Rory McIlroy’s talent is not relatable. But so much else about him is

Right.
Thank you.
OK.
Good luck.

Nod to the rules guy, handshake with his opponent, peg in the ground, blistered tee shot. And then, his familiar rolling-thunder, rolling shoulders walk down the fairway, chatting with his caddie.

This wasn’t just Monday morn on the first playoff hole at the Stadium Course. This has been Rory McIlroy for the 16 years millions of us have been following him since he started playing the PGA Tour as a 19-year-old in 2009. Now he’s 35, with a wife, a daughter. This is a man in full, fully engaged, not only in what he is doing but also with those around him. That’s why he is the most important player in professional golf today.

Second on this list is Bryson DeChambeau, 31-year-old winner of last year’s U.S. Open over McIlroy, contender almost every time he plays, owner of 2.3 million Instagram followers, golfing buddy of Donald Trump. But you can’t compare DeChambeau’s actual standing in the game with McIlroy’s.

Scottie Scheffler, Jon Rahm, Brooks Koepka, Xander Schauffele are all true stars. But in terms of their standing in the game, they trail DeChambeau by a hundred miles, and McIlroy by hundreds of miles.

The ordinary golf fan sees DeChambeau only now and then, at the four majors, at the Ryder Cup, on YouTube. That’s because he plays in the backwater of LIV Golf. In its fourth year, LIV has not found a way to engage large numbers of global golf fans. (Quick, who won the LIV event in Singapore last week?) DeChambeau, in his social-media activities, finds his way to millions of us. But what we’re looking at is a showman at the height of his powers. Golf never has had anybody quite like him. He’s made the game better and more interesting. He does things his own way.

But McIlroy is different.

At every tournament he plays, we see glimpses of every aspect of the man. Five years ago, when the Players was canceled mid-tournament because of the rising threat of Covid-19, McIlroy said, “It’s going to get worse before it gets better.” That was a wake-up call for this reporter. Speaking of those leaving the PGA Tour for LIV, he said, “Any decision that you make in your life that’s purely for money usually doesn’t end up going the right way.” Vyasanakere Prabhanjanacharya could not have said it any better. I’ll leave it to McIlroy, Irish really in every magnificent way, to share his insights about the Indian philosopher.

When you talk as much as Rory talks, you’re going to wish you had some mulligans. No reason to review them here, on St. Patrick’s Day. And then there are times, in the custom of the game and the example of his forebears, he should tell a waiting world how he got to the bottom of the 72nd hole. Who among us always gets it right? Nobody.

Most of us are drawn to this insanely difficult game because it gives us an endless opportunity to learn something, to improve. That was why it was such a joy to see J.J. Spaun play his way into the Monday playoff at TPC Sawgrass. A few years ago he was playing his way out of this game. Bud Cauley, the same. Rory McIlroy, in his own way, too.

The into-the-wind tee shot McIlroy played on 17, the par-3 with the island green, was a first cousin to the shot he needed on the par-3 15th at Pinehurst on U.S. Open Sunday. He teed it low. He took something off the shot. He flighted it low (for him). That shot at Pinehurst was smashed. Smashed has a time and place. But not on a finesse hole like 15 at Pinehurst and 17 at TPC Sawgrass. Every player ahead of him on the all-time list, from Ben Hogan to Seve Ballesteros to Jack Nicklaus and Lee Trevino and Tiger Woods, could do it all, including taking yards off shots. With your adrenaline pumping and your mind on fire, that’s one of the hardest things in golf to do.

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McIlroy called his 9-iron on 17 his “three-quarter three-quarter shot.” That works out to 56 percent of the whole, if that makes any sense. It doesn’t, but it does to Rory, and that makes all the difference. He prepared himself for the shot by standing on the driving range and hitting 9-irons in the direction of the third green, to duplicate what he would face less than an hour later. Now that’s just smart. Whether you’re trying to break 100 or 70, it’s a good feeling to know we play a game in which you can apply some thinking to your golf and improve.

On Sunday night, sleeping on the lead, McIlroy said he went to his hotel room, took a shower, ordered room service, watched half of The Devil Wears Prada, gave up on sleep at 3 in the morning, was in the gym at half-past 6, looked for something green to wear but couldn’t find anything, got on the range and played those 9-iron shots, went to the 16th tee and paid attention to every word the rules official said, paid attention to J.J. We can understand every part of that. We can even relate to it.

Trevino gave us the same thing, a life in golf we can relate to, that we can understand, that we can learn from. Trevino has six major championships. McIlroy has four. Trevino never won a Masters. McIlroy hasn’t, either. He should have 10 or more chances. One is coming up next month. This golf season is off to a good start.

Michael Bamberger welcomes your comments at Michael.Bamberger@Golf.com