Davis Love III has given the US the best chance of Ryder Cup success, says Phil Mickelson
By Keith Jackson at Hazeltine
Last Updated: 28/09/16 10:20pm
Phil Mickelson believes poor preparation for the Ryder Cup is now a thing of the past as he saluted Davis Love III for putting the US team in a "position to succeed" while hitting out at the failed approaches of previous captains.
Mickelson caused huge controversy following Europe's third straight victory at Gleneagles in 2014 when he was fiercely critical of Tom Watson's management, and ahead of this week's contest, he highlighted some poor decision making from Hal Sutton in Detroit 12 years ago.
His outburst at Gleneagles prompted the PGA of America to set up a Ryder Cup task force, with the likes of Mickelson, Tiger Woods and Love forming a committee to ensure the best possible preparation for Hazeltine National.
The 46-year-old will be making his 11th Ryder Cup appearance this week, having played on only two winning teams in his previous 10, and he is confident that the extra planning and changes to the US set-up will pay off in Minnesota.
"You play how you prepare," Mickelson said on Wednesday. "When we win or play well in majors, it's because we prepared properly and that allowed to us bring out our best golf. And in a Ryder Cup, you have to prepare properly for the event.
"Captain Love has been putting us in a position to succeed. He's taken input from all parties. He's making decisions that have allowed us to prepare our best and I believe we will play our best.
"It all starts with the captain. I mean, that's the guy that has to bring together 12 strong individuals and bring out their best and allow them on a platform to play their best. That's the whole foundation of the team."
Mickelson went on to recall how he was given only two days' notice by 2004 captain Sutton that he would be playing foursomes with Woods, which meant his preparations were disrupted by having to practice with the ball used by his team-mate.
"In 2004, Tiger and I were paired together and we ended up not playing well," added Mickelson, whose partnership with Woods ended with two defeats on the opening day. "But we were told two days before that we were playing together. And that gave us no time to work together and prepare.
"He found out the year before when we played at The Presidents Cup in 2003 that the golf ball I was playing with was not going to work for him. He plays a very high-spin ball and I play a very low-spin ball, and we had two days to come up with a solution.
"It forced me to stop my preparation for the tournament, to stop chipping and stop putting and stop sharpening my game and stop learning the golf course, in an effort to crash-course and learn a whole different golf ball that we were going to be playing.
"In the history of my career, I have never ball-tested two days prior to a major. I've never done it. It doesn't allow me to play my best. Had we known a month in advance, we might have been able to make it work. I think we probably would have made it work.
"But that's an example of starting with the captain, that he put us in a position to fail and we failed monumentally, absolutely. But to say, well, you just need to play better; that is so misinformed because you will play how you prepare."
Mickelson has enjoyed dealing with Woods in the build-up to this week's Ryder Cup, and he has been impressed with the volume of input from everybody involved with the task force.
He said: "It's been great. The last few weeks, we've been talking on the phone multiple times a day. It's been really exciting for us because we've been on so many teams for so many years.
"To have this much input and involvement in the process, the way Davis has implemented everybody's input, the way he's brought everybody together and their ideas, has been truly an inclusive process and it's been fun for Tiger and I to be a part of something like that.
"I think that when you look back on what the difference is, when players are put in a position to succeed, more often than not they tend to succeed and when they are put in positions to fail, most of the time they tend to fail."