THE runway to The Masters is getting shorter and shorter and with each passing week the questions around Rory McIlroy’s form grow louder and more perplexing.
If there was any progress to report on his trip to The Players Championship, it’s that he was able to finish in a tie for 19th. Given that his four previous outings yielded placings of 21, 21, 24 and 66, that will have to do for now if he wants look for optimism at the bottom of your bag.
The story of his final cycle of 72 was appropriate for a week in which his only point of consistency was the ability to follow multiple moments of promise with sustained bursts of errors.
One statistic demonstrated better than any other the wildness of his undulations: in the four rounds he made 26 birdies, which was the second most in the field. And yet he accompanied them with so many errors that, as of this writing, his nine-under total was 11 shots behind the leader, defending champion Scottie Scheffler, who was leading Xander Schauffele down the stretch.
That has often been McIlroy’s conundrum, simply put: Few players have his ability to damage a field with great play, but many others are better able to limit the amount he inflicts on himself.
Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland reacts to a missed putt on the first hole on Sunday
McIlroy hits from the pine straw in the first of the final round of The Players Championship
Over the four rounds, McIlroy made 26 birdies, the second most in the field.
The surprising thing is that he opened this tournament brilliantly: his 65 in the first round was exceptional. But in the end, his driving was wayward (only 50 percent of the streets were successful all week) and his approaches were too erratic for a sustained assault. Better than last week at Bay Hill; well below his best level.
With all that in mind, the final hole of his 72 was perhaps the most fitting way to end it, with a drive into the water and a missed par putt from 12 feet.
His sigh told its own story as he concluded a round in which his five birdies were offset by five missed shots. “I think after the first round my expectations went through the roof because I thought, ‘Oh, I think I’ve figured it out,'” he said. “Then the last three days were a little more difficult. But I think I’m going in the right direction. I’ve definitely fixed some of the iron shots, which was a big key for me coming into this week. I’ve made enough birdies, it’s just a matter of getting rid of the bad stuff.’
McIlroy will have two weeks off before returning to play in San Antonio immediately before the Masters in the second week of April. Until then, he will be a fascinated spectator from the sidelines when the PGA Tour’s six player managers meet for the first time with the LIV circuit’s Saudi sponsors on Monday.
The six – Tiger Woods, Jordan Spieth, Cantlay, Adam Scott, Webb Simpson and Peter Malnati – will hold talks with the head of the Kingdom’s Public Investment Fund, Yasir Al-Rumayyan, in an effort to jump-start slow-moving merger discussions.
Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland hits a shot from a bunker on the eighth hole on Sunday.
McIlroy, who was once so central to that effort until he resigned from the political board last year, said, “I think it should have happened months ago, so I’m glad it’s happening.” Hopefully that will move the conversations forward and get us closer to a solution.
‘I’ve said this before, I’ve spent time with Yasir. I think the people who have represented him on LIV haven’t done him any favors, so Greg Norman and those guys. I look at the two entities and think there is a big disconnect between PIF and LIV. I think you have PIF here and LIV are here doing their thing. So the closer we get to Yasir, PIF and hopefully finalizing that investment, I think it’s going to be a really good thing.
‘I think there is a way to incorporate team golf and they want team golf to survive in some way on the calendar. I don’t think it necessarily has to look like LIV.
“I think, in my opinion, you should leave individual golf and then play your team golf on the periphery of that. But, again, it’s going to take patience. People have contracts at LIV until 2028, 2029. I don’t know if they’ll see that until the end, but I definitely see LIV playing in its current form for the next two years while everything is resolved. .
“I don’t think it’s an overnight solution, but if we can get the investment, at least we can start working towards a compromise.”