Try telling these the Ryder Cup is just another event

For so many years, it was anything but a competition, so it’s useless to say what was at the heart of the Ryder Cup.

Something to do, perhaps. A week every other year to break up the monotony of tournaments? Tip back a few with golfers from Britain and Ireland with whom you have very little connection?

So the Americans won 18, lost three times and tied once in the first 22 editions of the Ryder Cup. Who cared?