Rory McIlroy: European Ryder Cup team OK with not being paid to play at Bethpage
Rory McIlroy said Thursday he would pay to appear in the Ryder Cup in the wake of a recent report that the PGA of America could compensate U.S. players as much as $400,000 to play in the matches next year at Bethpage Black.
“I personally would pay for the privilege to play on the Ryder Cup,” McIlroy told a handful of reporters following the opening round of the season-ending DP World Tour Championship in Dubai, as reported here by Golf Digest. “I’ve talked about this a lot. The two purest forms of competition in our game right now are the Ryder Cup and the Olympics. Both have purity because no money is involved.
“I don’t want to say being paid would taint the match, but it would give it a different feel. What we’ve done a really good job of is being this really cohesive group over the past decade. We wouldn’t want anything to change that.”
The Telegraph reported this week that the PGA is set – pending board approval – to reward the 12 American players for their participation after the simmering pay-for-play controversy last year in Rome. In recent editions, $200,000 per player was donated to charity. For reference, the reported $400,000 payout is equivalent to an 13th-place finish at the PGA Tour’s Players Championship, which carries a $25 million purse.
But the Ryder Cup’s increased commercial success – and fan ticket prices for Bethpage that have soared to $750 – have increased the discussion about whether participants should be compensated. McIlroy said that European team members have already had talks with captain Luke Donald about any potential payment plans, and though he understands the ongoing debate, McIlroy believes the money is best used elsewhere on the European side.
“The Ryder Cup does create a lot of revenue; it is probably one of the top five sporting events in the world,” McIlroy said, according to the report. “But the Ryder Cup is so much more than that, especially to the Europeans and to our tour. We’ve all had a conversation with Luke over the past few weeks. The consensus is that $5 million or whatever paid to the team would be better spent elsewhere on the DP World Tour – even to support the Challenge Tour.”
Tyrrell Hatton, Shane Lowry and Tommy Fleetwood all told Digest they supported McIlroy’s comments and had no interest in following the Americans’ lead.
“Pay me nothing or pay me $10 million to play in the Ryder Cup, I’m still going to do it,” Fleetwood told Digest. “I’ve genuinely never thought of getting paid to play. I’ve never really thought it was a thing. So I’m not going to worry about it now. It’s likely we’ll still have the same system as we’ve had until now. And we’ll still play for the same reasons that we’ve always played.”