Rory McIlroy - 4 Time Major Winner

prawnsambo

ligerdub wrote: »

He's now surely atop of the strokes gained v the field for the year now too. Good for him.

Yeah, he is number 1 for 2019 at 2.741. DJ is second on 2.583.

Russman

Jeez lads, reading some of this thread makes me want to give back a monthly medal I won because I hit a bad shot on the 4th hole so it doesn’t really count as a good win

I know Rory polarises opinion, but some of this is ridiculous. Didn’t Jack say he was successful because he could continue playing his game longer than the others could play theirs ?
I don’t remember too many people criticizing Tiger when Ernie or Vijay or Phil couldn’t handle the heat and faded away on a Sunday.
Shoot the lowest score, that’s all there is to it.
It seems that if Rory wins by 8 he’s streaky and will never be consistent, when he grinds it out, its the rest of the field fell away. As the pressure built yesterday his golf got better.

As for the not winning while in the final group, yes he played a few bad rounds (not them all) but let’s not forget golf is bloody hard and sometimes someone just shoots a better score than you.

fullstop

Russman wrote: »

Jeez lads, reading some of this thread makes me want to give back a monthly medal I won because I hit a bad shot on the 4th hole so it doesn’t really count as a good win

I know Rory polarises opinion, but some of this is ridiculous. Didn’t Jack say he was successful because he could continue playing his game longer than the others could play theirs ?
I don’t remember too many people criticizing Tiger when Ernie or Vijay or Phil couldn’t handle the heat and faded away on a Sunday.
Shoot the lowest score, that’s all there is to it.
It seems that if Rory wins by 8 he’s streaky and will never be consistent, when he grinds it out, its the rest of the field fell away. As the pressure built yesterday his golf got better.

As for the not winning while in the final group, yes he played a few bad rounds (not them all) but let’s not forget golf is bloody hard and sometimes someone just shoots a better score than you.

Agreed, it's incredible the lengths some on here will go to discredit anything he does. It's ok though, because debate

GreeBo

Golfgorfield wrote: »

None of that goes on the trophy, or in the record books.
Just the winners name.
I couldn't care less what manner a win happens, best score wins. End of.

If you want analysis. On a stretch of holes that are nothing short of scandless difficulty in tricky conditions. Rory 1 behind playing 15, made an incredible birdie. Hit 2 perfect shots on 16, made birdie, hit a perfect tee shot on 17, par, hit 2 incredible shots on 18. Won. Now if you think he got a handy one then the issue is in your head sir.

No one is arguing that it goes on any trophy or anything similar, so other than thanks whoring i have no idea why you are going there, again. Literally no one is saying he didn't deserve to win...? Strawman anyone

Perfect tee shot on 17? Pull the other one chief, its got bells on.

If people like you are going to be overly gushing about his round then for the sake of balanced discussion its up to others to point out the other side of things since you are so unwilling to even acknowledge them

He drove it badly for the weekend and had a very bad start both days. Most otjer tournaments he'd be out of it, but as i predicted, others fell away more and he got his win. He said himself he expected to need to shoot something in the sixties and he shot a -2 when there were much better scores to be had out there. Yeah he held it together over the last 3 holes to win it, but based on the previous 15 it could have all been out of his hands since he was only 1 under.

What most other tournaments would he be out of it in, this is probably(arguably) the strongest field of the year, all the majors have past winners, reduced fields, extra qualifiers.

I don't know for a fact but I'd imagine the players will have the lowest average world ranking of any field this year. (posssibly masters with reduced field but will have very high world ranked golfers)

Edit actually its probably TOC but the point still stands

GreeBo

Deleted User wrote: »

What most other tournaments would he be out of it in, this is probably(arguably) the strongest field of the year, all the majors have past winners, reduced fields, extra qualifiers.

I don't know for a fact but I'd imagine the players will have the lowest average world ranking of any field this year. (posssibly masters with reduced field but will have very high world ranked golfers)

Edit actually its probably TOC but the point still stands

tournaments where the guys ahead and around him don't collapse or have brain farts like rahm did.

There were many scores better than his out there on Sunday.

Alf Veedersane

GreeBo wrote: »

He drove it badly for the weekend and had a very bad start both days. Most otjer tournaments he'd be out of it, but as i predicted, others fell away more and he got his win. He said himself he expected to need to shoot something in the sixties and he shot a -2 when there were much better scores to be had out there. Yeah he held it together over the last 3 holes to win it, but based on the previous 15 it could have all been out of his hands since he was only 1 under.

I'd half expect the days he starts bad to continue in the same vein. It often has. But it didn't, which is a plus.

