Tour Confidential: Ryder Cup qualifiers, bubble watch and more

Check in every week for the unfiltered opinions of our writers and editors as they break down the hottest topics in the sport, and join the conversation by tweeting us at @golf_com. This week, we discuss the U.S. Ryder Cup auto-qualifiers, who might garner a captain’s pick, LIV’s Championship format and more.

Scottie Scheffler won the second leg of the FedEx Cup Playoffs, the BMW Championship, but we also now know the six auto-qualifiers for the U.S. Ryder Cup team: Scheffler, J.J. Spaun, Xander Schauffele, Russell Henley, Bryson DeChambeau and Harris English. What’s your biggest takeaway from this week?

Josh Sens, senior writer (@joshsens). That we can add an item to life’s list of certainties: death, taxes and Scottie Scheffler. But also ( despite Scheffler) the Europeans have a stronger team of automatic qualifiers than the U.S. does. On paper, anyway. 

James Colgan, news and features editor (@jamescolgan26): Other than Scheffler 4X-ing his Ryder Cup counterparts in points? I learned that the Americans are lucky Justin Thomas and Collin Morikawa didn’t leapfrog DeChambeau. Bryson was a lock all along, and his auto-qualifier status quiets what could have been a tired news cycle about his deservedness.

Nick Piastowski, senior editor (@nickpia): Scottie Scheffler’s really, really, really good. And he’s showing this might last a while. And that Robert MacIntyre versus the Bethpage boys and girls will be jolly fun. (But let’s keep it clean, gang.) 

U.S. captain Keegan Bradley will round out his team with six captain’s picks made after next week’s Tour Championships. That means East Lake is most important for which Ryder Cup hopeful?

Josh Sens: It’s a tossup for me between Cam Young and Ben Griffin. Both have shown good form this year, especially Young of late. Young, in particular, has sounded like a man chomping at the bit, after being passed over for Rome and now with the Ryder Cup coming to his home state, and a course where he won the state am.

Colgan: I think it’s Griffin, who’s safely inside the top-12 but wants to remove all doubt. But don’t leave out Sam Burns, either, who woke up on Sunday in 16th on the U.S. rankings and has the benefit of previous Ryder Cup experience and a close friendship with Scottie Scheffler to help his candidacy.

Piastowski: It’s the captain himself. Finish in the top 10, and Bradley picks himself three days later. Finish 28th, and there’s some doubt. A ho-hum finish at the BMW didn’t exactly inspire him being selected, but a strong run at the Tour Championship will.

Sam Burns finished T4 at the BMW and Rickie Fowler finished T7, although both, especially Fowler, are further down the Ryder Cup standings. But if you are captain, how do you balance picking someone higher up on the standings vs. someone with better recent form?

Sens: As a tiebreaker, I’d look further back in the historical record. How have they performed in these kinds of pressure cookers?. Burns went 1 and 2 in Rome and has not generally cut the profile of a killer closer. Fowler has a career 3-9-5 Ryder Cup record. In short, I’d probably look past both of them

Colgan: I think the goal is to pick the twelve best golfers. If No. 11 on your list suddenly can’t break 90, I’d think about recent form. Otherwise, I’d let the last 6 months serve as a much better test.

Piastowski: I’d certainly take a look — but then why have the standings at all? If you’ve bought in this far, no need to switch things up. That said, I’d maybe lean toward the hotter hand with picks 11 and 12 than going with the points system (unless, of course, the hot hand is also 11 or 12). Burns also has the benefit of being close friends with the world No. 1, and you want to keep that man happy. 

Joaquin Niemann won five of LIV Golf’s 13 events in 2025, yet it was Jon Rahm who claimed LIV’s season-long Individual Championship after a runner-up finish on Sunday in Indianapolis. Are you good with the format and Rahm winning the overall title, or does Niemann losing despite winning five times prove something isn’t right?

Sens: That does not sit right. Prioritizing prize money over sustained performance is not the way to measure a season-long reward, but that seems to be the case here.

Colgan: I would say golf’s “playoffs” need some overhauling across the board, largely because the vast majority of the people reading this story don’t understand how the PGA Tour or LIV end-of-season events work. The postseason should not require an advanced mathematics degree to understand … and considering the Rahm/Niemann discrepancy, LIV’s postseason might need fixing first.

Piastowski: I guess the question is, what do you like more — top-level consistency or wins mixed in with ties for 33rd? I’d lean toward giving more points toward victories, but Niemann also had five finishes this year of tied for 20th or worse. Rahm, meanwhile, finished no worse than tied for 11th, but never won. Weird one, for sure. It was close, though. 

With the conclusion of LIV’s Individual Championship, four players will now get relegated for next season. Now a few years into LIV’s format, does relegation work? What does it get right or get wrong?

Sens: It works in theory. Relegation adds a layer of pressure and gives fans a story to follow, which LIV needs as much of as it can get. In practice, though, a player who gets relegated can be picked up again, as happened with Branden Grace last year. He performed poorly enough to get dropped at the end of 2024 but he was popular enough to get picked up in time to play in 2025. That’s a relegation system without a lot of teeth.

Colgan: Agreed, Sens. Relegation as an idea is pretty sweet. But I’m not sure we’ve seen it in practice yet. 

Piastowski: It’s wait and see for me. This was in place last year, too, and players came back. But if LIV sticks to it, it makes the league more of an open shop, which is the goal. Who takes those available positions will also be interesting — as will any offseason contract negotiations with some of LIV’s biggest stars. 

Mason Howell won the U.S. Amateur on Sunday, beating Jackson Herrington 7 and 6 at The Olympic Club. It was an eventful week in San Francisco, headlined by Howell’s victory but also by the run of John Daly II, the emergence of a DIII underdog, raucous crowds (and interviews!) surrounding a local favorite and more. What was your most memorable moment from the U.S. Am?

Colgan: Jimmy Abdo!!!! The 4,292nd-ranked amateur in the world made it into the quarterfinal round of the biggest amateur event in the sport. I love an underdog story, and I’m not sure I’ve heard a better one in 2025 than Abdo’s, whose last four years have seen him left off his high school travel squad and D1 offer-less in the transfer portal. He made plenty of people remember his name at O-Club.

Piastowski: That I need to try a burger dog soon. Kidding, maybe. Colgan is right about Abdo — it’s one of the reasons why the Amateur is great. But I loved the crowds that Niall Shiels Donegan drew and his wild post-round interviews (which were conducted admirably by Golf Channel’s Brentley Romine). Another attraction of the Amateur is the up-closeness of the event, and this was certainly that.

Sens: The crowds that homegrown hero (and semifinalist) Niall Shiels-Donegan drew all week. Large and rowdy. And the pure joy that Shiels-Donegan demonstrated in putting on a clutch show for them. He didn’t win but he was the story of the week.

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