Scottie Scheffler’s flop shows Ryder Cup can bring down even world No 1s | Bryan Armen Graham

No world No 1 had ever started a Ryder Cup by losing three straight matches. Scheffler went one worse

Scottie Scheffler went to the 1st tee on Saturday afternoon backed by the theatrics of a prize-fighter making his ringwalk. He crossed the bridge from the practice green to the grandstand alongside Bryson DeChambeau, the thumping bassline and clavinet riff of Sirius by the Alan Parsons Project rattling the aluminum beneath their feet: the same track that once summoned Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls thundered from the speakers, the closest US analogue to the All Blacks' haka for spine-tingling pregame stagecraft. The stage was set for the world's best golfer to spark a comeback, to pull the United States back from the edge of humiliation at Bethpage Black.

Instead, it became the overture to a historic dud.