The 2021 Ryder Cup saw European Team Europe take a 11.5-4.5 lead over Team USA, with the US fans treated poorly due to their team's loss. However, the PGA of America has taken proactive steps to ensure respectful support at the PGA Championship.
Do you remember the Ryder Cup ? European golf fans surely do. As for American golf fans , well, maybe it’s better they didn’t. But on the grounds at Aronimink Golf Club for the PGA Championship, it’s clear that the PGA of America certainly does.
To quickly refresh your memory, it was a walloping, with Team Europe taking an 11.5–4.5 lead into Sunday singles, and while a brief run by the Americans made it feel like a miracle might be possible, ultimately, the But even worse than the beating Team USA took on the course was the beating Team USA’s fans deserved to take on Saturday.
After getting smacked in the first day of the event, American fans at Bethpage Black showed up rowdy and ready on Saturday, and It was a bad look for Team USA to lose that badly, and a bad look for Team USA fans for handling it so poorly, but at the end of the day it was a really bad look for the PGA of America, who as hosts of the Ryder Cup were the ones running the event and responsible for keeping things in check.
The Ryder Cup is an inherently raucous event, and the lineBut this week at the PGA Championship, it appears that the PGA of America has learned from its past mistakes, and is taking a more proactive approach to stemming the vitriol that could potentially boil over. Across Aronimink Golf Club, the leaderboards updating fans with the latest scores and players on the tee also mix in a few messages supporting positive fandom and good sportsmanship.
A sign that reads “Support great play no matter who it comes from” at the PGA Championship. | Tyler Lauletta/Sports Illustrated Hilariously, a few of the messages try their best to toe the line between encouraging fans to cheer, but not cheer too intensely.
“Make it an atmosphere players respect and remember,” pleaded the scoreboard. O.K. , so what decibel point threshold should we be aiming for? Anything softer than 75 decibels might not be worth remembering, but anything louder than 107 decibels might no longer be respecting the game.
Credit to the PGA of America. Heading into the greater Philadelphia area, it’s not surprising that the reputation of the area’s fans might have gotten into the heads of those running the tournament, especially after the fracas that unraveled at Bethpage Black. There’s nothing wrong with being proactive about supporting good sportsmanship. That is a positive thing!
That said, it is also at least a little bit funny. There were meetings about this. There were sheets of paper handed back and forth with phrases like “Respect the players, cheer the plays,” written down, crossed out and punched up. The amount of people who had to clear “Make it an atmosphere players respect and remember” feels like it had to be at least four, with two meetings that could have been emails locking in the signage.
And to the credit of the fans during Thursday’s round, everyone was rather well-behaved. Dallas resident Scottie Scheffler got a bit of a jeering at the hands of Eagles fans on the green, but it was very much of the good-natured variety. , I only heard two chants of “E-A-G-L-E-S EAGLES” all day. If you had set the over/under at 4.5, I would have taken the over thinking I had easy money, and lost.
Things may heat up a bit as the weekend gets going. At the U.S. Open a few years ago, a proxy Ryder Cup broke out as American Bryson DeChambeau chased down McIlroy to win on Sunday. Should a similar dynamic unfold this Sunday, it’s possible the cheers get a bit more intense, but if they do, it’s clear the PGA of America is already thinking about how to best handle the situation.
Tyler Lauletta is a staff writer for the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated. Before joining SI, he covered sports for nearly a decade at Business Insider, and helped design and launch the OffBall newsletter. He is a graduate of Temple University in Philadelphia, and remains an Eagles and Phillies sicko. When not watching or blogging about sports, Tyler can be found scratching his dog behind the ears.
Ryder Cup Team USA Team Europe Results Decibels Support Golf Fans PGA Of America Bethpage Black Aronimink Golf Club PGA Championship Good Sportsmanship Cheers
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