Pavin wants Team USA to come out swinging

The 38th Ryder Cup kicks off tomorrow at the Celtic Manor Twenty Ten Course in Newport, Wales, with more question marks than normal.

The inclusion of 11 rookies -- six for the Europeans and five for the Americans -- pushes a competition teeming with questions about Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson and Lee Westwood into totally uncharted waters. Add to the mix a forecast of rainy weather for the three days of the event on a 7,378-yard, par-71 layout with wide but-still-sometimes-elusive fairways and thick third-cut rough and you have a volatile concoction difficult to predict.

A look at the world rankings would indicate that Team Europe should take back the Ryder Cup it surprisingly lost in 2008 at Valhalla. But world rankings won't mean anything once the players tee it up tomorrow, and as the PGA Tour always likes to say: "Anything's possible."

The opening four-ball pairings indicate that Team USA captain Corey Pavin is hoping his long-hitting bombers can put the home team on the defensive and into an early hole. For the opening session, Pavin has chosen to play his full complement of big hitters, including two apiece in two of his four pairings, as Mickelson and Dustin Johnson will compete in the opening match with Bubba Watson and Jeff Overton playing the anchor leg of the morning matches.

"I wanted to get guys out there in better-ball that make a lot of birdies," said Pavin, who will have six of his seven longest drivers among his eight players in the first session. "It's a very aggressive game tomorrow morning, so I just look for guys that can get the ball in the hole very quickly."

The morning matches break down like this:

First match: Mickelson/Johnson (USA) vs. Westwood/Martin Kaymer (EUR)
Second match: Stewart Cink/Matt Kuchar (USA) vs. Rory McIlroy/Graeme McDowell (EUR)
Third match: Steve Stricker/Woods (USA) vs. Ian Poulter/Ross Fisher (EUR)
Fourth match: Watson/Overton (USA) vs. Luke Donald/Padraig Harrington (EUR)

That means Americans Jim Furyk, Zach Johnson, Hunter Mahan and Rickie Fowler are taking the morning off while Europeans Miguel Angel Jimenez, Edoardo Molinari, Francesco Molinari and Peter Hanson sit out, too.

It will be interesting to see how Woods and Mickelson, who haven't played particularly well of late, perform in the spotlight's glare. Neither has a dominating Ryder Cup record. Is Pavin expecting too much out of players struggling with their games? If Pavin's big hitters fail to land an early knockout punch, will the Europeans grab the upper hand and never look back?

Team Europe captain Colin Montgomerie will be watching Westwood closely to see how Europe's best player will perform in his first competition since withdrawing from the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational in Akron with a torn plantaris muscle that caused swelling in his right ankle and calf. He's been out of action for six weeks.

The biggest unknown is how the rookies -- Dustin Johnson, Watson, Kuchar, Overton and Fowler for USA and Kaymer, McIlroy, McDowell, Edoardo Molinari, Francesco Molinari and Hanson for EUR -- will perform when their mouths get a little dry. Their successes or failures will play in big role in deciding which captain will be second-guessed for coming up with the wrong strategy. All these questions for an event that always stirs up a lot of national pride should make for some fun television viewing. Expect to see a lot of birdies. The Celtic Manor greens are relatively flat and smooth, conducive for a lot of cup rattling.

The Ryder Cup can be seen on ESPN (today: 2:30 a.m.-1 p.m.) and NBC (Saturday: 8 a.m.-6 p.m.; Sunday: 7 a.m.-1 p.m.).

For a closer look at the Twenty Ten Course at Celtic Manor, check out:
http://www.rydercup.com/2010/usa/course/tour/index.cfm

For a closer look at the Ryder Cup teams, check out:
http://www.thegolfchannel.com/2010-ryder-cup-teams/

Information from RyderCup.com, PGATOUR.com, ESPN.com and GolfObserver.com contributed to this post.