Martin Dempster: US fired up for Ryder

TOM Watson’s determination to leave Gleneagles in September with the Ryder Cup is being shared by the man who engineered his appointment.

Ted Bishop: Cup comes first. Picture: Getty

An e-mail that landed in my inbox from Ted Bishop, the president of the PGA of America, with a subject line of “really?” was proof of that.

“I read with interest your story on Tom Watson and Tiger Woods,” he wrote in 
response to a recent article in The Scotsman.

In it, I’d suggested that Watson could be pressurised into picking Woods for TV purposes on the back of the US ratings for the last round of the Open Championship having been down considerably on the previous year.

“I am bothered that you would think I would be more concerned about TV ratings than the outcome of the Ryder Cup,” added Bishop. “While Watson and I might share different views on ObamaCare, we are totally in agreement about the No 1 priority with the Ryder Cup – bringing the Ryder Cup back to the US.”

It’s not the first time Bishop has responded to a story in The Scotsman, having fired off an e-mail to Sandy Jones, the PGA chief executive, following something he said earlier in the year.

There’s nothing wrong with showing passion, though, and you get the impression that, through Watson in particular but also Bishop in the background, this US side is certainly going to be fired up.