And yeah, he didn't shoot a stellar score and maybe he could have been out of it if anyone around him had been going low. But maybe he didn't chase birdies because he didn't need to and played more conservatively.

But I don't know if that was him trying to shoot low and not being able to or if he was playing conservatively.

Nor necessarily directly addressing you, GreeBo. It's more a general comment.

GreeBo

Alf Veedersane wrote: »

I'd half expect the days he starts bad to continue in the same vein. It often has. But it didn't, which is a plus.

And yeah, he didn't shoot a stellar score and maybe he could have been out of it if anyone around him had been going low. But maybe he didn't chase birdies because he didn't need to and played more conservatively.

But I don't know if that was him trying to shoot low and not being able to or if he was playing conservatively.

Nor necessarily directly addressing you, GreeBo. It's more a general comment.

From what i saw he wasn't being conservative at all, certainly not being left of the point on 18 when there was acres to aim at and let it naturally come in down the right.
Its an interesting point though, with positives and negatives whichever way he was playing!

Nonoperational

Good win. Sets up a potential great season. For all our talk he has earned $4,580,008 in 7 events outside sponsorship, and won one of the biggest events of the year. I'd say he's sleeping easy enough all the same.

GreeBo

GreeBo wrote: »

tournaments where the guys ahead and around him don't collapse or have brain farts like rahm did.

There were many scores better than his out there on Sunday.

The guys around him are the ones playing in the same course conditions, with similar amount of pressures on them. The guys who made runs are the ones who played with no win pressure and are just shooting at everything to try make a score. There is loads who would have went the other way.

His scoring was one of the better ones in the last 8 groups.

He was best of the last 3 groups and one shot off the best of the last 5 groups.

Its nonsense to say in a other tournament it wouldn't have been good enough as you have no idea in this one he did well in comparative terms to the other players around him under the same conditions many of which are top class players in their own right

Alf Veedersane

GreeBo wrote: »

From what i saw he wasn't being conservative at all, certainly not being left of the point on 18 when there was acres to aim at and let it naturally come in down the right.
Its an interesting point though, with positives and negatives whichever way he was playing!

And maybe it was a day he benefitted from others falling away. But a lot of others fell away when it counted and he didn't. Of the 10 behind him, only Fleetwood and Day were within 4 of him starting.

So yeah you could look at it as falling in his lap and not actually playing well enough to deserve it or you could flip it and say that when it came the the final straight, he was the only one who kept the pace while all of the rest, and there were a few, fell away.

Some people judge him by the high bar he has set. Some people love to find fault. It's the nature of the beast. I'd like to think most are in the former camp.

The results are coming together and there is a semblance of consistency coming into the Masters. That may not mean anything at the Masters but here's hoping it does.

fullstop

Alf Veedersane wrote: »

And maybe it was a day he benefitted from others falling away. But a lot of others fell away when it counted and he didn't. Of the 10 behind him, only Fleetwood and Day were within 4 of him starting.

Just like back in the days Tiger used to dominate. Those around him often collapsed on a Sunday and Tiger didn't.

I'll probably be accused of saying McIlroy is dominating now...

Russman

How often do the players in the last group or two out on Sunday shoot the low score of the day ? I don’t know the answer but I’d guess not very often. I do know the winner almost always shoots the lowest score for 72 holes though. So what if others had better Sunday scores ?
Is the argument really coming down to “if someone had shot lower than him he wouldn’t have won” ?? Or “he only won because XXX faded away” - aren’t those true of every tournament result/winner ?

As for whether he was conservative or not, it depends by what standards are we judging him - top tour pro or club amateur ? He started his second shot on 18 well right and maybe he turned it a little too much in the air, maybe he didn’t, only he’ll know for sure. But by starting it so far right it gave him margin for error and could be argued he was being conservative. Maybe he didn’t want to putt down that hill to that front pin from 30 feet right, that’s a steep hill and not an easy two putt. Personally I think he just drew it a hair more than intended.

sligeach

Russman wrote: »

I do know the winner almost always shoots the lowest score for 72 holes though.

You could be onto something there.

Dav010

fullstop wrote: »

Agreed, it's incredible the lengths some on here will go to discredit anything he does. It's ok though, because debate

It’s amazing how touchy a small group of you get when there is anything but praise for him, it’s a strange thread, where only nice things can be said apparently.

I certainly don’t discredit him, but I don’t think he is as good as you think he is either. He played fantasticly, credit where credit is due. But it’s one win, let’s see if he maintains the form he has shown so far, or will he go back to the form he has shown over the last 3 years where there was only occasional consistency over a 4 day tournament.

