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Something that I didn’t hear mentioned in the pod was the complete absence of match play in American professional golf.
The last time some of the players on the American side could have played high-stakes match play was the US Amateur/NCAA Team Championships. Truly believe the removal of the Dell Matchplay from the schedule is one of the biggest handicaps for the US captain in terms of picking the right players for the team.
How do the guys like Kiz on the US side and Poulter on the European side, who both made their careers off of being match play assassins, even break through onto the team nowadays if there is never a chance to showcase that?
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Russia and Japan do play lots of rugby… Japan are really good actually.
I think the comment around team sports was more meant in terms of relatively the US on a global stage performs extremely well in individual sports (see most of the sports at the Olympics) and relatively to that, a bit shit on the team side of things.
Part of that is obviously due to you guys nott really engaging with the global sports that everyone else plays.
I hear you guys aren’t much into rugby, but it’s definitely got more nations regularly competing at a very high level with each other than; ice hockey, American football, baseball and basketball.
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Japan is ranked 13th and we are 15th. Are we really good at rugby then?
This isn’t part of it, it’s all of it. We are a big country but that doesn’t mean we participate in those sports. For example : we have 50k youth rugby players, south africa has 500k
I think “Europe is good at team stuff, America is good at individual stuff, and it’s a reflection of culture” is a very fun trope that just doesn’t hold up to facts.
I can, in fact, make a case that we are great a team soccer because we don’t have talent (again, we’ve removed our best 10,000 athletes from the pool, something no other nation does) and we’re still a Top 20 country.
Americans have won gold medals in hockey (men and women), in volleyball (men and women), softball (women), water polo (men and women), basketball (men and women), soccer (women), and our 4x100 relays teams are the envy of the world outside Jamaica.
Hell, depending on when we start the clock, the USA has actually won two gold medial in rugby in 1920 and 1924, which is one more world title than England has won in soccer in that same time span.
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I think this typifies the ‘debate’. When an American says ‘hockey’ they picture the game played on ice with a puck but maybe 80% of the world’s population picture the game played on grass / astro with a ball.
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How much professional match play is played in Europe? And how much are the European Ryder cup players playing in those match play events?
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They put up a hell of a fight against Japan in the 2019 world cup, just saying.
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Careful with this - Basketball and baseball have way more players and fans across the planet than rugby.
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Ya I’d argue the biggest thing holding back USA Men’s soccer is the lack of a bonafide superstar. Teamwork is fine but they don’t have one guy who can change a game with their individual skill and brillance. Yes you need talent all over the field. Mbappe can’t iso/hero ball his way to victory.
But the top end talent of the USA Men’s team just isn’t close to the best teams in the world. It has come a long long way but their problem isn’t their “team spirit”.
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OK, it would be so easy for me to look up exact figures on this, and I’m not going to do that, so you could easily be correct.
But I just want to say, basketball I can believe, baseball no way. Which countries play baseball other than the US, canada, Mexico and Japan? I’m sorry but baseball is every bit as bad as cricket.
USA, Japan, South Korea, Dominican Republic, Cuba are the main baseball markets. I agree, I find it unwatchable, but it seems to have some traction!
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The pure nature of American football puts flame to the lie that Americans aren’t good at team sports. Maybe the rest of the world doesn’t play it, but 11 on 11 American tackle football is the ultimate team game. 11 players working in concert, relying on and sacrificing for one another, 100% of the time. It would be unplayable and horrendously unwatchable if the individuals on the field were incapable of teamwork.
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According to wikipedia there are professional baseball leagues in 39 countries. Most are in the Americas and Asia but there are more than 15 countries in europe with professional leagues.
Definitely not as widespread as soccer or rugby but it’s not miles away like you might think.
Jaime is a dope. Had to shut this one off about halfway. Acting like Europe is running out a bunch of 10 handicappers and beating the Americans based on team work and guile
It’s a freaking 3 day sample size and the home team keeps winning. Exhausting over analysis.
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ahem
(this is in jest and I agree with your overall position)
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#1 draft pick in MLB last year, Travis Bazzana, is an Aussie. If they produced the #1 pick, I imagine they play some baseball down under.
Lets not get into an argument on cricket vs baseball 
Looked up global fandom and its soccer, cricket, field hockey, basketball, football. Doesnt really count though as cricket is dominated by India… having a billion in one country helps push the stats a little.
The US are pretty good at rugby sevens to be fair.
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DPWT holds the Team Cup in January. This year, Rose, Fleetwood, Hatton, Rai, Wallace, R. Hojgaard, Neergaard-Petersen, Norgaard, Olesen, and Pavon all played. Foursomes, Four-Ball, and Singles. At least gives the Euro Captain a chance to see a lot of his team hopefuls in action every year.