In a culture of ephemeral fascinations, proclamations, and opinions, long-term memory is in short supply, even in a game as steady as golf.
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Heading into this week, it had not been a banner 2016 for Rory McIlroy.
US PGA Championship victor Jimmy Walker finished third on 12 under after a second successive 70 while Adam Scott ended with three straight birdies to match McIlroy’s 65 and take fourth on 11 under.
Rory McIlroy won the Deutsche Bank Championship to claim his first PGA Tour title for 16 months. The TPC Boston played host to the return of the Mac.
McIlroy was four over through the first three holes of the championship, but he roared back into contention at the weekend before sealing victory with a six under par final round of 65. What’s different about this win is that McIlroy was 4-over through three holes in R1 before settling in and racking up the birdies (24) and one eagle.
“Hopefully this is momentum I can bring on to the next couple of weeks and ultimately the Ryder Cup to hopefully help Team Europe win another one of those. I wasn’t searching”, McIlroy said. However, it was his first PGA Tour title since 2015 when he won the Wells Fargo Championship.
“But for the past 12 months, I’ve still had three wins worldwide”. Chided for not caring enough about his game – or possibly caring too much.
Just look at the dramatic improvement in his putting stats. He went so far to tweak his grip a bit before Saturday’s second round and proceeded to only need 25 that day.
With two tournaments left, McIlroy feels he’s got his putting right.
On a windswept day in Massachusetts, McIlroy fired on all cylinders to reach a 15-under par winning total. “It has been a good lesson for me this week not to get down on myself, to stay patient”.
The top 30 after that event will then make up the field for the series-ending Tour Championship. A light fixture fell inside the media tent. But he got around TPC Boston in 19-under over the final 69 holes, along the way finding a putting stroke that worked for him. From there, he almost holed the bunker shot for an eagle and had a tap in birdie to finish the tournament at 15-under par.
Casey was asked how big a factor Mother Nature was in the final round.
Another birdie at the 12th gave him the outright lead for the first time and, although he gave a shot back at the 17th, he finished positively with a four at the par-five 18th. After bogeying 17, he found the greenside bunker with his second shot on 18.
He knocked his shot from the sand to inside of 2 feet for a tap-in birdie. 8 and 9 to go out in 5-under 31.
“I wasn’t getting impatient”.
“After three holes on Friday there was so much going through my head and none of those things involved sitting beside a trophy at the end of the week, so it’s just been incredible”. He had to beat out most of the world’s top 50, so he has plenty to be proud of as the season winds down.
The current world No5 ranked McIlroy went into the last day sharing seventh place at nine under par after rounds 71, 67 and 66.
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Adam Scott knows what it’s like to be scrutinized for putting, and he referred to McIlroy as “Teflon coated” because he doesn’t let the criticism stick. “It is still a work in progress but I hit some nice ones this week and take a lot of encouragement from that”. “And this week he’s found some magic in his fingers or something and he’s holing everything”.