That is not an attempt to discredit him, that is the reality of his game, flashes of brilliance, but regular missed opportunities.

It’s incredible that something the guy himself has acknowledged in interviews, (recently he said if he could sort out his play on final days, he’d be dangerous when talking about missed opportunities to win when in final group) offends his fans on here so much.

Hitch2222

I don't think anyone who is being viewed as a "fan" of McIlroy believes for one minute that he is infallible or doesn't deserve criticism. I think it has been mentioned numerous times in recent weeks that he deserves criticism like any other athlete.

The issue here has been that even in the face of some stellar performances where he has shown to be the most in form golfer of 2019 he is still being unnecessarily criticised. He keeps putting himself in position and this weekend he did enough to win.
Obviously, no issue looking at the performance and critiquing where further improvement is needed for the Masters etc but it's the consistent need to find flaw that's the issue.

The goalposts are consistently being moved to suit the narrative of certain posters.
One week the only thing that matters is the win and this week in light of winning such a big tournament, it's the means of that win that is of paramount.

Outside of my personal issues with the type of criticisms levelled against McIlroy, it's quite clear that there is a core group that irrespective of performance and/or result it won't be enough to sway them.

Deeper Blue

NDWC wrote: »

I do reckon he'll win soon but I thought he'd win tonight tbh. It's slightly worrying that he didn't get over the line but surely he can't keep playing this well and not win? Don't think I'd fancy him next week though.

Well I was half right :pac:

Would've been a shame if he had played this well for a stretch without getting a win.

Interesting times ahead

Dav010

Hitch2222 wrote: »

Outside of my personal issues with the type of criticisms levelled against McIlroy, it's quite clear that there is a core group that irrespective of performance and/or result it won't be enough to sway them.

But why does this seem to bother you and a few others so much? It’s a discussion forum, posters will not always have the same opinions. This thread keeps getting derailed because posters like you take criticisms of the topic personally, it is really strange.

Hitch2222

Dav010 wrote: »

But why does this seem to bother you and a few others so much? It’s a discussion forum, posters will not always have the same opinions. This thread keeps getting derailed because posters like you take criticisms of the topic personally, it is really strange.

You're doing that thing you do again.

As I have stated numerous times, even in the post above that you didn't quote I have zero issue with criticisms of McIlroy. No issue whatsoever.

My personal issue which isn't shared by everyone is how one critiques or praise an athlete for their mentality. I replied to you because s large proportion of your critiques focus on that which is something that I find nonsensical.

I have no issue with you or anyone else criticising McIlroy but I find your mode of criticism adds no value.
If I thought you made valid rational and consistent points I'd have no issue acknowledging them.

Dav010

Hitch2222 wrote: »

My personal issue which isn't shared by everyone is how one critiques or praise an athlete for their mentality. I replied to you because s large proportion of your critiques focus on that which is something that I find nonsensical.

Some athletes transcend their sport based on their talent, I suppose Messi, Ronaldo and Bolt are the obvious modern day examples. They work hard of course, but they are better than everyone else.

But the reason we often praise/critique athletes for their mentality, is that at the top of a lot of sports the margins between the top athletes are so fine, the 6 inches between their ears is what makes the difference. It isn’t unusual now to hear of athletes working with psychologists to improve performance. Mcilroy himself has spoken about losing focus at critical times, in fact as recent as Sunday he spoke about changing his mentality to accept that the near misses are a “ process” he must go through and that in his mind, he has determined them to be “remote misses”.

I really do not get why you are getting annoyed about this, the player himself has acknowledged that he loses focus at times and is having to change his mentality.


https://m.independent.ie/sport/golf/fresh-mental-approach-gets-rory-back-on-masters-track-37928250.html

GreeBo

sligeach wrote: »

You could be onto something there.

We could deffo build a game around that concept.

GreeBo

Russman wrote: »

How often do the players in the last group or two out on Sunday shoot the low score of the day ? I don’t know the answer but I’d guess not very often. I do know the winner almost always shoots the lowest score for 72 holes though. So what if others had better Sunday scores ?
Is the argument really coming down to “if someone had shot lower than him he wouldn’t have won” ?? Or “he only won because XXX faded away” - aren’t those true of every tournament result/winner ?

As for whether he was conservative or not, it depends by what standards are we judging him - top tour pro or club amateur ? He started his second shot on 18 well right and maybe he turned it a little too much in the air, maybe he didn’t, only he’ll know for sure. But by starting it so far right it gave him margin for error and could be argued he was being conservative. Maybe he didn’t want to putt down that hill to that front pin from 30 feet right, that’s a steep hill and not an easy two putt. Personally I think he just drew it a hair more than intended.

