Rory McIlroy needed some alone time. He craved anonymity.
He’d just let the U.S. Open slip through his hands with two short missed putts on the final three holes at Pinehurst No. 2 last month and hastily bolted the premises immediately afterward.
The next day, McIlroy predictably withdrew from the Travelers Championship, for which he’d committed, “to process everything and build myself back up,” he said at the time.
He wasn’t in any kind of head space to answer questions about how he failed to end his 10-year drought without a major championship, when he had one hand on the trophy in the waning moments of the final round.
He didn’t want to recount the 30-inch putt on the 16th hole with the lead, a putt he pulled left after having made his previous 496 putts from inside 3 feet; or the nervous missed downhill 4-footer he missed on the 72nd hole, which opened the door for Bryson DeChambeau to storm through.
McIlroy needed to get lost somewhere — to a place where no one would remind him about what had just taken place at Pinehurst.
So, he went to Manhattan. He walked the High Line while listening to tunes on his AirPods and got away for three days.
“It was nice to sort of blend in with the city a little bit,’’ McIlroy said last week in advance of playing the Scottish Open, his first tournament back after the U.S. Open. “I walked around. I walked the High Line a couple of times. I made a few phone calls. Sort of was alone with my thoughts for a couple days, which was good.’’
McIlroy won’t be alone in his thoughts this week when he arrives at the British Open at Royal Troon, where he has one final chance to win his first major championship since 2014. Many eyes will be fixed on him to see how he responds to what he called one of the worst moments of his career.
“The way I’ve described Pinehurst on Sunday was like, it was a great day until it wasn’t,’’ McIlroy said. “I did things on that Sunday that I haven’t been able to do in the last couple years — took control of the golf tournament, holed putts when I needed to … well, mostly when I needed to.’’
McIlroy, who continues to insist he feels “closer to winning my next major championship than I ever have,” said there were “learnings in there, too’’ from the loss at Pinehurst.
If McIlroy has proven himself to be anything in his brilliant career, it’s that he’s resilient. He famously went on to win the 2011 U.S. Open just two months after he’d blown a four-shot lead at the Masters with nine holes to play.
“When I look back on [the U.S. Open final round], just like I look back on some of my toughest moments in my career, I’ll learn a lot from it, and I’ll hopefully put that to good use,’’ McIlroy said.
Since Pinehurst, outside support has poured in for McIlroy, who’s become a polarizing figure the past couple of years with his strong and sometimes waffling opinions about LIV Golf, his presence on the PGA players council and his off-and-on marriage issue with his wife, Erica.
“I think any golfer — any human being — who’s watched Rory finish with those missed putts on 16 and 18 really felt for him,’’ said Luke Donald, McIlroy’s European Ryder Cup captain. “Obviously, I would have loved to have seen Rory pull through after not having won a major for 10 years or so, but he does time and time again bounce back, stronger than most people.’’
Brad Faxon — who, like Donald, will be calling the Open as an analyst for NBC this week — has worked with McIlroy as his putting coach.
“Any of us that have played this game knows how this game can flip in an instant,’’ Faxon said. “I think that’s why we love and hate this game so much, [because of] what it can do to the human mind. I think these things will help Rory to be stronger when he gets in that situation the next time. I think it will be better for him.’’
In the immediate aftermath of his win at Pinehurst, DeChambeau declared McIlroy “will win multiple more major championships. There’s no doubt. I think that fire in him is going to continue to grow.”
Matthieu Pavon, who was in the mix until the end at the U.S. Open, said, “At the end of the day, we are all human. Rory has been chasing another major [for] many years. The more you want it, the tougher it gets, and the highest expectation you have for yourself, the tougher it gets [and] the more pressure you get into. Rory is just a massive champion. I’m sure he will fight back really soon.”
“Soon,’’ McIlroy hopes, is this week at Troon. For his mental well-being, it needs to be.
