Robert MacIntyre issued a warning to Team USA ahead of the 2025 Ryder Cup.
It’s Tour Championship weekend, and the 30 best players on the PGA Tour this season are fighting it out for the FedEx Cup at East Lake. But one eye is on September, and the upcoming Ryder Cup at Bethpage Black, New York.
Robert MacIntyre has automatically qualified already for the Ryder Cup. He’s set to walk into a new environment: a Ryder Cup on American soil. He was part of the European team that dismantled the Americans in Rome, but this is an entirely different prospect.
An ever-confident MacIntyre won’t shy from the occasion, and he sent a message to the Americans during the Tour Championship.
Robert MacIntyre sends message to Americans ahead of Ryder Cup
We may well have seen a Ryder Cup preview last week at the BMW Championship, and Team USA took the point. MacIntyre went head-to-head with Scottie Scheffler for the championship and was dominated on the final day.
It’s not the first time the American has destroyed a competitor, and it won’t be the last. Scheffler is having a Tiger Woods-esque season, having won two of the four major championships, including The Open Championship at Royal Portrush.
Chants of “USA” rang around Caves Valley Golf Club as Scheffler won the BMW, but MacIntyre isn’t disheartened by the experience. Instead, he thinks it’s crucial to have gone through that ahead of what’s set to be a hostile environment in New York.
He told reporters, “You know what it’s really going to help me for? Bethpage. There’s things that I’m going to learn from that week, and from Saturday and Sunday especially, that are going to help me massively.
“The way I handle myself, not so much my attitude out there, because I’m fiery, I’m always going to be fiery. I’m always going to swear, yell, and get angry. But just the way I interact with the crowd.”
MacIntyre shushed a fan during Saturday’s action in celebration of making a long putt, after the fan heckled him on the green. He returned to the course on Sunday to a riled-up crowd and shot three over par.
The Scot continued, “I was trying to keep them out of the way, but instead I did what I did on Saturday and brought them into it.”
Robert MacIntyre sent Ryder Cup message by Luke Donald after shushing fan at the BMW Championship
European Ryder Cup captain Luke Donald doesn’t face the same pre-tournament challenges as his opposite number, Keegan Bradley, who faces huge decisions ahead of Bethpage.
His team is expected to be roughly the same as the one he took to Rome in 2023. Justin Rose was the biggest question mark going into the British Open. Donald asked him to show some form in order to be picked, and Rose responded by winning the St. Jude, locking up his place.
Donald is familiar with all the playstyles and characteristics of his team and knows how to manage them effectively. That includes managing MacIntyre’s fire when it comes to the hostile crowd.
On MacIntyre’s interaction with the fan at the BMW, Donald said, “I’m going to have obviously all those conversations once the team is set, and I’ve had conversations with certain players already to just kind of mentally get ready for that cauldron, that atmosphere.
“That’s something I’ve been thinking about since day one of the captaincy. That is going to be a major feat, how we react to the crowds, and certainly less is more… it’s just using it the right way.”
It’s a clear message to MacIntyre and the team: play golf, and keep the crowd out of it. That’s something he has clearly learned going into the Tour Championship.