US captain Keegan Bradley says he will have a “hard look” at whether he should play in September’s Ryder Cup after his dramatic one-shot victory in the Travelers Championship on Sunday.
Bradley, 39, birdied the last hole of his final round in Connecticut to deny England’s Tommy Fleetwood the chance to win his first PGA Tour title.
Victory moved him seventh in the world rankings and ninth in the American Ryder Cup qualification standings. The top six in the latter qualify automatically for the event in Bethpage, New York, with another six players given captain’s picks.
Arnold Palmer was the Ryder Cup’s last playing captain, when he led the US team aged 34 in 1963.
“It’s still June so we have got a long way to go [but] this definitely changes things a little bit,” said Bradley – the youngest captain since Palmer.
“This definitely opens the door to play. I don’t know if I’m going to do it or not but I certainly have to take a pretty hard look at what’s best for the team.
“Every year I was out here, I wanted to play on the Ryder Cup team, and then this would be the first year where maybe I didn’t want to. I just wanted to be the captain and, of course, this is what happens.”
Bradley’s most recent Ryder Cup appearance was in the defeat at Gleneagles in 2014, having also played on the losing side two years earlier.
He missed out on a place in 2023 when Justin Thomas, who was below him on the points list and struggling for form, was preferred by captain Zach Johnson
Bradley was named captain this time after Tiger Woods turned down the opportunity.
He insisted he would not give up the captaincy if he did make the team but could take on a dual role with the help of vice-captains Webb Simpson, Brandt Snedeker, Kevin Kisner and Jim Furyk.
“I never really planned on playing,” he said. “Now, with the amazing vice-captains I have, I feel a lot more comfortable if I went that route.
“I had this epiphany at the US PGA Championship when I was getting these loud ‘USA’ cheers.
“I don’t think any player in the history of the game has experienced what I’m experiencing in that I’m a Ryder Cup captain, in my eyes still one of the best players in the world trying to win majors and tournaments, coming down the stretch of a tournament.”
Bradley said when he was asked to be captain, the first thing the PGA of America told him was they wanted him to be the first playing captain since Palmer.
“My head was spinning,” he said. “I didn’t know what they were talking about, but they knew that was a possibility and that we would have things in place for that.
“A year ago I don’t know if I would have thought I would be seventh in the world but I certainly thought I would be contending in tournaments.”
