Tiger Woods breaks silence on rejecting Ryder Cup captaincy, pledging commitment to PIF negotiations
Tiger Woods has finally broken his silence on not accepting the Ryder Cup captaincy this time. He said he was so packed with his schedule that it would have been an injustice to the U.S. team.
Earlier, speculation was quite high that Woods would pick up the US captaincy for the upcoming Ryder Cup. However, he declined the offer, citing his busy schedule, and later Keegan Bradley was announced as the new captain.
On Tuesday, July 16, during the pre-event press conference at Royal Troon ahead of the Open Championship, Woods explained the reasons behind not taking up the captaincy role. He said:
"I mean, my time has been so loaded with the Tour and everything we're trying to accomplish. I'm on so many different subcommittees that it just takes so much time in the day, and I'm always on calls, and I just didn't... I told Seth that I just didn't feel like I could do the job properly. I couldn't devote the time. I barely had enough time to do what I'm doing right now.
"And add in the TGL starting next year, as well as the Ryder Cup. And you add all that together with our negotiations with the PIF, all that concurrently going on at exactly the same time. There are only so many hours in the day, and I just feel like I would be doing the captaincy, the players, and Team USA an injustice if I was the captain with everything that I have to do."
Tiger Woods is set to be in action this week at Royal Troon, which will be his fifth start of the season. He is playing in the Open Championship for the first time after skipping it last year.
A look at Tiger Woods' performance at the Ryder Cup
Tiger Woods is arguably the greatest professional golfer on the planet and has umpteen records to his name. However, his performance at the Ryder Cup is nothing to boast about.
Woods has played 37 matches in his eight appearances at the biennial event and has a 13-21-3 record. He last competed at the Ryder Cup in 2018 where he went 0-4-0 at the event. Only twice in his career, he ended the tournament with a positive record. 2012 was his best year where he went 3-1 at the Celtic Manor Resort.