence, but I’m curious how much confidence he has on a golf course like this given his run of recent form. How he performs in Paris this week is certainly worth tracking.

Memory Lane: Phil’s Foursomes Debacle

By Jay Rigdon

Quick, when was the last time Phil Mickelson played in a national team competition? That’s right: 2018, at Le Golf National. It’s not fair to say he was so bad that week that it prevented him from ever playing again; plenty of other decisions have led to his current exile, along with his understandable age-related decline. But in concert with general inconsistency, that week was bad enough that it prevented him from being selected in 2021 for Whistling Straits, which he missed out on despite being the reigning PGA Champion.

It’s truly wild that Phil’s lengthy Ryder Cup career essentially came to a close in such a low fashion. Captain Jim Furyk sending Phil out with Bryson DeChambeau as part of Friday foursomes remains one of the most questionable decisions in recent Ryder Cup memory. When the morning matches were announced the night before the competition and Phil wasn’t playing in the four-ball session, Golf Twitter was aghast at the implication that Phil would be sent out in the afternoon for alternate shot.

In a moment of seeking some kind of logical reason, I remember looking at the scorecard and reasoning that there was one way it might make sense: letting Phil tee off the even holes, which included three of the course’s four par 3s. I talked myself into this to the point of tweeting it, even.

Deleted my first tweet because I flipped the holes, but Phil makes more sense in alternate shot when you consider three of the four par 3s are even-numbered holes. That's essentially 12 approaches, assuming he plays evens, and his scrambling/putting is a major foursomes asset.

— Jay Rigdon (@jayrigdon5) September 27, 2018

Was this a stretch? Yes, of course. Even taking this into account, it was pretty clear that Phil was a horrible fit for the course in general and the foursomes format specifically. But, hey, at least there could be some kind of strategic thinking behind it; using Phil’s iron play and short game to try and balance out partner Bryson DeChambeau’s game.

And then the match started. With Phil teeing off on No. 1, thereby completely negating any semblance of strategy. It went predictably wrong, and quickly, with the European pairing of Sergio Garcia and Alex Noren 7-up at the turn after a sparkling front-nine 31. It honestly wasn’t that close, with Phil doing things like hooking an iron into the water off the tee on a par 5.

pic.twitter.com/ivvo4TcO3U

— Kyle Porter (@KylePorterCBS) July 30, 2024

It’s one of the most baffling decisions ever, and likely the last memory we’ll really have of Phil on that particular stage, which somehow feels both unfair and apt in equal measure. It’s also a perfect example of how and why the Americans haven’t won a Ryder Cup in Europe in over three decades.

Tour Guide is a weekly Club TFE feature looking at the world of pro golf, focusing on course details, players to watch, swing analysis, and the occasional light-hearted romp through golf history.