"Let's just focus on the golf for a little bit" - Rory McIlroy's decision to quit the PGA Tour board in November 2023 after fighting so passionately against the LIV Golf League for so long came as quite the shock to most people around the world at the time.
The four-time Major winner first publicly stated that between his golf game, his family, his growing investment portfolio, and his involvement in TGL "something had to give" - and that was the reason for the eyebrow-raising decision.
Yet, a handful of telling lines in front of the Netflix cameras - broadcast during the early episodes of Full Swing: Season 2 - may have gone a long way to revealing another vital factor behind the Northern Irishman opting to pack his side-role in.
McIlroy was followed throughout the 2023 season by the Full Swing crew and was regularly asked about his relationship with the PGA Tour's rival circuit and its players.
Briefly discussing the way both tours are characterized before the political turning point in the season, McIlroy said: “They [LIV players] are portrayed as the villains and we [PGA Tour] are portrayed as the good guys, the ones who stayed. There’s certainly something there.”
Then came the infamous June 6 agreement. Almost no one saw it coming. Least of all, McIlroy, despite being a key part of the PGA Tour board which was fighting for a better future for the US-based circuit.
The 34-year-old - who had also firmly nailed his colors to the mast in the preceding months - later explained that he felt like "a sacrificial lamb" who had been "betrayed" before stating "I still hate LIV."
Speaking to the makers of Full Swing at the time of the agreement being made public, McIlroy questioned PGA Tour commissioner, Jay Monahan's behavior towards him and his peers as well as the boss' sharp u-turn from claiming "we will never work with LIV" to forming a sport-defining partnership with Yasir Al-Rumayyan and his Public Investment Fund.
Reacting to the agreement, McIlroy said: "What happened? How did you get from not knowing this guy (Al-Rumayyan) and not meeting this guy to signing what is probably the biggest deal in the history of professional golf? What happened?
“You’re telling us that these guys (LIV) are almost like the enemy to you’re partnering with them. It’s a hard one to swallow. I’m like, 'why did I just waste 12 months of my life to fight for something that was always going to come back together again?'”
The most-recent line in that paragraph highlighted how McIlroy - who had offered himself up as one of the PGA Tour's unofficial leading spokesmen throughout the early days of the sport's civil war - felt betrayal "probably for the first time in my life" and why he then started to consider removing any kind of distraction from his pursuit of golfing greatness.
He continued: “There is a palpable vibe of confusion and anger because we have very little information now apart from basically entered into an agreement, don’t know what that agreement is going to involve.
"It was all sprung on us so quickly, everyone was blindsided by it and I think that created a lot of anger and a lot of confusion amongst the tour membership. Jay realised pretty quickly that the rollout of it could have been handled better.”
Then came the apathy from McIlroy. Worn down by the arguing and ultimately feeling like his fight was all for nothing - all while having failed to add to his Major tally - the 34-year-old gave his clearest true indication as to why he would go on to leave the PGA Tour board once the cameras had stopped rolling.
Referencing Brooks Koepka's fifth Major victory - at the 2023 PGA Championship - while he remained on a number he has possessed since 2014, McIlroy said: “F***, someone has got more majors in my era than I have.
"It’s hard not to define myself as one of the best golfers in the world, so when you struggle like that you feel a little lost, but I think it was a wake up call for me to say ‘let’s just focus on the golf for a little bit.'
"You know you get dragged into these things from time to time, and I’ve been dragged in in a big way. I’m almost at the point where it's like 'f*** it, do what you’ve got to do.'”
