Penton: McIlroy dealing with ‘major’ scar tissue
By Bruce Penton
Professional golfers don’t like to use the word ‘choke’, but how else to explain what Rory McIlroy did to hand the 2024 U.S.Open championship to Bryson DeChambeau?
Putting superbly all day and not only overcoming a three-stroke deficit but building a two-stroke lead with five holes to go at Pinehurst No. 2 in North Carolina, McIlroy missed a putt of two feet, 11 inches on No. 16 and another shorty, three feet, nine inches, on 18, to open the door for DeChambeau’s victory. It was the second U.S. Open title for DeChambeau, who plays on the LIV tour. He needed a spectacular shot of his own on 18 to win the tournament and he didn’t miss, manoeuvring a 55-yard bunker shot to within three feet and sinking the putt to earn a one-stroke victory.
McIlroy has done this type of thing before. In 2011, while he was just a pup of 21, McIlroy seemingly had the Masters title in his grasp. He started the final round with a four-stroke lead and, incredibly, finished 10 strokes behind. His downfall was on the back nine, where he triple-bogeyed No. 10, bogied 11 and doubled-bogied 12 en route to an 80.
Now that he’s 35, the ghosts of Choke City are evidently still in his head. He's gone 10 years without winning a major and it’s not an overstatement to say he was the dominant player of his era. Winning zero majors over a 40-tournament span is hard to believe, especially when the likes of Brian Harman, Wyndham Clark, Gary Woodland, Patrick Reed, Danny Willet, Zach Johnson, Shane Lowry, Jimmy Walker and Jason Dufner — journeyman players mostly — all won a major during McIlroy’s dry period.
McIlroy isn’t the first professional golfer to mess up when the pressure rose. The most famous choke job was that of Jean van de Velde of France, a virtual no-name who somehow stood on the 18th tee of the final round of the Open Championship in 1999 at Carnoustie with a three-shot lead and proceeded to make a triple-bogey seven to fall into a three-way playoff, which was won by Scotland’s Paul Lawrie.
Hall of Famer Sam Snead had a glorious career, but never won a U.S. Open. In 1937, he led the Open with one hole to go, but carded a triple-bogey on the last hole to lose. Doug Sanders at the 1970 Open Championship, Scott Hoch at the 1989 Masters and Bernhard Langer at the 1991 Ryder Cup all embarrassingly missed short, vital putts.
It’s hard to know whether McIlroy will ever be able to shed the scar tissue that has built up between his ears, and whether he’ll ever be able to sink a relatively easy putt to win a major. But it seems the more he misses those significant putts, the less chance there is for him to generate the mental toughness needed to finally succeed.
Super 70s Sports: “In 1971, Juan Marichal tossed his 50th career shutout. Fifty years later, scientists are baffled when they discover that if you throw even one complete game your entire arm will blow up.”
RJ Currie of sportsdeke.com: “In early November, 1963, Ronald Howes marketed the first Easy-Bake Oven — three years before the start of the Maple Leafs last Stanley Cup-winning season. Since then both have run on the same principle: just replace one dim bulb with another hoping the final product won’t be half-baked.”
Toronto Globe and Mail columnist Cathal Kelly, on hockey: “Other sports claim to be vicious. Hockey was the only one in which participants routinely lost half their teeth.”
Headline in the New York Post: “Tall order: 7-foot-9 Florida recruit is about to make college basketball history. Oliver Rioux makes Zach Edey look like Muggsy Bogues.”
Canadian parody website The Beaverton: “The Chicago Blackhawks set an NHL record in 1968 when their entire roster looked like dads who expected their daughters to be home by 9 pm and you didn’t want to find out what was gonna happen at 9:02.”
Janice Hough of leftcoastsportsbabe.com: “And if anyone who even casually followed the NHL and the Stanley Cup playoffs says they expected (a Game 7) after the Florida Panthers went up 3-0 on the Edmonton Oilers…. well, drug test them or give them a lie detector test.”
Bob Molinaro of pilotonline.com (Hampton, Va.): “Next week marks the 40th anniversary of the NBA draft, in which the Rockets selected Hakeem Olajuwon No. 1, the Portland Trail Blazers took Sam Bowie second and the Bulls reluctantly chose Michael Jordan third.”
RJ Currie of sportsdeke.com, giving the No. 1 reason why more than 50 teams competed in England’s 12-hour, overnight lawn tractor race: “The mow, the merrier.”
Another one from Currie: “American Andy Roddick went into the tennis Hall of Fame despite being a winner in only one major event. Two, if you include marriage to SI cover girl Brooklyn Decker.”
Care to comment? Email brucepenton2003@yahoo.ca