GMac And Rory's Golf Dynamic Has Changed...And What Better Time To Sort This Out Than Ryder Cup Week!

In my early roundup of UK papers for The Loop, note the lack of Team USA related stories. And in Brian Keogh's roundup of press conference quotes, the longest answer belongs to Graeme McDowell trying to convince us that he and Rory McIlroy are chummy teammates who now apparently aren't a good fit for fourballs.

This is all very minor on the scale of Ryder Cup controversies, but considering how organized Paul McGinley appeared heading in and how bonded Team Europe is purported to be, the oddity of sorting out the understandably deteriorated GMac-McIlroy dynamic under the Ryder Cup's glare is at least inconvenient for Team Europe.

Tuesday's spin from Gleneagles?

GMac and Rory have never been closer. And now that we've learned the former Ryder Cup partners will be playing with others after months of being assured nothing was amiss between the two despite lawsuit issues, now it's merely their "golf dynamic" that has changed.

Ewan Murray in The Guardian with the breakdown of McDowell's comments.

“Rory and I’s golf dynamic has changed significantly from the first time we ever played together back when perhaps the older brother/kind of younger brother leadership role that maybe I had with him, that’s changed.

“He’s the world’s No1 player. He’s a four-times major champion. The dynamic between him and I is changed forever. He would now be the leader of the two of us and perhaps the dynamic doesn’t work as well as it did in the past. Perhaps I’m the kind of guy that needs that leadership role a little bit, who needs to feel like he is on at least on a level with the guy he’s playing with. I’ll be the first to admit it.

GMac gets big points for a golf-specific explanation for why they aren't good fourball partners at this point, but again, why wasn't this wheeled out weeks ago?

“At Medinah a couple of years ago, and Rory and I spoke about this, I found the better ball format very difficult with him because he likes to go first, I let him at it, and I kind of come second. You know, he’s standing there beating it 350 down the middle, and I put my tee in the ground thinking there’s not really a lot of point in me hitting this tee shot and find myself throwing myself at it, and literally it kind of didn’t help my game much at Medinah playing better-ball with him. Foursomes I think is different. I think we could still play foursomes really well together.”