When Phil Mickelson revealed why his pairing with Tiger Woods at the 2004 Ryder Cup ended in failure

45-time PGA Tour event winner Phil Mickelson and 82-time PGA Tour event winner Tiger Woods were paired together during the 2004 Ryder Cup and had a disastrous outing. In 2016, Mickleson opened up about the pairing and revealed what went wrong.

The 2004 Ryder Cup matches were held at Oakland Hills Country Club from September 17 to 19. Team USA was captained by Hal Sutton and featured players such as Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Kenny Perry, David Toms, and Chris Riley.

For the morning four-ball and afternoon foursomes on day one, Captain Sutton paired Woods and Mickelson together. However, the two fell behind and lost their matches. Team Europe eventually won the event 18.5-9.5. Years later, Mickelson revealed that they were only given a two-day notice for their pairing and didn’t have enough time to prepare.

“That gave us no time to work together and prepare… Tiger found out the year before when we played at the Presidents Cup in 2003 that the golf ball I was playing was not going to work for him. He plays a very high-spin ball and I play a very low-spin ball, and we had to come up in two days with a solution,” Phil Mickelson said in September 2016. (Via Golf.com)

“So, I grabbed a couple dozen of his balls, I went off to the side and tried to learn his golf ball in a four- or five-hour session on one of the other holes, trying to find out how far the ball goes. It forced me to stop my preparation for the tournament, to stop chipping and putting and sharpening my game in an effort to crash-course learn a whole different golf ball that we were going to be playing,” he added.

The 54-year-old PGA Tour winner also revealed that he had never ball-tested two days before an event, and if he had known about his pairing with Woods at least a month earlier, the outcome would’ve been different.

Phil Mickelson further praised Sutton for his decisiveness as a captain, saying it was a sign of great leadership. However, he reiterated that Sutton’s decision to pair him with Woods put the team in a position to fail.

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“Hong Kong was just a glimpse of what’s coming”: Phil Mickelson feels he is finding his form after LIV Golf Hong Kong

Phil Mickelson played in LIV Golf Hong Kong which was held from March 7 to 9. He had an impressive outing, finishing in third place in the solo standings. After the event, Mickelson stated that his best is still yet to come.

“I’m not going to be able to overpower a golf course relative to the field because my style of golf now is not as reckless,” Mickelson said. (Via LIV Golf) [00:23]

“Great example in Hong Kong was the final round on 10. I had the driver out, I could easily reach the green, but there was no place to miss it… Hong Kong was just a glimpse of what’s coming, I believe it was a great start. It was fun, exciting, but felt so good,” he added.

After Hong Kong, Phil Mickelson headed to LIV Golf Singapore where he finished at T19 with four-under.