If it’s true, Phil Mickelson should be banned from professional golf.
Or is it one gambling degenerate trying to take down his feckless gambling degenerate buddy? Either way, golf deserves answers now.
Billy Walters, the casino maven serving time for insider trading who was intimate buddies with pro golfer and five time major champion Phil Mickelson, has outed Phil’s degenerative gambling in a new book, but the most colossal detail is the accusation that Phil allegedly attempted to have Walters lay down a $400,000 wager on the Ryder Cup Sunday singles at Medinah Country Club in 2016, a team on which Phil was playing actively in singles that Sunday. According to Walters’s book, he responded, “Have you lost your f—ing mind? Don’t you remember what happened to Pete Rose? You’re seen as a modern-day Arnold Palmer. You’d risk all that for this? I want no part of it.” According to Walters’s book, Mickelson replied, “alright,” and it was unclear whether he ever made the bet.
Typical of Phil’s handicapping skills, Europe tied the biggest rally in Ryder Cup history and won the match and the Cup 14.5 to 13.5
This is nuclear. Mickelson’s gambling debts are highly regarded to be the reason he abandoned all semblance of golf honor and ethos to take enough money from the Saudis to solve his Vegas problem, which according to Walters top $100 million. Walters estimates that over his five-year gambling relationship with Mickelson, the golfer bet over a billion dollars. At times, his “limit” was a ludicrous $400,000 per bet.
That’s an addiction and a sick one at that. no wonder rumors swirl about his family relationships crumbling.
Phil is already seen by many fans as a traitor to the PGA Tour for defecting to the LIV Tour. If Billy Walters’s allegations are true, Mickelson should never represent the Stars and Stripes again on a competitive golf team, and he should be banned from the Ryder Cup. This is a developing story.
UPDATE 1: Mickelson issues denial via X, formerly Twitter: “I never bet on the Ryder Cup. While it is well known that I always enjoy a friendly wager on the course, I would never undermine the integrity of the game.” Walters wrote that Mickelson’s gambling losses are estimated to be about $100 million. He says Mickelson in 2011 made 3,154 bets, about nine wagers per day.
UPDATE 2: Rory McIlroy shades Mickelson on X – he can bet on the Ryder Cup now that he’s not playing in it.
That’s called riding him like Secretariat.
