If there was any doubt before the Players Championship, Rory McIlroy will be the favourite for many by the time the world’s best golfers head to the Masters next month.
There just seems to be something different about Rory McIlroy in the early stages of the year. The Northern Irishman has won twice on the PGA Tour before April for the first time in his career – and both victories came at marquee events.
McIlroy followed his triumph at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am by winning the Players Championship. The 35-year-old edged out J.J. Spaun in a playoff on Monday at TPC Sawgrass. It was the second time McIlroy has won the event.
Of course, it is nearly impossible to not look at McIlroy’s win through the prism of the upcoming Masters. For more than a decade, he has been a victory at Augusta National away from completing the career grand slam.
Rory McIlroy has added a skill to his game ahead of the Masters
Plenty of fans are desperate to see McIlroy wearing that green jacket before he calls time on his career. But clearly, talent is not all that is needed to win.
The good news is that McIlroy appears to have bolstered his arsenal of shots, having played some sublime knockdown wedges at Sawgrass. And speaking after his win, McIlroy suggested that he was inspired to add to his repertoire after his previous visit to Augusta.
“Again, going back to the ball change earlier in the year, it’s sort of forced me to play more shots like that. It’s a little spinnier ball. It launches a touch lower. So if I get it up in the wind with the spin, the variation of distance can be quite a bit,” he said.
“The ball change has really forced me to do that, and the first time I worked on it a lot was at Pebble Beach, and we had to contend with some really windy conditions there at the weekend and played well in that.
“Look, we play an outdoor sport for the most part, apart from Mondays and Tuesday nights, that you’re going to have to contend with the wind and you’re going to have to — I think back to the second round at Augusta last year, it was so gusty. I maybe didn’t have all the shots that were required to go out and shoot something under par that day.
“When the conditions come like that, I just feel like I’m a lot better prepared to handle them, especially it’s always been okay off the tee, but it’s flighting the sort of wedges and short irons, which have been the issue, and I feel like I’ve been able to rectify that.”
The stats show the improvement Rory McIlroy has made on the PGA Tour this year
It is still early on in the season, so the sample size is not the largest. However, there has been a notable improvement in McIlroy’s approach game this year.
According to the PGA Tour website, McIlroy was down in 52nd for strokes gained in that particular area of the game during 2024. He was fourth for strokes gained off the tee.
This year however, McIlroy is up to 17th for approach, while he is second off the tee.
Scottie Scheffler showed last year that no-one needs to be the best putter in the world to dominate if the rest of their game is virtually unmatched.
Based on current evidence, McIlroy will be nearly impossible to keep up with if his putter gets at all hot at Augusta in a few weeks.
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