AUGUSTA — The burden might have been greater than we knew, bigger than he let on, certainly more daunting than any outside of the arena could fathom.
Rory McIlroy carried it with him for the better part of a decade while still remaining among the top players in the game, rarely falling outside of the top five in the Official World Rankings while racking up his share of tournament titles without the biggest hardware.
McIlroy last won a major championship prior to Sunday in 2014, when the golf world was a different place and he was clearly a different golfer. That year, when he triumphed in the British Open at Royal Liverpool, thoughts almost immediately shifted to Augusta the following April. Before that, he knocked off another major in the PGA Championship at Valhalla.
Truth be told, if there was only one major championship for McIlroy to win, you’d almost assuredly bet on the Masters. His game just seemed so well-suited to Augusta National, his four-shot lead after 54 holes in 2011—before a final-round 80—suggesting his mastery.
But McIlroy knows the history. Plenty before him were supposed to win the Masters, too. Think of Johnny Miller or Tom Weiskopf or Greg Norman or Ernie Els. They were expected to have their own green jacket and a place for life at Augusta National.
It never happened.
And since this was McIlroy’s 17th attempt, the second-longest behind 2017 winner Sergio Garcia, it was becoming increasingly apparent that there were no guarantees for him, either.
That didn’t stop Jack Nicklaus and Tom Watson and Gary Player, after hitting their ceremonial first tee shots on Thursday, from declaring they felt McIlroy would win. Easy enough to say.
“It's tough,” McIlroy said. “You've had Jack, Gary, Tom, Tiger (Woods), you name it, come through here, and all say that I'll win the Masters one day. That's a hard load to carry, especially—it is. It really is.
“These are idols of mine, and it's—look, it's very flattering that they all come up here and they believe in me and they believe in my abilities to be able to win this tournament and, you know, achieve the Grand Slam and all that.
“But it doesn't help, you know,” he said with a laugh. “I wish they didn't say it. But, you know, I think as well, as the years have went on, I've just become more accustomed to the noise that sort of surrounds my whole Masters week and I've become a little more comfortable with it.”
It does help explain the large exhale and drop to his knees after holing the winning putt in the playoff over Justin Rose, the scream when he got up on his feet and the tears as he heard chants of his name while walking toward the clubhouse.
Unburdened, there is no reason why this can’t unleash another round of major victories.
Not only did he finally win the Masters, but McIlroy prevailed in a major championship for the first time in 11 years. He now has five major titles and it sure makes sense to think he’ll be among the contenders at Quail Hollow next month, site of the PGA Championship, where he’s won four times at the PGA Tour event held on the course, including last year.
McIlroy has now won three times this season on the PGA Tour and four times worldwide since his crushing defeat to Bryson DeChambeau last year at the U.S. Open.
DeChambeau gave it a good fight again this week at the Masters, finally succumbing to some indifferent iron play which he said plagued him all week. After overcoming it for the better part of three rounds, the two-time major winner was unable to make up for the deficiencies Sunday, a glaring error at the 11th hole all but ending his hopes.
But LIV Golf’s most popular player again reminded everyone what the golf world is missing with the current divide in the game. As the nearly two-year talks to get a deal between the PGA Tour, DP World Tour and Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia appear to be in peril, you wonder if the powers that be on both sides paused to watch the glory of the past weekend.
We can’t have that kind of drama without all of the best players competing together, and it won’t happen again until Quail Hollow, Oakmont and Royal Portrush, the course in Northern Ireland that is practically in McIlroy’s backyard.
While the current divide is a boon to the major championships, even the leader of the Masters, Fred Ridley, acknowledged prior to the tournament that a resolution is desired.
“I'm going to continue to be saying that and encouraging the leaders of the organizations involved to try to work together to come up with a solution,” Ridley said. “But I think we all agree that four times a year is not enough to have the great players of the game together.”
The weekend’s drama was a reminder of that. McIlroy prevailed but LIV’s DeChambeau was in the final group. Former Masters champion Patrick Reed, another LIV player, finished third. Jon Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton had strong weeks.
The PGA Tour might be fine without them, but it would be better with them. And that can’t happen without a deal.
Who knows what will happen now. But McIlroy, an advocate for a deal, has better things to enjoy now. He’s just the sixth player, and first in 25 years, to capture the career Grand Slam. He’s got a place at all of the majors for nearly as long as he wants.
The game overall might still have some issues. But not McIlroy. He’s free now to pursue further greatness.
Nick Dunlap's 19-Shot Improvement
Nick Dunlap showed a lot in his interview after the second round of the Masters, where his 71 was miles from making the 36-hole cut because he shot 90 in the first round.
His open-day score was the worst by 11 shots and was obviously frustrating and embarrassing for the two-time PGA Tour winner who is still just 21 years old.
Dunlap’s 19-shot improvement was amazing simply because of the pride he displayed.
