Why this Rory McIlroy Masters hug resonated

Masters Sunday is known for producing spine-tingling roars, but it has also produced its share of eye-watering hugs.

Who can forget Nick Faldo and Greg Norman in 1996, embracing on the 18th green after Norman had kicked away a six-stroke lead? A victorious Faldo, normally not the touchy-feely type, pulled Norman in close and advised his opponent on how to handle the forthcoming media coverage of his meltdown: “Don’t let the bastards get you down.”

A year later, another hug for the ages: Earl and Tiger, after the younger Woods had blistered the field by 12 and reinvented professional golf as we knew it. As he walked off the 18th green, Tiger collapsed into Earl’s arms, burrowed his chin into his father’s right shoulder and closed his eyes.

Fast forward to 2019 and Tiger’s sixth and most improbable Masters win. Waiting for him by the green was his son Charlie, resulting in a bear-hug that called to mind Earl’s from more than two decades earlier. All the feels, and then some.

The moments that followed Rory McIlroy’s first Masters win on Sunday evening also did not lack for emotion.

Before he’d even exited the 18th green, the new champion had doled out three hugs: one for his caddie and childhood friend, Harry Diamond; another for playing partner Justin Rose, who’d just joined Ben Hogan as the only player to lose two Masters playoffs; and a third for Rose’s long-time caddie, Mark Fulcher. As McIlroy stepped off the back of the green, he shook hands with four green-coated Augusta National members before exhaling and extending his arms toward his wife, Erica. That embrace was followed by another — with the couple’s 4-year-old daughter Poppy, who McIlroy scooped up off the ground.

On McIlroy’s walk to scoring, more hugs along the way: for his managers; for Tom Nelson, chairman of the Masters media committee; for his close Tour pals and Ryder Cup stablemates Shane Lowry and Tommy Fleetwood.

Standing to Fleetwood’s immediate right on the receiving line was who at least one British tabloid would later refer to as a “mystery woman.” To close watchers of the professional game, though, this well-wisher was anything but mysterious. It was Justin Rose’s wife, Kate, to whom Justin has been married since 2006 and who has been a staple at Ryder Cups and other big-time events ever since. Kate has witnessed firsthand many of Mcllroy’s soaring highs and crushing lows. She understands the challenges and stresses of the profession, and how winning major championships, even for the world’s best talents, is nearly impossible. She knows what the green jacket meant and means to McIlroy, just as she knows what a second major title would mean to her husband’s legacy and Hall-of-Fame chances.

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McIlroy, a historian of the game, knows that, too. He can tell you all about Rose’s other near-misses, especially the 2017 Masters when no player topped Rose’s 279 mark over 72 holes before Rose fell to Sergio Garcia in a playoff. “I feel for him a little bit,” McIlroy, in his green jacket Sunday evening, said of Rose, “because he’s been so close.”

So when McIlroy spotted Kate next to Fleetwood, you could understand the mixed and heightened emotions coursing through both of them. Kate was joyful for McIlroy but gutted for her husband; McIlroy was ecstatic for himself but also oozing empathy for the friend over whom he’d just triumphed. What else could he and Kate do but quietly exchange a few words?  

“Listen, I think in the moment you realize what it means to everybody involved,” Justin Rose said Wednesday at Harbour Town, where he is in the field at the RBC Heritage. “You realize what it means to other families, what they must be feeling. You’re a part of the moment. You’re a part of the story. You’re a part of all of the energy that’s going on in that moment. I think that’s what happens. You embrace that connection that you have with everybody and all that’s going on in the moment.”

Put another way, golf can be the most solitary and lonely of pursuits, but then along comes one of those rare and precious moments when the room lights up and you realize you’re actually not alone.

Rose said he didn’t know what Kate said into McIlroy’s ear, and frankly, he sounded like he didn’t think it was any of his business. “I don’t think that was discussion-worthy,” he said.

Rose also was asked whether he’s ever had “a hug like that in golf with a competitor.”

“I got a great hug from Tommy Fleetwood when I walked off 18 on Sunday,” he said. “Meant a lot. It’s not always about the result. It’s about how someone can make you feel or what they say.” Assuming, that is, the player can process it in the moment. Rose continued, “Sometimes your mind is spinning a million miles an hour in those situations, and often it’s hard to take in what someone might say to you.”

Big picture, Rose said on Wednesday, he is “tormented” by the possibility of what could have been at Augusta National last week but also that he couldn’t have asked for much more from himself.

“No regrets,” he said. “You can lose a golf tournament and there’s a million things that you think I should have done this differently. There’s not really much I can look back and go, I should have done that differently on the day. It’s more just, like, wish it would have added up to a different result.”