Bill Haas Was A Captain's Pick Before He Wasn't A Captain's Pick

The ever-likable Bill Haas will need to get in the Tom Watson-disdain line following Alex Miceli’s report that the PGA Tour veteran and former FedExCup champion was a Ryder Cup captain’s pick before the Captain was talked out of the selection by Webb Simpson.

From Miceli’s report that includes a case for Haas over Simpson (and even Chris Kirk) and news that Watson might have consulted fellow Stanford alum and future buddies tripmate Tiger Woods about Haas as a team member:

It's unclear how Woods might have advised Waston, but on Monday night after the Deutsche Bank Championship, Watson called at least some of his team members who were flying from Boston to Denver with the news that Bradley, Mahan and Haas were the picks.

Tuesday morning at Cherry Hills, where the BMW Championship was to be contested, word of Watson's selections had leaked out and the news was being discussed among the caddies and players on the range.

As word began to spread in Denver, Watson was home in suburban Kansas City, listening to an impassioned phone plea from Simpson.

So impassioned that he picked Simpson, only to quickly sour on him at Gleneagles, as Jim McCabe writes in a follow-up to add texture, contrast and some general warm-fuzziness to Bob Harig's report on Captain Tom Watson's bizarro inspirational tactics.

Watson met Mickelson, Bradley and Simpson in the lunchroom and told them that they would be on the bench for the afternoon foursomes, too. (It meant that Simpson, who had played in Friday morning’s four-balls, would sit out three straight sessions and play just twice in this Ryder Cup.)

Several sources said the news was enough of a blow to Mickelson, Bradley and Simpson; what made it worse was how blunt Watson was, disparaging the way the three of them had played Friday. To Mickelson, the captain had crossed the line.

“Phil’s a leader,” said a source who was in the locker room all week. “His fatherhood came out. He’s a protector. He was angry with the way Watson had talked to Keegan and Webb.”

Oddly, while McCabe's sources try to downplay Watson's handling of the gift from the team, a centerpiece of Harig's report, the only thing his conflicting views agree on is the Captain's horrific communication skills, which are at the heart of how he accepted his gift and managed his team.

“Watson didn’t communicate, and he didn’t listen to his vice captains,” said one source. “He was disrespectful (to players), but it wasn’t the time or place for Phil. Two wrongs don’t make a right.”

Yet another source took another view. “If Phil did this in private, if he said it to Watson’s face, to (PGA of America president) Ted Bishop’s face, no changes would be made. The U.S. would continue to go down the same alley.”

The PGA of America soon will release a statement, separate from the Watson statement: no decision will be made on the 2016 captain for several months and that plans first will be put into motion to form a committee that will decide on future captains. That would seem to indicate that Mickelson’s bold and aggressive move could serve a positive purpose going forward.

That is confirmed in a radio interview given by PGA of America president Ted Bishop, who selected Watson  and now is confirming that the PGA is going to button up their captaincy selection process with a task force. GolfNewsNet has the link to the interview. Bishop more directly addresses the intention of Mickelson in calling out tactics and confirms that the methodology was productive in getting the PGA's attention.