Keegan Bradley's decision loomed over golf. 1 Ryder Cup question remains

The past 12 months had a little of everything - a career Grand Slam, Ryder Cup chaos and so much more. With 2026 on the horizon, our writers look back at the most memorable moments from 2025 and explain why they mattered.

No. 15 - The zero-torque putter movement | No. 14 - ‘Happy Gilmore 2' takes golf world by storm | No. 13 - Joaquin Niemann's big 2025 (and crucial 2026) | No. 12 - J.J. Spaun slays Oakmont| No. 11 - The Internet Invitational | No. 10 - Jeeno Thitikul’s record year | No. 9 - Tiger Woods’ next role | No. 8 - Tommy Fleetwood breaks through | No. 7 - TGL’s launch

Biggest golf moments of 2025 No. 6: Keegan Bradley’s decision

When the PGA of America surprisingly tapped Keegan Bradley as the 2025 Ryder Cup captain in the summer of 2024, the writing was on the wall for the dilemma he was about to face.

After Zach Johnson left him off the 2023 team, the PGA of America named Bradley, who had no prior vice-captain experience and was still one of the best American golfers in the world, captain, seemingly because they felt bad about what happened in Rome. At the time, Bradley said he would only be on the team if he automatically qualified. Naturally, he played great golf in 2025, won the Travelers Championship and started to move the goal posts about whether or not he’d use a captain’s pick on himself for the 2025 squad.

For months, Bradley’s decision loomed over the professional golf world. Everyone was asked about it constantly. They were asked what Keegan Bradley should do, if he could do it and what was best for an American team that would be a slight favorite at Bethpage Black. Bradley said he “agonized” over the decision, but ultimately made the selfless decision not to pick himself. In a cruel twist of fate, Bradley, who lives for the Ryder Cup, had his dream taken from him again. Despite being clearly one of the 12 best American players, he would not be teeing it up at a course he used to sneak onto while he was at St. John’s. He had a different job to do. A new dream to try and accomplish.

"I grew up wanting to play Ryder Cups. I grew up wanting to fight alongside these guys, and it broke my heart not to play. It really did," Bradley said. "But ultimately I was chosen to do a job. I was chosen to be a captain."

But Bradley’s decision not to play wasn’t the end of the story. It was just the beginning.

The week at Bethpage saw Bradley’s flaws as an inexperienced captain but on full display. He trotted out the worst possible U.S. foursomes pairing and sent them out again after they got routed. He sent the Scottie Scheffler-Russell Henley pairing off the wrong tees and that mistake was only righted on Day 2 at the suggestion of the caddies. He admitted to making a mistake with the setup, which allowed the Europeans to roar out to a commanding lead before holding off a furious U.S. rally on Sunday.

In the end, a home Ryder Cup loss fell at Bradley’s feet. That’s a pain that can’t be erased.

"The darkest time of my life probably," Bradley said at the Hero World Challenge about life after the Bethpage defeat. "I mean, I don’t know how else to describe it. Certainly, definitely of my career."

Any Ryder Cup loss brings overreactions and questions. Is there any way the U.S. can compete in 2027 at Adare Manor? Do they have to completely start from scratch? What is the path back to Ryder Cup relevancy for an American side that currently seems lost?

But as Bradley’s selfless Ryder Cup decision and subsequent loss recede into the rearview mirror, the picture ahead is clearer.

We’re still just four years removed from the Americans’ resounding 19-9 win at Whistling Straits, the product of supreme talent and a successful and competent American operation that was expected to be the foundation for teams for years to come. The shellacking the Americans took in Rome, combined with Tiger Woods’ decision not to captain in 2025 and Phil Mickelson’s exodus to LIV, caused the Americans to go off the board by picking Bradley, a sympathetic figure after the 2023 snub, as a surprise captain. After that, everything that could go wrong did. Bradley was put in a position to fail and eventually found himself in an impossible situation after he unsurprisingly played well enough to be on the team, had anyone else been captain. After choosing the captaincy over making his Ryder Cup return, Bradley didn’t set his team up to succeed as his lack of experience in the American Ryder Cup system became clear.

The American failures were everywhere at Bethpage Black, and yet, the path ahead is not hard to see.

The Americans still have a talent edge on paper. The Europeans are a well-oiled machine, but it wasn’t that long ago that the Americans had seemingly learned from their opponent, solved their failures and appeared primed to have the upper hand after European dominance in the aughts. A road loss and a confluence of poor decisions led to a Bethpage disaster. But the U.S. doesn’t need to remake the wheel; perhaps it just needs to get back on the road it was on before Rome. There doesn’t need to be an overreaction to Bethpage, just a simple course correction.

Bradley’s Ryder Cup future is less clear, leaving a question hanging in the air. Will Bethpage be the end of Keegan Bradley’s Ryder Cup saga? Or is there another chapter to be written?

"I would love to avenge that loss, but that’s not up to me," Bradley said about potentially being a captain again. "That’s not up to - I don’t think that’s fair for me to come out here and say that. But I would love to do it again at some point. I don’t know if that will ever happen, probably won’t. I think if you ask any losing captain if they would like to do it again, they would all want another shot."

The hardest thing to do in life is forget. Forget your scars, your mistakes, your decisions. Forget what could have been, what might have been.

For Keegan Bradley, an unexpected run as Ryder Cup captain took something from him and left him hoping for a chance at Ryder Cup redemption.

We just have no idea if that opportunity - as a player or captain - will ever arrive.

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