At this point, you might as well just call him Hat-rick Cantlay, with all the attention paid to his headwear.
Patrick Cantlay, the American golfer at the center of one of the biggest controversies of the 2023 Ryder Cup, walked into Bethpage Black Tuesday proudly sporting a Team USA hat, something he hadn’t done two years ago in Rome, as reports suggested it was in protest over Ryder Cup players not being paid.
Cantlay chuckled when the topic of his hat was broached, before reiterating what he had said two years ago.
“Like I’ve said a million times, the hat didn’t fit last [Ryder Cup], and this year we worked with them to make sure we had one, and we got one, so we’re good,” he said.
Cantlay had been the heel of sorts two years ago at Marco Simone, with European golf fans even taunting him by waving their hats at him to mock him, after a Sky Sports report came out that Cantlay’s hatless appearance was a protest of US players’ lack of compensation for participating in the event.
The American denied the report, which also suggested the alleged protest had fractured the team locker room.
While the topic of “Hatgate” was still being talked about two years later, the position of whether players should be paid to play in the Ryder Cup has been put to bed after the PGA of America announced in December that it would give each American player $500,000 for participating, with $300,000 earmarked for charity.
Cantlay denied that he had any part in the discussions about Team USA paying its players, calling it the “PGA of America’s decision.”
The 33-year-old Long Beach, Calif., native said that he would be putting the money he earns toward his personal charity.
Conversation has picked up around the fact that the United States players are receiving money to take part in this year’s Ryder Cup, and it’s led some to even suggest that the Europeans care more about it than their American counterparts.
Cantlay insisted that he and his teammates were “100 percent focused on playing the best possible golf.”
“I think this event is very good at generating lots of noise, and that’s not going to help any of us put points on the board,” Cantlay said. “I think we need to put 100 percent of our focus on playing the best golf we can and let the noise be exactly what it is, just noise.”
“This week we’re playing for something bigger than ourselves,” he also said. “We’re playing for our team. We’re playing for our country.”