Why does anyone who makes a comment on aspects of his performance get lynched in this thread? Any positives that same person makes are ignored and the baying hounds move in...its a discussion forum, or at least supposed to be, not a fan appreciation thread.

"So what"? Well its a discussion point, thats supposed to be the point of this thread, to discuss things. Everyone posting "woo-hoo!" and high fiving each other isnt a meaningful discussion, at least not to me.

I think he also drew it more than he wanted, a lot more since anything right of the pin moves closer anyway, as we saw from Doris just before him.

Russman

Hitch2222 wrote: »

I don't think anyone who is being viewed as a "fan" of McIlroy believes for one minute that he is infallible or doesn't deserve criticism. I think it has been mentioned numerous times in recent weeks that he deserves criticism like any other athlete.

The issue here has been that even in the face of some stellar performances where he has shown to be the most in form golfer of 2019 he is still being unnecessarily criticised. He keeps putting himself in position and this weekend he did enough to win.
Obviously, no issue looking at the performance and critiquing where further improvement is needed for the Masters etc but it's the consistent need to find flaw that's the issue.

The goalposts are consistently being moved to suit the narrative of certain posters.
One week the only thing that matters is the win and this week in light of winning such a big tournament, it's the means of that win that is of paramount.

Outside of my personal issues with the type of criticisms levelled against McIlroy, it's quite clear that there is a core group that irrespective of performance and/or result it won't be enough to sway them.

I'd agree with a lot of that. Its not a matter of being a fan or not a fan etc., he's certainly not above criticism or critique, and so often leaves himself open to it with some of his statements and actions, but sometimes some of it comes across as old fashioned Irish begrudgery. I honestly can't see a whole lot to criticise about his performance at The Players this year - other tournaments in the last 12 months, absolutely.
Talking about what another player did or didn't do or hypothesising as to what Tiger might have done back in the day is pointless IMO. Yeah if Rahm hadn't had his brain fart on 11 it might have been different but if Rory hadn't has his own brain fart on 4 it might also have been different, ifs and buts. If Rocco Mediate had held that putt, he'd have a US Open and Tiger would be stuck on 13, if Sergio had held that put on 18th Padraig wouldn't have one of his Opens.
If we're setting the bar at what Tiger did then everyone will come up short, he was a once off, nobody will ever have his rate of winning again.
Sawgrass is an unbelievably hard golf course that punishes even a slight error very harshly and he got the job done.

Hitch2222

Dav010 wrote: »

Some athletes transcend their sport based on their talent, I suppose Messi, Ronaldo and Bolt are the obvious modern day examples. They work hard of course, but they are better than everyone else.

But the reason we often praise/critique athletes for their mentality, is that at the top of a lot of sports the margins between the top athletes are so fine, the 6 inches between their ears is what makes the difference. It isn’t unusual now to hear of athletes working with psychologists to improve performance. Mcilroy himself has spoken about losing focus at critical times, in fact as recent as Sunday he spoke about changing his mentality to accept that the near misses are a “ process” he must go through and that in his mind, he has determined them to be “remote misses”.

I really do not get why you are getting annoyed about this, the player himself has acknowledged that he loses focus at times and is having to change his mentality.


Note the opinion of a sports psychologist:

https://m.independent.ie/sport/golf/fresh-mental-approach-gets-rory-back-on-masters-track-37928250.html

I didn't reply to you directly as I think it is quite clear no appetite for this debate on the thread. I have apologised already for playing my part in this discussion so I'm not planning to continue it.

I'll finish with saying that referencing a professional psychologist now is not exactly what you have been doing over a vast number of posts. I responded to your personal opinion on McIlroys mentality which I questioned as I find the majority of your critiques as nonsensical conjectures rooted in little substance.

Now you are retrospectively attempting justification for your critiques by alluding to a sports psychologist who discusses "So until he starts to play more maturely - until Rory McIlroy learns how to play more patient and tactical golf - I don't see him winning at Augusta."
That doctor is offering an opinion how McIlroy should play golf not his psyche.

Even though that article says nothing noteworthy, if you had lead with that at the beginning instead of making vague nonsensical psychological links between McIlroys shortcomings and his mental state I probably wouldn't have responded.
As I said I'm done anyway you're welcome to spout whatever you like to justify your dislike for him

Russman

GreeBo wrote: »

Why does anyone who makes a comment on aspects of his performance get lynched in this thread? Any positives that same person makes are ignored and the baying hounds move in...its a discussion forum, or at least supposed to be, not a fan appreciation thread.