He was so frustrated after the first round that he had his caddie purchase dozens of golf balls for him.
“I hit a couple buckets of balls at my Airbnb into the woods,” he said. “I don't know if there was any houses or anything back there. But you just hit a bunch of golf balls and—I had more of a knot in my stomach today than I've ever had starting a round of golf.
“I definitely can learn something from that, but it's certainly not a position that you ever want to be in again.”
Dunlap said he’s been struggling for most of the year and he’s having difficulty getting out of it.
“I’m hitting hundreds of golf balls that not everybody can see,” he said. “I'm doing it alone, and it's not getting any better, so it's pretty frustrating.
“I think it's just kind of gradually crept in since Hero (in December) probably. It's just kind of continually gotten worse. Like I said, I think my 3-wood on 15 (during the second round) was the first free golf swing I've probably had in four weeks. I'm just going to go and hit a bunch of golf balls and get ready for next week.”
Dunlap won the American Express Championship early last year while still an amateur, changing his life almost immediately. He had planned to remain amateur at least through the rest of his college season at Alabama but ended up deciding to turn pro a few weeks later.
There were clearly ups and downs a long with way but he won the opposite field Barracuda Championship in July, the same week as the British Open, and he qualified for his second Masters by being among the top 50 in the Official World Golf Ranking
“It's extremely rewarding and extremely humbling and frustrating at the same time,” Dunlap said of his brief time as a pro. “You try to have fun even though it can be quite frustrating at times, and especially right now it's hard to find something fun about it. But I got to come out and play Augusta today, so it could have been a lot worse.”
Nobody would have blamed Dunlap had he decided to withdraw after the opening round and try to figure out his issues away from the spotlight. But he didn’t, and he earned a lot of respect for his efforts.
“I would never let myself do that,” he said. “Never going to quit. I've never withdrawn from anything. I've never teed it up and not finished. I take pride in that, and that's always how I'm going to be.”
Justin Rose, All Class
As satisfying as Rory McIlroy’s Masters win was for him, it was an equally crushing loss for Justin Rose, who now has lost the Masters twice in a sudden-death playoff.
It’s difficult to find much more he could have done, having shot a final-round 65 after opening the tournament with a 65. He’ll lament the 75 in the third round that put him seven strokes back of McIlroy. It’s rare for a player to come from that far back, and it would have been one shot short of the record for a final-round comeback in Masters history.
For Rose, 44, the opportunities might not be forthcoming. The 2013 U.S. Open winner also tied for second last year at the British Open and was sixth at the PGA Championship.
“It’s a bogey away from being the greatest round I ever played,” Rose said of the 17th-hole bogey that preceded his birdie at the 18th.
“Definitely I'm proud of myself. I think, yeah, played great golf today. I think I flipped the switch from yesterday. Yesterday I was so angry coming off the golf course because I turned 69 into 75. I didn't let that momentum seep into today, and I think that that was, from a professionalism point of view, very, very proud of that switch overnight and into this morning.
“Today I hit a lot of quality shots under pressure, and I felt like I was getting stronger and stronger and stronger as the round was going on. I felt so good with my game, good with my emotions, and I'm super proud of that. Because you can't prepare for that. You can't practice for that. That's when you learn about yourself, and I'm still learning about myself.
As tough as it was, Rose handled the aftermath quite well, as evidenced by his comments.
“Rory is a friend for sure,” he said. “Walked on the tee. We shake hands. That's the business end of things. When it's all said and done, I said to him, Listen, I was glad I was here on this green to witness you win the career Grand Slam. That's such a cool, momentous moment in the game of golf. Yeah, that was it.
“He was obviously pretty overcome with emotion and probably not going to be able to take in much at the time. But, I mean, it was a big day in golf.”
Patrick Reed On the Rise
Patrick Reed didn’t quite have enough to win a second green jacket but his third-place finish helped all but assure him a spot in next month’s PGA Championship, where with another strong week he can qualify for the U.S. Open.
Reed bemoaned a poor putting week at Augusta National—he holed out for eagle on the 17th hole—but felt assured that he could win the Masters again as he did in 2018.
“First thing he (caddie Kessler Karrain) said to me is hey, we keep doing what you're doing, you're going to have another one of these,” Reed said. “The game is where it needs to be. I'm doing things the right way. Now it's just put it all together and make some putts.”
Reed moved to 49th in the Official World Golf Ranking from 106th, a strong achievement for a player who is not getting any points while playing in the LIV Golf League. The PGA traditionally invites any player not already exempt who is in the top 100 in the OWGR.
There are two top 60 deadlines for the U.S. Open coming up in the weeks prior to the U.S. Open, including right after the PGA. Reed can avoid having to endure final qualifying if he maintains that top 60 spot. He’s already qualified for the British Open via a top three finish earlier this year at the International Series Macau event.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Finally a Masters Champion, Rory McIlroy Is Now Free to Pursue Further Greatness.
