The Memorial is next up on the PGA Tour schedule as Jack Nicklaus plays host but at the minute, all eyeballs are on Rory McIlroy after he decided to not play the event.
McIlroy has decided to skip the event at Muirfield Village in favour of playing the Canadian Open before the US Open.
However, McIlroy has been criticised for making that decision, and after so many past discussions over the best players playing in the signature events, he’ll have plenty to answer to when he next plays.
Still, McIlroy will have his reasons and as we all know, he can pick and choose when he wants to play to fit his schedule.
Furthermore, some players just don’t like certain courses and according to Smylie Kaufman, that was the feeling he got from speaking to McIlroy out on course last year.
Rory McIlroy’s feelings on Muirfield Village are clear as he opts to not play The Memorial
McIlroy has always played in The Memorial when he can and after Scottie Scheffler skipped The Truist, fans were looking forward to seeing them battle it out.
However, speaking on his latest episode of The Smylie Show, Smylie Kaufman has revealed that McIlroy told him last year that he just finds Muirfield Village just ridiculously hard.
“Rory has the right as a PGA Tour player to play in any week that he wants to play in. We mentioned the reason why you would be under criticism for it because he said we need to play against each other the most to bring more eyeballs to it. That’s when the rating stock was really at a premium last year,” Kaufman said.
“I don’t think that Rory loves to play Muirfield as much as maybe he used to. The place has just gotten ridiculously hard, man. Last year was an absolute joke.
“It was so, so hard. I remember walking out some fairways with Rory, just talking about the golf course with him and how frustrated he was just with certain shots that are just like, what are you going to do? There’s nowhere to miss it here.
“Typically, that form of complaints would be made by players way less talented than him. If a player like him is saying, man, this place is just ridiculous, that’s just a bit of a sign of maybe it’s a little bit too much now. I don’t think they quite have that golf course quite like it used to be.”
Rory McIlroy following Scottie Scheffler’s lead in skipping signature events
There is a lot of debate to be had on the signature events and whether the top players should skip them or play in them.
However, as it stands, the PGA Tour players are entitled to play when they want and McIlroy has clearly seen how it worked out for Scheffler in skipping the Truist.
Scheffler went on to win the PGA Championship and ultimately, his decision to miss the Truist was the right one.
Right now, Rory McIlroy will be looking at what Scheffler did and hoping he follows a similar path as he heads to Oakmont for the US Open.
Indeed, if McIlroy does win out at Oakmont, then everyone will be hard-pressed to question his motive.
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