The 41st Ryder Cup is set to begin later this week. Based on the past few events, we should have a classic on our hands. The Ryder Cup is simply the best team golf event in the world and my favorite non-major event that we have in professional golf today. Golfers who play for $8 million purses week in and week out absolutely cannot control their emotions over an exhibition match in late September with the whole world watching. What on earth could be better than that?

Here are nine things you should know about the 2016 Ryder Cup at Hazeltine.

1. The United States is (and should be) the favorite: This year's American squad is a heavy favorite, and it should be. It boasts a superior team in both experience and Official World Golf Ranking and is playing on home soil where it has something to prove after getting embarrassed on the final day in 2012 at Medinah. It has 10 top 25 golfers in the world whereas Europe has just five. Almost any way you look at it, the U.S. has a better team of golfers.

There is absolutely no reason this year's U.S. team should not wallop the Europeans which probably means we're in for one of the better Ryder Cups ever.

2. The U.S. has one Ryder Cup win since 1999: Here is how the last seven Ryder Cups have gone since the United States won at Brookline.

  • 2002: Europe wins 15.5 to 12.5 in England
  • 2004: Europe wins 18.5 to 9.5 in United States
  • 2006: Europe wins 18.5 to 9.5 in Ireland
  • 2008: U.S. wins 16.5 to 11.5 in United States
  • 2010: Europe wins 14.5 to 13.5 in Wales
  • 2012: Europe wins 14.5 to 13.5 in United States
  • 2014: Europe wins 16.5 to 11.5 in Scotland

Three of those were abject disasters for the U.S. while two of the last three (2010 and 2012) came down to the very last matches. The U.S. created a task force after the last defeat to try and right the ship, which I'm not sure was really that necessary. If a few shots go differently in either 2010 or 2012 then we're talking about how the U.S. has completely dominated Europe coming into 2016.

Overall, the U.S. has dominated with a 25-13-2 record historically.

3. U.S. captain Davis Love III is extremely confident in his team: Love made a few headlines last week when he said the U.S. might have one of the great teams in professional golf history. "We don't have to do anything superhuman, we're a great golf team," Love said. "This is the best golf team, maybe, ever assembled." I guess nobody told him that only four of his golfers (Jordan Spieth, Dustin Johnson, Patrick Reed and J.B. Holmes) have career winning percentages at the Ryder Cup above .500.

4. One of the great defeats in major history came at Hazeltine: What do we know about Hazeltine, which is just outside of Minneapolis? Well, we know the course is going to be long (7,600 yards). We know Rich Beem took one of the most improbable major championships ever there (in 2002). And we know that Y.E. Yang beat Tiger Woods by three strokes at the 2009 PGA Championship in one of the great takedowns of a legend in golf history. That's the last big-time tournament that was played there.

We also know that Phil Mickelson is not pleased with how the PGA Tour failed to prepare the U.S. team for Hazeltine last week at the Tour Championship.

"This is a great example of the disconnect that we have on the U.S. side because the Tour doesn't own the Ryder Cup or doesn't work in conjunction with the PGA of America," Mickelson said Sunday. "The European Tour would never have the setup be so different the week before the Ryder Cup. If we were in Europe and they were going to set up the course a certain way, the week before they would set it up a certain way. We're not going to have rough like that -- this is the worst rough I've seen in years. We're not going to have that rough next week. Why the Tour set it up so differently from what we're going to have next week is a lack of communication and working together. It's those kinds of details that we have to sort through as a unit to bring out our best."

5. The players don't make money: Like I said earlier, one of the best parts of the Ryder Cup is how giddy multimillionaires get over a trophy and some national pride. They certainly don't get any of the millions brought in from television contracts and tickets. As the Telegraph recently pointed out, though, the PGA of America does throw the U.S. golfers a bone by donating some of the what could be over $100 million in revenue to charity. PGA of America donates $100,000 to charity and $100,000 to a college development program, in the name of each participant.

6. Trash talk has been tremendous: I'm confident Mickelson has been writing material since he threw Tom Watson under the bus and backed over him in 2014, but he didn't get the first shot in this year. There have been a few, and Rory McIlroy has probably been the most outspoken (other than Lee Westwood questioning Tiger Woods' helpfulness as a vice captain recently).

"Definitely assembled the best task force ever, that's for sure," McIlroy told Golf Channel in response to Love saying he might have one of the great teams of all time (see above). "Look, it's a great team. They have a lot of very talented players in there. They're obviously quite confident. So you know what, it's up to us to go there and try to upset the odds."

7. Best and worst on each team: A surprise figure has historically been one of the best golfers on the European side: Sergio Garcia has won 64 percent of potential points at this event. He is only surpassed by Justin Rose at 71 percent.


On the U.S. side, Patrick Reed and J.B. Holmes lead the way although each has only played in one Ryder Cup.

One reason some people think Europe has been so successful is because the players galvanize easily. Consider the European team coming together to root on Rory McIlroy on Sunday in his Tour Championship win at East Lake. Can you imagine the Americans doing the same for Mickelson or Rickie Fowler? I can't.

8. The 1991 Ryder Cup changed everything: The War on the Shore, as it is called. It ushered in the modern era of Ryder Cups as we know them. The U.S. won that year, but there were several controversies, a ton of bad blood and a tournament that came down to the very last putt. That we could be so lucky to see another one like it this time around.

9. This tournament is going to rock. Who knows. Maybe we will get something reminiscent of the War on the Shore. For all the talk of how much better the U.S. team is and how the Ryder Cup task force is going to work in its first event, strange stuff starts happening when you throw these teams in this event. We have gotten some all-time memories in the first 40 Ryder Cup events. I can't wait to see what No. 41 has in store.