Did Keegan Bradley tip his hand to the U.S. Ryder Cup pairings for Bethpage Black later this month?

The tee times for this week’s Procore Championship offer a possible sneak peek into Bradley’s thinking. Ten players on the U.S. Ryder Cup roster are competing in Napa, and they are all paired together or with a vice captain.

Scottie Scheffler will play the first two rounds with Russell Henley and Webb Simpson. Cameron Young, Justin Thomas and Ben Griffin make up the second Ryder Cup-centric grouping. Collin Morikawa, Sam Burns and J.J. Spaun will play together, while Harris English, Patrick Cantlay and Gary Woodland will make up the final tee time.

Notable Round 1-2 tee times (all times in ET)

• 3:38 p.m. Thursday/10:33 a.m. Friday: Scottie Scheffler, Russell Henley, J.J. Spaun
• 3:49 p.m. Thursday/10:44 a.m. Friday: Collin Morikawa, Harris English, Webb Simpson
• 4 p.m. Thursday/10:55 a.m. Friday: Patrick Cantlay, Sam Burns, Gary Woodland
• 4:11 p.m. Thursday/11:06 a.m. Friday: Justin Thomas, Ben Griffin, Cameron Young

What sticks out?

Well, Scheffler and Henley playing together is no surprise. The duo played three sessions at last year’s Presidents Cup and proved to be a dynamic pairing with a 2-1-0 record, playing both Foursomes sessions and one Four-ball session. The two were considered a likely pairing again at Bethpage Black, and their tee time in Napa will only strengthen those considerations. Spaun is a Ryder Cup rookie, but with an exemplary tee-to-green game, he follows a similar archetype to Henley and coule be a possible partner for Scheffler.

Thomas is playing alongside a pair of Ryder Cup rookies in Young and Griffin. Could Thomas fulfill the role of a veteran leader in charge of bringing the young guys along? It makes sense. Thomas, while just 32 years old, is the most experienced member of the U.S. Team with three prior Ryder Cup appearances. Thomas and Young both play Titleist ProV1x golf balls (though Young recently switched to a slightly different variation), which could make them a possible Foursomes pairing. Young’s lone statistical deficiency is his approach play, which is also Thomas’ calling card.

Cantlay and Burns played together twice at the Presidents Cup last fall, and the pairing at the Procore is a sign we could see them team up again. It’s important to remember that Cantlay has played a majority of his matches alongside Xander Schauffele. Without Schauffele in the field, it tracks to that Cantlay would play with the other player he has the most familiarity with. Morikawa and Burns have also played together twice in team events – once in the 2023 Ryder Cup (Four-ball) and once at last year’s Presidents Cup (Foursomes) – though they aren't in Napa.

Instead, Morikawa and English will play alongside each other. They did not team up during English's lone Ryder Cup appearance in 2021. English played twice with Tony Finau there at Whistling Straits, who does have a similar statistical profile to Morikawa -- with a strong tee-to-green game but an inconsistent short game.

Similarly, the European Team is dropping similar clues for its pairings over at the DP World Tour’s BMW PGA Championship. Eleven members of Team Europe will play this week in England, split across five groupings:

• Justin Rose, Tommy Fleetwood
• Ludvig Åberg, Matt Fitzpatrick
• Viktor Hovland, Rasmus Højgaard
• Tyrrell Hatton, Robert MacIntyre
• Rory McIlroy, Shane Lowry, Jon Rahm

While the European Team returns 11 of the same 12 players from 2023, several new potential pairings are teased here. Rose and Fleetwood have not played together previously, despite playing on the same team twice before. The same goes for Åberg and Fitzpatrick, and Hatton and MacIntyre.

The possible pairings preview only adds to the excitement for both the Procore Championship and BMW PGA Championship. The intrigue surrounding potential matchups is what helps fuel the Ryder Cup’s year-long news cycle, which will finally crescendo in two weeks when all the theoretical discussions are thrown out in favor of the actual golf.

That can’t come soon enough.