In 13 career appearances at Big Jack’s Memorial TourRory McIlroy has five top-10 finishes and four more top-20 finishes. It’s a record, at one of the most enjoyable stages of the game, that most players would embrace, but McIlroy is not, of course, most players. He is a 30-time PGA Tour winner with six major titles and the career Grand Slam. He has arrived at a place where he is not looking to win any tournament, but the right KIND of tournaments. Directors. The National Team opens. Events organized or related to legends.
“I would say here and the Tiger event at the Riviera, they’re both the ones I’d like to win,” McIlroy said on Wednesday.
Tiger’s event is the Genesis Invitational in Los Angeles, where McIlroy is winless in 10 tries. “Here” is this week’s event, the Remembrance, on Muirfield Village in Ohio, where McIlroy is 0-for-13. “I always thought it would be nice to win here and take that little walk up the hill on the 18th green and shake Jack’s hand,” McIlroy said.
McIlroy and Nicklaus go back nearly two decades: mentee and mentor, fellow GOATs and South Floridians, casual lunch companions at the Bear’s Club. During one of those drives a couple of years ago, McIlroy gave Nicklaus a brief description of how he planned to attack. Augusta National in the Masters of that year. “I wouldn’t change a thing,” Nicklaus told him. “I think that’s exactly the way you have to play it.” Before this year’s Masters, Nicklaus spotted McIlroy during a session and offered him more advice. “I put my hands on his shoulders,” Nicklaus said, “and said, ‘No to both of them surprisingly.’
McIlroy made several doubles, but Nicklaus’ message still got through: Don’t be a dummy out there. Observing this strategy led McIlroy to it second green straight jacket.
Which brings us back to the village of Muirfield. What wisdom has Nicklaus imparted to McIlroy on how to manage Nicklaus’ masterpiece?
“He hasn’t asked me,” Nicklaus said Tuesday.
The reporters did, though — specifically, if Nicklaus had any theories about why McIlroy hadn’t yet triumphed at Muirfield. Nicklaus gave a thoughtful response.
“I think this golf course is a golf course that really takes patience,” he said. “I didn’t design it for big players, I didn’t design it for short players, I didn’t design it for the middle. I tried to design it so that we cater to everybody and try to give every type of player a fair swing. And when you realize that, you can’t stand up and just hit it on every hole.”
This approach is how a younger Nicklaus tried to destroy his design (unsuccessfully), and it’s not hard to imagine a younger, more daring McIlroy coming to the MVGC with the same mindset. Over time, though, McIlroy, like Nicklaus, learned that driver — at least with the distance he breaks his tee shots — is no good at Muirfield. That’s because freeways tighten his landing zones.
“It’s frustrated me in a way that I feel like my biggest weapon has been kind of neutralized here,” McIlroy said. “And then I got to play the golf course like most of the other guys on the course.”
that is, strategically — identifying the best leaves for the most optimal angles on the greens and then controlling the flight and spin of those approaches.
Even the greens aren’t pushy, Nicklaus said, especially for players who want to lock their irons (see: more modern Tour pros). “Take 3, 6, 9, 10, 14, 15, 17 and 18,” Nicklaus said. “If you roll the ball off the green, what happens? Not a good score.”
The alternative? Change your trajectories, Nicklaus said. That’s what he learned to do, both at Muirfield and at another park with which he became synonymous, Augusta National. “I think Augusta is also a trajectory golf course,” Nicklaus said.
McIlroy is a style maestro. In fact, he can do almost anything he wants with a golf ball. At Muirfield, it’s just a matter of committing to the shots the course calls for. If McIlroy can follow this formula, a warm handshake from his fellow Bear’s Club could be in his very near future.
“I’d like to see Rory play well here,” Nicklaus said.
