Entertainment

Saga of Rory McIlroy continues at Genesis Scottish Open

Published

2 months ago

July 10, 2024

He walked the High Line afterward, just a man alone with his thoughts.

Rory McIlroy had already planned to spend some time in New York City, so he went through with it, three days in Manhattan as he went about the slow process of putting his life back together after the worst moment of his professional life. A few people recognized him, but mostly, they let him be, his AirPods blocking out the world.

“It was nice to sort of blend in with the city a little bit,” McIlroy said from the Genesis Scottish Open at The Renaissance Club on Wednesday, his first public comments since he finished second at the U.S. Open at Pinehurst No. 2, which marked his 11th top-five in a major since he last won one (2014 PGA Championship), and the second straight U.S. Open in which he finished one back.

I walked around,” he continued. “I walked the High Line a couple of times. I made a few phone calls. Sort of was alone with my thoughts for a couple days, which was good. I had some good chats with people close to me, and as you start to think about not just Sunday at Pinehurst but the whole way throughout the week, there was a couple of things that I noticed that I wanted to try to work on over the last few weeks coming into here, and obviously next week at Royal Troon Golf Club.

“They were hard but at the same time, as each day went by, it became easier to focus on the positives and then to think about the future instead of what had just happened.”

Maybe you watched McIlroy lose the U.S. Open. Maybe you got swept up in his quest because, season after season, sequel after sequel, you’re still the worst kind of fool and the best kind of audience.

“Did you just fall down?” your wife asked at the worst part, from the kitchen, and yes, you did sort of let your legs buckle upon McIlroy’s unaccountable short miss on 16.

“Rory just missed a two-foot putt,” you said.

He’s falling apart again, you didn’t add. Because that would not be kind, nor would it help.

Also, technically, it was two and a half feet, but when McIlroy missed from 3 feet, 9 inches at the last, you just knew Bryson DeChambeau was going to walk through that open door. McIlroy’s two-stroke lead with five holes to play was gone to three bogeys in his last four holes. It was game over, but good news for the sequel. Frodo and the ring. McIlroy and major No. 5.

After winning four majors from 2011-14, he has only found ways to lose them. You strain for a comparison from another sport and decide he’s like those mid-career Major Leaguers Rick Ankiel, Steve Sax and others who suddenly and unaccountably forgot how to throw. You wonder how McIlroy contracted the major yips. You wonder if maybe you’re cracking up a little yourself. You really hope he doesn’t read this.

How much to remember? How much to forget?

These are the questions for McIlroy as he prepares to defend his title at the co-sanctioned Genesis Scottish Open 25 days after what he described as his lowest point as a professional.

“It was a great day until it wasn’t,” he said. “If anything, I’d say my pre-shot routine got a little bit long. Started to look at the target a few more times over the ball.”

He also started to look back at DeChambeau, he added, which was partly because of the routing of the course at Pinehurst, he said. It was also a mistake.

“Not really staying in my own little world for the whole 18 holes,” McIlroy said. “But really, apart from that, there’s not a lot I would do differently.”

The spotlight will be squarely on McIlroy as he tees it up alongside Robert MacIntyre, whom he pipped by a shot at last year’s Genesis Scottish Open, and Viktor Hovland for the first two rounds this week. It will only intensify next week after he makes the 105-mile hop to Troon for The Open Championship and another crack at major No. 5. We’re coming to the end of season 10 of this unscripted drama, a cat-and-mouse game that, in all its twists and turns, supersedes anything else on TV.

At 35, McIlroy may be at an inflection point. One photo from Pinehurst said it all: caddie Harry Diamond’s left hand on McIlroy’s back as he staggered off to sign his card. Moments later, NBC showed the three-time FedExCup winner, his face a rictus of agony, watching the bitter end as DeChambeau made a par save from the front bunker that was anything but routine but seemed preordained, nonetheless.

McIlroy, a man fighting himself, left the course without comment.

“The one word that I would describe my career as is resilient,” he said the next day in a statement. “I’ve shown my resilience over and over again in the last 17 years and I will again.”

He withdrew from the Travelers Championship, resolving to take some time away to “process everything and build myself back up.” And then he disappeared into masses in Manhattan, just another human in a sea of them. Walking. Thinking. He’d done a lot right at Pinehurst; he’d have to hold onto that. It was a great day until it wasn’t.

For this week, at least, he can be comforted by the fact that The Renaissance Club was the site of one of his most inspired victories, his sensational 5-iron tee shot to the par-3 17th and a scalded 2-iron into a fierce wind on 18. His two unlikely birdies were enough to edge MacIntyre for the win in flagstick-bending wind.

“To finish two, three like I did,” McIlroy said. “You know, everyone talks about the 2-iron at the last but the 5-iron I hit into 17 was just as good a shot if not a little bit better. To hit two iron shots like that and hole the putts what I needed to, it was awesome. Sort of I felt in some ways bad that it came at the expense of Bob, but at the same time it was amazing to win a tournament that I had never won before.”

Reflecting on happier times was a reminder that all is not lost, even if it sometimes feels that way.