Roryfied Air
Rory McIlroy has just won his fourth major championship, the 2014 PGA, at the ripe young age of 25 years old. Right away, you know he’s in some pretty good company when you realize that the only other two players to accomplish that at such an early age were Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods, pretty much recognized as the two greatest golfers of all time. He has solidified his role as the world’s top ranked golfer by winning his last three events, two majors and one World Golf Championship, over world class fields, and now has a huge lead over the rest of his peers on the official world golf rankings.
He has made the leap from star player in the golf world to superstar athlete of the pop culture world and he is now one of those elite athletes that are known only by their first name. Tiger. Peyton. LeBron. Kobe. Rory.
Whatever Tiger Woods was about ten years ago, Rory McIlroy is now. HE is the one everyone thinks is the man to beat. HE is the one piling up the majors that everyone else is busting their butts to try to win. HE is the one who blisters the field with scores so far under par, most of the players playing on the same course in that same tournament are left leaving the course wondering “how in the hell did Rory shoot so low this week?”
Get ready for it to happen a lot more often, folks. McIlroy is just starting to enter his golfing prime, which is usually physically defined through the ages of 25 to 35 skills wise, and maybe lasts another five to ten years after that while the experience gained on the mental side ofter compensates for the skills lost due to age. He is a long ways from that part of the golfer’s playing life cycle when injuries and things like the yips in putting creep in. He has the poise of a veteran golfer while having the skills of one of its prodigies. He hits the ball REALLY far, he hits his iron shots really accurately, and, oh yeah, he putts and chips well enough to beat the rest of golf’s elite in the majors. He is, quite simply, making the difficult look easy.
With four majors already under his belt, he now has his sights set on some really impressive feats. The fourth leg of the Grand Slam, the Masters, could be had as early as next spring. He is only that one title away from joining legends Ben Hogan, Gene Sarazen, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods as winners of the Grand Slam. Any major win would tie him with the legendary Seve Ballesteros and his five majors, and just beyond that is Sir Nick Faldo with his six. He is only 25 years old, people. At the pace he’s at, which is four majors since 2011, McIlroy might earn himself a Sir in front of his name while he’s still in his twenties. One major in six of the next ten years would put his total into double figures, which would put make him a serious candidate to being on golf’s Mt. Rushmore.
It would have been fun to see this decade’s meteoric star in his prime play against the brilliant prime of last decade’s star Tiger Woods. But that is unlikely to happen. I don’t think there is anyone out there besides diehard Tiger fans that would say HIS best golf was ahead of him (as opposed to the sensational 14 major career behind him) while at the same time, I don’t think there are many people out there, period, who don’t think McIlroy is either in it, or is just entering HIS prime.
Rory McIlroy is now entering “Roryfied air.” What started out as a career arc of someone being a really good young golfer, which then kind of evolved into talk about him maybe being The Next Big Thing, could now, just possibly, turn into something quite legendary. Sir Rory McIlroy. Say it. It kind of rolls right off the tongue, just like some of those other knighted dudes. And it’s not as crazy of a concept as you think. He could be THAT good.
