The 43rd Ryder Cup was an unfair fight. The young, overpowering Americans dismantled the Europeans with little resistance on their way to consecutive wins on home soil. The team felt different. All the problems coming into the week — team chemistry, less experience than the Euros, among other things — seemed to melt away when the first session teed up on Friday morning.
Justin Thomas, making his second appearance in the Ryder Cup, played in all but one match throughout the week at Whistling Straits. That session just so happened to be the Four-ball matches on Saturday afternoon. Like many fans in the crowd, Thomas decided to have an ice-cold adult beverage while watching his teammates tee it up off the first.
“(Daniel) Berger and I — cause I guess that’s a Wisconsin thing that they do at the Bucks games — that lineman they have just houses a beer,” Thomas told Chris Soloman of No Laying Up during a podcast interview. “He’s like ‘should we do it?’ and I’m like ‘dude we can’t chug a beer, we just can’t do this.’
“But we went out there and started throwing stuff into the stands, and then they kept chanting and kept chanting. Then two people threw two beers down, and we just kind of looked at each other and I’m like, ‘I mean we gotta get these guys going, I guess we gotta do it.’
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“Since there was a hole in it I couldn’t shotgun it, and I turned it around and Berger already had a key in it. He had his fraternity days from Florida State take him back. I knew I wasn’t going to chug it very quickly so I Gronk spiked it.”
The Americans would eventually split the Four-ball session with Europe.
Thomas also touched on Tiger Woods during the interview saying he and the 15-time major champion are in constant contact. “He’s still his sarcastic-ass self, so nothing has changed there, so I’m glad to see that he’s still chipper as always.”
He was also asked if he thinks Woods will ever play on Tour again.
“I don’t see him ever playing if he can’t play well. He doesn’t strike me as a guy who’s played at home and he’s shooting a bunch of 75s and 76s and he’s like, ‘OK, I’m gonna give Augusta a try this year.’ That’s not really gonna be him, at least from my understanding, what I know of him.”
We’ll have to wait and see about Woods, but his Hero World Challenge is scheduled for December 2-5, where a loaded field is headed for the Bahamas, including the aforementioned Thomas.
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