"So what"? Well its a discussion point, thats supposed to be the point of this thread, to discuss things. Everyone posting "woo-hoo!" and high fiving each other isnt a meaningful discussion, at least not to me.

I think he also drew it more than he wanted, a lot more since anything right of the pin moves closer anyway, as we saw from Doris just before him.

I totally accept that, but it seems that no matter what he does some people will find a negative in a performance (not necessarily you, I often agree with a lot of what you post). I agree it shouldn't turn into a high-fiving thread, but a little bit of balance would be good. He's probably always going to be a love him or hate him player (I've genuinely no idea why though) which probably drives a lot of it I suppose.

prawnsambo

Russman wrote: »

I'd agree with a lot of that. Its not a matter of being a fan or not a fan etc., he's certainly not above criticism or critique, and so often leaves himself open to it with some of his statements and actions, but sometimes some of it comes across as old fashioned Irish begrudgery. I honestly can't see a whole lot to criticise about his performance at The Players this year - other tournaments in the last 12 months, absolutely.
Talking about what another player did or didn't do or hypothesising as to what Tiger might have done back in the day is pointless IMO. Yeah if Rahm hadn't had his brain fart on 11 it might have been different but if Rory hadn't has his own brain fart on 4 it might also have been different, ifs and buts. If Rocco Mediate had held that putt, he'd have a US Open and Tiger would be stuck on 13, if Sergio had held that put on 18th Padraig wouldn't have one of his Opens.
If we're setting the bar at what Tiger did then everyone will come up short, he was a once off, nobody will ever have his rate of winning again.
Sawgrass is an unbelievably hard golf course that punishes even a slight error very harshly and he got the job done.

Just on the 'brain fart' on the fourth. In his press conference, he was asked about that and he said that he had the club and intention to go ten yards past the pin a bit to the right, but it inexplciably came out left and short. And he reckoned if it had gone the direction intended it would have been enough to get there. A little shorter than intended, but the direction doomed it. So in his view, just one of those ball flights that can happen out of the rough, but rarely enough to be unexpected.

GreeBo

Russman wrote: »

I totally accept that, but it seems that no matter what he does some people will find a negative in a performance (not necessarily you, I often agree with a lot of what you post). I agree it shouldn't turn into a high-fiving thread, but a little bit of balance would be good. He's probably always going to be a love him or hate him player (I've genuinely no idea why though) which probably drives a lot of it I suppose.

The few negative posts *have* to be negative because quite often the positive side always seems to by far outweigh the negative!

fwiw I don't hate him at all and was hoping he would close it out, I just dont think it was a faultless performance (his driving over the weekend for one thing). My first post after the win was pretty balanced imo, but was jumped on anyway, its quite tiresome tbh.

As already said, he short game and especially putting was much improved, driving was poor, but that may be due to time spent on other areas, irons were pretty good bar the occasional dodgy short iron, which he still needs to remove from his game (you cant have a miss that bad with a wedge, its going to cost you sooner or later)

bmay529

There is no point in trashing Rory. He won... and so was better than anyone else on the day... period. The guy is so talented and he knows it. One minute he misses a put you might expect to get and the next minute he drops a bomb and is right back in it!! He seems fearless and goes for everything... sometimes they come off and sometimes they don't!! When on form most agree he is hard to beat.

prawnsambo

For those who were asking, apparently he was wearing a green... ish polo shirt under his top. So that's one less criticism anyway.

rooney30

Hitch2222 wrote: »

I didn't reply to you directly as I think it is quite clear no appetite for this debate on the thread. I have apologised already for playing my part in this discussion so I'm not planning to continue it.

I'll finish with saying that referencing a professional psychologist now is not exactly what you have been doing over a vast number of posts. I responded to your personal opinion on McIlroys mentality which I questioned as I find the majority of your critiques as nonsensical conjectures rooted in little substance.

Now you are retrospectively attempting justification for your critiques by alluding to a sports psychologist who discusses "So until he starts to play more maturely - until Rory McIlroy learns how to play more patient and tactical golf - I don't see him winning at Augusta."
That doctor is offering an opinion how McIlroy should play golf not his psyche.

Even though that article says nothing noteworthy, if you had lead with that at the beginning instead of making vague nonsensical psychological links between McIlroys shortcomings and his mental state I probably wouldn't have responded.
As I said I'm done anyway you're welcome to spout whatever you like to justify your dislike for him

Davo10 is about one step below being a troll on this thread . Keep him living on scraps