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Naples' Mediate tells Pittsburgh paper he's 'extremely disappointed' for not being picked to Ryder Cup team
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Naples resident Rocco Mediate couldn't be reached for comment by the Daily News regarding not being picked to the U.S. Ryder Cup team on Tuesday, but he did grant an interview to his hometown paper, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
Mediate, a native of Greensburg, Pa., said he received a phone call from captain Paul Azinger, now a fellow Calusa Pines Golf Club member, on Tuesday morning.
"All he said was, 'Roc, I didn't pick you,' He didn't give a reason," Mediate told the paper. "I'm extremely sad and extremely disappointed."
During his press conference announcing his four picks -- Steve Stricker, J.B. Holmes, Hunter Mahan and Chad Campbell -- Azinger said he would not get into discussing why players who were not selected didn't make the team.
"I would like to say, there's a lot of players I could have picked that I didn't pick," Azinger said. "I don't want to try to justify for anybody really why I didn't pick the guys that I didn't pick. There are a lot of guys who are really deserving to be on the team, and I have some really good friends who I would have liked to have picked that I didn't pick.
"So, there was some heartache in all of this, as well."
Mediate, 45, vaulted into contention by nearly beating Tiger Woods to win the U.S. Open in June. He lost on the first hole of sudden death after the two were tied following an 18-hole playoff. Mediate would have been the oldest U.S. Open champion.
After the Open, Mediate had three straight top-30 finishes, including a tie for 19th at the British Open. But in his last four events, he tied for 52nd in the World Golf Championships-Bridgestone Invitational, shot a final-round 85 to finish next to last at the PGA Championship, missed the cut at The Barclays, and tied for 69th on Monday at the Deutsche Bank Championship. The top eight in the Ryder Cup points standings automatically made the team after the PGA. Mediate was 14th after the PGA.
"I missed one cut in my last 12 events. That's pretty good," Mediate told the Tribune-Review. "I've had a couple of mediocre weeks, too, but that's just being human.
"Without a doubt, this is some of the best golf I've played, the best run of golf I've ever had. Everything that I accomplished at the U.S. Open was overlooked, and that's very disappointing. It didn't matter what I did there."
Back at the end of July, Mediate said at the Bridgestone Invitational that he wanted to make the top eight to get on the team automatically, and that he realized he still had work left.
"Just because I was runner-up in the U.S. Open does not mean that I'm on the Ryder Cup team," Mediate said on July 31. "That is not going through Paul's head."
Mediate and Azinger have been close friends for a long time, and Mediate said that won't change.
"He's a good man and a friend," Mediate told the Pittsburgh paper. "I respect him and his choices. Paul, I love the guy. The guys he chose will be just fine. I just thought I was going to be one of them.
"I tried my hardest, and if what I did since June wasn't good enough, what can I do? I've never been this close, and right now, it just hurts a lot. I'm not feeling really good about anything right now."
"There's no question Rocco could have been a tremendous asset to the team, and I could name several players that would have been a tremendous asset for the team," Azinger said during his press conference Tuesday. "It was really difficult for me not to pick Rocco Mediate."
Azinger had said after making changes to the selection system that he would delay his captain's picks -- which he had doubled from two to four -- for three weeks after the PGA Championship, so he would get the golfers playing the best.
"Obviously, everything was predicated on the last couple of weeks, and that's too bad," Mediate said.
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"Obviously, everything was predicated on the last couple of weeks, and that's too bad," Mediate said.
That's a curious comment. Isn't the Ryder Cup to be played in a few weeks? Don't you want your "hot" players starting? This is not an All-Star game that doesn't mean anything, or is it?
I like Rocco as much as the next avg area sports fan but he knows his game is not tuned right now as evidenced by his last 4 starts including not making the cut at Barclays and finishing next to last at the PGA. He wouldn't pick himself!
#1 Posted by naplesregular on September 8, 2008 at 12:29 a.m. (Suggest removal)
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