Passionate Bubba poised to turn on style and waterworks

Excitable, emotional and creative, Bubba Watson seems to have been made for the Ryder Cup and there may be no better platform for his brand of golf than here, this weekend, at Medinah Country Club.

That is certainly the way the reigning Masters champion sees it and the left-hander likes how his United States team captain Davis Love III has set up the 7,863-yard layout.

“This golf course is built for great golf, no matter what team it is, it’s built for the fans to enjoy the game,” Watson said yesterday.

“So you’re talking about no rough. Some of the trees are missing; so you’re looking at great golf out of the trees when you hit one wayward. Everybody has the ability to hit the shot out of the trees. Let’s see the big hook, the big cuts, over trees, under trees, around bunkers to make birdies.

“No matter what team it is, as a fan of golf, you should be excited about that, to watch great shots, great shots be produced to win matches, to lose matches, whatever it is.

“It’s just made for a spectacular game of golf.”

Ryder Cups are very much made up of moments of the spectacular, unique moments. Average putters sink incredible putts, dependable players make uncommon errors, passion are stirred to abnormal levels and friends become enemies for just a few days. It all makes for a roller coaster of emotions for Watson, a guy whose tear production could power the hydroelectric plant of a small city and whose feelings are never too far from the surface.

“You know, it’s going to be challenging because we want to win so bad. This is my first time in the US with the crowd behind me, so I’ll probably get really excited. So I will probably need to just slow down, just so I can get back to some kind of normality.

“I want to win this and honour my dad who’s not here anymore, so there’s a lot of things going on in my head, I’ve got to just calm down and just be focused on one shot at a time.

“I’m probably going to cry at some point this week because I just cry every week, it seems like! So there’s going to be good shots I’m going to cry about, there’s going to be bad shots I cry about, and hopefully I do everything in a respectful way. No player out here from either team is trying to disrespect anybody, it’s just for the love of that little trophy that we want to win and we want to win for our countries.”

Watson can readily understand the passion for the Ryder Cup exuded by Europeans such as Sergio Garcia and Ian Poulter, whose quotes about wanting to “kill” his friends in the US team on the golf course then buy them a drink on Sunday night have been taken out of context in some quarters of the American media.

“As a fan of golf, Ian Poulter is an amazing story. Love Ian Poulter to death... I respect him very much, and I love how passionate he is about winning it.

“That’s the same way our team is. And again, it’s the little gold Ryder Cup is what we’re trying to get, and again, it doesn’t matter who it is that I’m facing.

“If I was facing y’all or facing Poulter or facing Phil Mickelson, it’s about winning the cup.

“I think we all do that, and we’re not trying to disrespect or make fun of any other player. It’s just we’re trying to win that trophy, and his [Poulter’s] passion is about that trophy, just like our passion is.

“We want to be able to lift that trophy on Sunday night, so yeah, we all have the same passion and the same drive. It’s to win that trophy.”