AUGUSTA, Ga. – Around these parts, comfort is often fleeting.
Past Masters champions can use this place to mark the passage of time, conjuring confidence with each memorable trip around Amen Corner. But for other players, the ones not invited to Tuesday’s Champions Dinner, any sense of stability is usually served in small doses.
Augusta National makes you work for every stroke gained, and they can all be taken away in the blink of an eye. No one in this week’s field knows this better than Rory McIlroy, who has never looked more lost than when he explored the eastern frontier of the 10th hole during the final round in 2011. Comfort was non-existent last year as soon as he shoved a 3-foot eagle putt on the second hole Sunday, sparking four hours of confounding mediocrity.
So this time as he returns to these hallowed grounds, with the final leg of the career grand slam more within reach than it’s ever been, McIlroy is switching gears.
Call him Rory the Renaissance Man.
McIlroy’s start to the 2019 season has been nothing short of ideal. Seven top-10s in seven starts, perpetually in contention before breaking through with a win at TPC Sawgrass. Every form-related box has been checked by the man currently leading the PGA Tour in total strokes gained. The Hope Diamond may contain more flaws than his game, as currently constituted.
It’s gotten the attention of bookmakers, who have listed him as a consensus favorite this week, as well as his peers. Asked who he’d wager on to win this week if not himself, Jon Rahm didn’t hesitate.
“Rory is playing unbelievable golf. I mean, he’s playing the best golf he’s played in a long time,” Rahm said. “This is who I see right now playing the best, and somebody who fits really good to this golf course.”
Of course, green jackets aren’t handed out for pre-tournament plaudits. It’s been 14 years since the player favored to win here actually pulled it off, and McIlroy’s pursuit brings with it the extra scope of the slam. No player in history has made the Masters his fourth and final leg, and no player to successfully complete the superfecta has needed more than three cracks to do so.
83rd Masters Tournament: Tee times | Full coverage
They are all facts with which McIlroy is well aware as he makes attempt No. 5 this week, having contended in each of the previous four but fallen short every time. In recent months, he has pulled out all the stops, making holistic improvements off the course with the hopes of both improving his on-course results and detaching his self-worth from them.
He “dabbled” in meditation beginning last year, even logging a 20-minute session before his victory last month at TPC Sawgrass. He’s taken up juggling, still stuck at keeping no more than three balls in the air at a time. And when asked to list his favorite book he read in the last year he quickly rattled off four titles, all geared toward self-improvement.
“It’s searching until you find what resonates with you,” McIlroy said. “I found what I feel is the best path forward for me, and I’ve committed to it.”
While his scores are still dictated by birdies and bogeys, McIlroy has begun to focus more on what he calls the Ps: among them perspective, persistence and poise.
All of them might just unlock the Masters riddle for the Ulsterman, who remains in search of that elusive green jacket as he nears his 30th birthday. He has openly spoken about the toll some of his close calls have taken, and he doesn’t shy away from the burden that comes with chasing the one tournament that has managed to elude him.
“It’s definitely taken me time to come to terms with the things I’ve needed to deal with inside my own head,” McIlroy said last month at Bay Hill. “I think sometimes I’m too much of a fan of the game, because I know exactly who has won the grand slam, and I know exactly the people I would be putting myself alongside.”
Even though he’s in the midst of his best golf in nearly five years, McIlroy’s is an unenviable position. With external expectations at an all-time high, he knows all too well that a single missed putt or errant drive could lead to 12 more months of facing the same barrage of azalea-laden questions.
It’s a delicate balance between believing your game is strong enough to win a major and coping with the potential that someone else might walk away with the trophy in a given week. Phil Mickelson had to wait until age 34 to win his first major, facing a similar line of questions to the one that currently follows McIlroy around each spring. When, how and why not now?
“That’s always a challenge when you put so much emphasis on winning a particular event, but it’s also the chance to bring out your best,” Mickelson said. “You just need those little breaks, little putts here or there to go in, little things to happen that push you into the winner’s circle and that’s probably all that he’s waiting for this week. You can’t force it. It just has to happen.”
Whether it happens this week – McIlroy finally translating years of near-misses into a new wardrobe addition – remains to be seen. But one thing that’s certain is that the man who strides to the first tee Thursday morning will be a far cry from the one who got lost in the woods eight years ago. Outside of the name on the caddie bib, he might not bear a striking resemblance to last year’s version, either.
This is a newer, calmer, more confident McIlroy, one who is spending as much time honing his craft during the day as dog-earing pages digging into guided meditation techniques at night. That shift in strategy has paid off in a big way thus far, and it’s also afforded him what could prove to be an elixir once the pressure starts to mount over the weekend: a pervading sense of peace and, yes, maybe even a little comfort.
“I keep saying this, I would dearly love to win this tournament one day,” McIlroy said. “If it doesn’t happen this week, that’s totally fine. I’ll come back next year and have another crack at it. But I’m happy with where everything is, body, mind, game.”
