Rory McIlroy ‘frustrated’ at the Memorial. Jack Nicklaus has solutions
In 13 career appearances at the Big Jack’s Memorial Tournament, Rory McIlroy has five top-10 finishes and four other top-20s. It’s a record, in one of the splashiest sections of the game, that most players would accept, but McIlroy, of course, is not most players. He is a 30-time PGA Tour winner with six major titles and a career Grand Slam. He has reached a point where he is not looking to win any championships but the right grace of competitions. There are hundreds. The world is opening up. Events hosted or associated with legends.
“I’d 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 next event is the Genesis Invitational in Los Angeles, where McIlroy has failed in 10 attempts. “Here” is this week’s event, the Memorial, at Muirfield Village in Ohio, where McIlroy is 0-for-13. “I always thought it would be nice to win here and take a little walk up the hill from the 18th green and shake Jack’s hand,” McIlroy said.
McIlroy and Nicklaus go back nearly two decades: instructor and mentor, fellow GOATs and fellow South Floridians, who occasionally eat lunch at the Bear’s Club. In one of those toasts a few years ago, McIlroy gave Nicklaus a detailed explanation of how he planned to attack Augusta National in that year’s Masters. “I wouldn’t change a thing,” said Nicklaus. “I think that’s exactly the way you have to play it.” Before this year’s Masters, Nicklaus saw McIlroy during various sessions and offered him additional advice. “I put my hands on his shoulders,” Nicklaus said, “and I told him, ‘No double bogeys.’
McIlroy carded a double, but Nicklaus’ message still got through: Don’t be a dummy out there. Heeding that strategy led McIlroy to his second straight green.
Which brings us back to Muirfield Village. What wisdom did Nicklaus give McIlroy about how to handle Nicklaus’ art?
“He hasn’t asked me,” Nicklaus said Tuesday.
The reporters asked, in particular, whether Nicklaus had any ideas as to why McIlroy had not yet won at Muirfield. Nicklaus gave a reasonable answer.
“I think this golf course is a golf course that really needs patience,” he said. “I didn’t design it for the big hitters, I didn’t design it for the short hitters, I didn’t design it for the middle. I tried to design it so we could take care of everybody and try to swing every type of player. And when you get that, you can’t just stand up and just hit it on every hole.”
That grab-and-rip-it approach is how young Nicklaus often tried to kill his shot (unsuccessfully), and it’s not hard to imagine a younger, braver McIlroy entering the MVGC with the same mindset. Over time, however, McIlroy, like Nicklaus, has learned that the driver — at least for the distance he smashes his shots — isn’t good at Muirfield. That’s because the fairways pinch his landing spots.
“I’m frustrated with the way I feel like my biggest weapon is kind of gone here,” McIlroy said. “Then I have to play the golf course like a lot of other guys on the course.”
That, with strategies – to identify the best leaves and the best angles on the green and control the flight and rotation of those paths.
The greens aren’t a pushover, either, Nicklaus said, especially for players who like to cover their irons (see: most modern tour pros). “Take 3, 6, 9, 10, 14, 15, 17, and 18,” Nicklaus said. “If you spin the ball on that green, what happens? It’s not a good result.”
Another way? Change your ways, says Nicklaus. That’s what he learned to do, both at Muirfield and at another similar ballpark, Augusta National. “I think Augusta is a golf course,” Nicklaus said.
McIlroy is a great host. Really, he can do whatever he wants with the golf ball. At Muirfield, it’s just a matter of committing to the shots the course calls for. If McIlroy can follow that formula, a warm handshake from his fellow Bear’s Club may be in his very near future.
“I’d like to see Rory play well here,” Nicklaus said.
