Regardless of what the home soil history says, Team USA was a little far from enjoying home court advantage this year. On one side, there lay the course’s difficulty; on the other was the fact that seven of the Team Europe players had already tasted Bethpage Black’s offerings. It meant pairings and order carried all the influence to stir the Ryder Cup outcomes, and three matches in, fans were adamant that Captain Keegan Bradley had failed to capitalize.

The three-day event began with four Foursomes, and it couldn’t have gone worse for Team USA. For the first time in Europe’s Ryder Cup history, they managed to add a win in each of the first three matches on American soil. Naturally, Bradley soon found himself in the middle of the storm. The pairings he had picked hadn’t worked.

• Bryson DeChambeau and Justin Thomas   vs  Jon Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton        Result: 4 & 3
• Scottie Scheffler and Russell Henley   vs  Ludvig Aberg and Matt Fitzpatrick        Result: 5 & 3
• Collin Morikawa and Harris English  vs  Rory McIlroy and Tommy Fleetwood     Result: 5 & 4
• Xander Schauffele and Patrick Cantlay  vs  Robert McIntyre and Viktor Hovland Result: USA won 2-up

Bradley’s captaincy has been under the radar for a while, considering he’s the youngest after Arnold Palmer. He even received a share of mixed reaction following his decision to start the day with foursomes, and the results by the end of the day were of no help.

Scheffler’s loss was a clear indication that he and Ryder Cup foursomes aren’t the right pairing to begin with. The world No.1 has dropped past three of the very same matches. Rahm and Fleetwood, on the other hand, maintained their winning streak of 5-0 in foursomes at the event.

Then there was the pairing of Morikawa and English. Data Golf, a data analytics firm, says that the pairing was only as good as the 132nd best, leaving one wondering about Bradley’s decision.

The captain was believed to have spent a good amount of time roaming the course of the Procore Championship to analyse his pairings. He even rented house and hosted dinners with his vice captains to experiment with the dynamics. Morikawa would say that Bradley has been welcoming of every suggestion, but the Day 1 results hardly reflect the efforts.

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Fans blast on Keegan Bradley

The reactions are outpouring, not sparing Keegan Bradley at all. Social media platforms like X are seeing a surge of reactions, with many saying “told you so,” and others expressing their shock at the USA’s underwhelming performance. Let us take a look at some of them.

One commenter said, “@Keegan_Bradley Need a serious change in the pairings in foursomes. You put some terrible teams out this morning. Henley, Morikawa, and Thomas have zero business in this format.”

The frustration makes sense if one watches the rounds. Henley missed multiple short putts, Morikawa/English collapsed quickly, and Justin Thomas misfired on key iron shots. As per data, Henley/Scheffler was a top-10 pairing, but Henley’s execution tanked it. On the other hand, the Morikawa/English pairing was already the weakest option available on paper. Their loss against Rory/Fleetwood created history for Europe— it marked the largest margin of victory for an away pairing since 2004.

Then DeChambeau and Thomas’s pair fell flat to the LIV duo of Rahm and Hatton who made five birdies after the sixth hole. This comes after DeChambeau faced certain scrutiny from known analysts.

Another comment says, “If I’m Captain Keegan, I’m sitting Thomas Henley, Morikawa, and English for the afternoon and let the other guys try. These guys have been a disaster this morning.” Bradley’s decision to bench alternatives like Cameron Young and JJ Spaun did not sit right with many. They were considered dynamic options but were left out, and after the scores, it might look like Bradley’s morning pairs leaned more towards “names” than form or fit.

Echoing the sentiment, another one said, “Keegan should be fired on the spot for that Morikawa / English pairing. One of the more baffling decisions I’ve seen.” As aforementioned, Morikawa/English was rated badly. Going up against McIlroy/Fleetwood (+2.15 skill rating), it was always a mismatch. Europe won 4 of the first 6 holes easily.

Fans also went after Bradley’s captain’s pick decision. “Shocker: Morikawa wasn’t a good pick. Justin Thomas wasn’t a good pick. Also, Morikawa and English pairing never made any sense.”

Collin Morikawa hasn’t shown any sort of exceptional performance this season, with his best being T19 at the Tour Championship. If one thinks about it, his selection was purely based on his past Ryder Cup experiences. A 2-1-0 record in foursomes. On the other hand, Justin Thomas had one win on the PGA Tour this year, at the RBC Heritage, his first win 3 years. But still, in comparison, his performance stat is better than Morikawa’s. He had eight top-10 finishes and made the cut in 19 out of the 21 events played.

At last, one fan stated all the data, which goes against everything Bradley put into the course today. “The Ryder Cup “captain” role is just classic overblown professional golf main character self-important prattle. Give anyone on golf Twitter an earpiece and a pen, and a coloring book, and they could make teams with the same variance of outcomes. It’s golf, man. But rolling out Collin/Harris, @DataGolf hypothetical 132/132 data-driven worst pairing, is something. Why not CAM YOUNG (NY Bred) or JJ SPAUN (US OPEN) to bang with this crowd early? This is all my current train of thought. Could change.”

One might agree to this, as the Captain’s role just involves staying behind the ropes and observing the gameplay. His main task comes when deciding the pairs, and Bradley, after Day 1, seemed to have failed in that. He could have sent JJ Spaun, as the man has one Major this year, but for some reason, he held him back. Now, what exactly was the strategy behind this is not known.

All in all, it’s just the start of the event and Bradley believes he can change the result. Otherwise, he would have to carry the mark of captaining a team that lost on its home turf.