Rory McIlroy captured his second consecutive green jacket last Sunday, winning his sixth major championship.
The win will mean a lot to his legacy.
I believe McIlroy is now the best European golfer ever, overtaking Seve Ballesteros and Nick Faldo. I also think this win pushes him to number 10 on the list of greatest male golfers in history, sneaking past Phil Mickelson.
By the end of his career, there likely won’t be any debate. McIlroy, who will turn 37, seems destined to be at the level of a Tom Watson or Arnold Palmer.
This raises the question of how many majors McIlroy will win in his career.
I’m drawing the over/under line at 7.5 degrees
If you had to bet on whether McIlroy will be over or under this line of 7.5 majors, which side would you pick?
Let’s start with the case for why McIlroy will win at least two more majors.
If he reaches eight majors, that would surpass Palmer and tie him with Watson. Only five golfers in history have more than eight majors: Jack Nicklaus (18), Tiger Woods (15), Walter Hagen (11), Ben Hogan (9) and Gary Player (9).
This would put him in a certain realm of the game that is reserved for legendary figures, so he must have a lot of hunger to reach that level.
McIlroy has two wins in the last five tournaments played. He has played consistently outstanding golf over the past few years, especially in the majors where he usually competes.
Since 2022, Rory has 11 major top-10 finishes. Check out his results in the last seven stages of the US Open (T9-T8-T7-T5-2-2-T19). He’s been in the mix almost every year and hasn’t won any of them.
It looks like he has nothing to lose at this point, which could be very cheap going forward.
If McIlroy retired tomorrow, he would still be the best European player to ever play the game. Yes, there are opportunities to raise his legacy to the next level. But there also doesn’t need to be as much tension in his game — the same tension that contributed to an 11-year hitting drought.
McIlroy has a career winning rate of 10.8 percent, though that drops to 8.8 percent in majors.
I will predict that McIlroy has at least five seasons of golf left where he is still at the peak of his ability and the desire to compete has not waned. Let’s just say he has roughly 20 major championship appearances left at this level of golf.
If you were to give up his career strikeout rate, that would be about two majors. If you crunch his major win rate, it’s about 1.8 major wins expected in that span.
I think his established comfort level at Augusta and the aforementioned US Open success is enough to make a fair case that he’ll pick up at least two more championships total for his career. You might as well look at his competition and say that only Scottie Scheffler is a threat to win majors by a fraction at this point. Jon Rahm, Xander Schauffele, Bryson DeChambeau and others should remain factors, but it doesn’t look like any of them have the capacity to be at the McIlroy/Scheffler standard.
The main signs are desire and the possibility of injury (which McIlroy has only endured for brief periods in his career).
If he stays relatively healthy, I think grad above 7.5 is a big bet.
The case for under? As mentioned, McIlroy went almost 11 years without winning one of these. They are very hard to win.
And in the modern game, it seems like players over the age of 40 start to decline rapidly. It’s not 2004 anymore. There are examples of world-class players like Justin Rose, 45, who are still relevant in the majors – but the list of guys who have recently dropped into their 40s is much longer.
McIlroy takes great care of his body and has such a fluid swing that I feel like he might be able to stay at the top of the game longer than most – but Father Time comes to us all.
What do you think of that 7.5 line? Will he earn two more degrees?
