FARMINGDALE, N.Y. (AP) — Often sports, at their best, are the purest form of competition. They offer a chance to pick winners and losers in showdowns between rival teams, countries, sometimes even worldviews, in an arena where the games are played for high stakes but, ultimately, not for life and death.

This week’s Ryder Cup is an example of that.

It’s the biennial U.S. vs. Europe matchup on the golf course — an affair that has grown more contentious, occasionally uncomfortable and at times alarmingly petty over the past four decades.

This year’s edition has the added intrigue of being played in front of what is historically one of golf’s most bombastic and least-forgiving crowds that will converge at the country's toughest public course — Bethpage Black on Long Island. Adding to the m

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