President Cup Captains Announced

This week, the announcement of the 2015 President Cup captains took place. For the International Team, they will be lead once again by Nick Price, who captained the team last year. Captain Price did as good of a job as he possibly could under the circumstances - he just didn't have the firepower on his team to stack up against the American squad. With the Internationals having home course advantage next year, Price is given a second opportunity to see if he can will his team to victory. The Internationals will also be calling on KJ Choi as a vice captain. The event will take place in South Korea, so Choi's presence in some capacity was expected. Many, including myself, expected Choi to be named captain for the event, for Price returning for another shot also makes a lot of sense.

Team USA will be captained by Jay Haas. Haas played on three Ryder Cup teams and two President Cup teams, and has 9 PGA Tour wins to his name. The announcement was a little bit of a surprise, as Haas has flown under the radar the past couple of years, but the announcement was also accepted as a positive one, as many people think Haas has the personality to lead the team into a hostile environment. Haas's vice-captain will be Fred Couples, who went 3-for-3 as a captain of the Presidents Cup, so Haas will have plenty of experience behind him.

Personally, both of these announcements make sense to me. The only person besides KJ Choi who should have gotten an opportunity to captain this team is Nick Price, and so seeing them give Price another chance in what may be much more favorable conditions is the right thing to do. The Internationals need someone who is going to come at this process with a lot of passion, and Price showed that he has exactly that. He is going to be thinking about these matches for the next year and a half, and whoever he is able to get on his team, he is going to expect nothing but the best from them. The Internationals need to win in order to make these matches mean something again, and I'm sure Nick Price knows this.

For the Americans, they are playing with house money entering enemy territory. If they give someone the team to someone like Haas, who has vice captain experience, and it doesn't work it, then there is no real harm in it. They get to know right away if Haas is the kind of captain they need long term, or if he is going to be a one and done disappointment. Either way, Team USA is under zero pressure entering these matches, so they didn't need some huge name that is known as being a tough, cerebral guy.

The only odd announcement was Fred Couples being a vice captain. I figured he would want to just sit back and relax, not having to worry about these kinds of events anymore. Apparently, once you get a taste of it, you want to savor it. Just ask Tom Watson.