LOS ANGELES (AP) — The only thing worse for players than getting asked about winning their first major are endless questions about when they will win another one.
That’s what Rory McIlroy is facing.
The scrutiny no longer is limited to the spring, with Augusta National on the horizon and the reminder that a Masters green jacket is all that keeps McIlroy from the career Grand Slam. Any major will suffice at this point.
And about the only answer is what Wyndham Clark offered not long after the tears, the hugs and the hoisting of the U.S. Open trophy.
“I just feel like it was my time,” Clark said. Sometimes there’s no better explanation.
Clark never had to face the “when” question because he earned his first PGA Tour victory only six weeks ago, and because the U.S. Open was only the seventh major he had ever played.
He showed big game at Los Angeles Country Club, from the par saves around the turn to his deft touch with a wedge and putter over the last two holes to preserve his one-shot win over McIlroy. Perhaps five years from now it won’t seem like such a surprise, at least for Clark.
Tiger Woods never faced those questions, either. Much of those 11 years between his 14th and 15th major was more about when he would play than when he would win.
Woods had reconstructive knee surgery and four back operations. McIlroy missed one major after hurting his knee playing soccer.
McIlroy is a massive talent, and so it’s reasonable to at least consider whether a four-time major champion has underachieved. Worth noting is winning majors has become tougher than ever as golf gets deeper and younger. Of the 33 majors McIlroy has played since his last win, 21 of those winners were younger than him.
More alarming is not that McIlroy failed to win Sunday, rather that he has given himself so few chances over the last nine years.
Since his last major title in near darkness at Valhalla in 2014 at the PGA Championship, he has played in the final group only twice — he was three behind Patrick Reed in the 2018 Masters and tied with Viktor Hovland last year at St. Andrews in the British Open.
Los Angeles allowed for natural comparisons with St. Andrews. It’s not so much what McIlroy did wrong as what he failed to do — make putts. He hit all 18 greens and took 36 putts in the British Open. He didn’t make a putt longer than 7 feet over the final 33 holes of the U.S. Open.
The final day at LACC wasn’t quite that bad, but it wasn’t great. McIlroy had 16 pars, one bogey and one birdie. That’s a round that often wins a U.S. Open. It’s just that this Open featured two 62s and a 63 before the week was over. McIlroy didn’t make a birdie over the last 17 holes.
There wasn’t much left for him when he finished but to hope for Clark to three-putt — yes, he was hoping for such an outcome because it was all he had — and when that 60-foot putt settled a foot next to the hole, McIlroy didn’t bother to stick around in the scoring trailer to watch him finish.
