Photo by Stuart Franklin/R&A/R&A via Getty Images
Ahead of the 2023 Memorial Tournament, Jack Nicklaus discusses Rory McIlroy’s major championship drought.
Jack Nicklaus spoke with the media on Tuesday ahead of the Memorial Tournament, and the topic of Rory McIlroy and major championships came up in discussion. The media asked what Nicklaus made of his nine-year major drought and if he had any advice for the Northern Irishman.
Since McIlroy’s 2014 PGA Championship and Open Championship victories, he hasn’t won a major title. Last season was the closest he has come — the previous lowest he finished in a major was eighth at the PGA Championship. But last year, McIlroy finished solo second at the Masters, T5 at the U.S. Open and a solo third at the Open Championship.
After that incredible run, many thought McIlory would finally get over the hump at the Masters this year. However, he surprisingly missed the cut in Augusta with one of his worst performances at the venue since his meltdown in 2011. After that abysmal performance, McIlroy skipped the first elevated event at the RBC Heritage and got fined a hefty $3 million, per Golf.com.
Nicklaus called his drought a mystery but said he felt McIlroy would eventually win another major. He and Nicklaus have talked more times than the media probably knows throughout his career, so the 18-time major winner weighed in on the topic.
“I was just with Rory just a few minutes ago, but I don’t know really know what to make of it. Because he’s very confident. He works very hard at it,” Nicklaus said of McIlory. “He’s a good student of the game. He practices a lot. I don’t know whether his is a constant lack of being able to keep that concentration for the whole thing or not because sometimes he is the par, par, par, double, 8. He does that sometimes.”
Nicklaus said he asked McIlroy why he loses that concentration at times, and the four-time major winner doesn’t know.
“Nobody, when you’re doing it — you don’t know. You try to think about why you do it, but you don’t,” Nicklaus said. “As far as talent, he’s as talented a player as there is in the game of golf. Why he hasn’t won in nine years? Kind of a mystery to a lot of people because he is so good.”
After McIlroy’s shot an 80 at Augusta back in 2011, he went to Nicklaus.
“He came to me when he shot 80 at Augusta, and he came to me out here on the practice range, and we talked after, and I said to him, Rory. What in the world? I said, Did you learn anything from what you did? And he said, I think so, but I’m not sure,” Nicklaus said. “He said, I think so. I said, Well, I hope you did because you’re going to need to apply it here in a couple weeks at the U.S. Open. So he went off to Congressional, and then what did he win by eight shots?”
That eight-shot victory was McIlroy’s first major championship. After that dominating performance, Nicklaus said he sent McIlroy a note.
“I dropped him a note after because I didn’t see him, and I said, you obviously learned something from Augusta, but more important, did you learn anything from why you won,” Nicklaus said. “It’s one thing to learning of why you lose, but it’s also important to learn why you won. You put those two things together and if you understand ‘em both firmly then you’re going to win a lot of golf tournaments. So Rory was really good about that, that time in his life.”
Things have changed for McIlroy in the last few years. He got married and now has a daughter, Poppy. Life changed for the Northern Irishman, and while he is still quite young and in his prime, Nicklaus thinks McIlroy is working through a period of his career that he will eventually wake up from and start winning majors again.
“He’s going to wake up one morning and say… Hey, I better, you know, get on the stick here and start winning some more majors because he’s certainly going to win some more,” Nicklaus said. “I can’t believe that he’s not.”
McIlroy has two more chances this season to get that illustrious fifth major — either at the U.S. Open at LA Country Club or the Open Championship at Royal Liverpool.
