Rory McIlroy Will Never Win the Masters

[TommyRude]

Rory will NEVER win the Masters.  I made this prediction last summer.  At that time, I said the only way he could possibly win was if he got a lobotomy.  

But there’s more.  As in many things in life, it’s not one thing, it’s a combination. With Rory, it’s a combination, some physical, some mental, a lot of it self inflicted.

Let me say here, I like Rory - but I’ll be honest, I like the old Rory much better, you know - the young Rory, jauntily strolling up the fairway, looking around, do e do de do, no cares, no issues, nice friendly kid, kinda like Paul McCartney.

Let’s fast forward to the current Rory - much different.  There are 3 main reasons why he will never win the Masters. 

First reason - physical.  Rory has Keith Clearwater syndrome.  You guys remember him, right?  Was a good tour player back in the 80s, and then he started to work out, he got buffed, looked good.  And his game went into the shitter.  Now Rory - he can still play of course, but look at him - he’s over buffed, it looks unnatural.  His chest is really thick back to front.  His upper body is super buffed - too much.  You can see it when he stands over shots, he’s all tensed up, WAY too much,  The old, younger Rory, loose as a goose, really flexible.  The current Rory - that buffed tenseness affects some of his shots, especially under pressure, he’ll yank shots to the left, and then overcompensate and push shots to the right.

Second reason:  Mental - and I think this is connected to the physical.  As he started getting buffed up, he started to become more aggressive.  Remember the match against Patrick Reed?  That was the early sign - he was all screaming and flexing… WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?  He turned into the hyper macho dude, really was not so great.  That also came out in his opposition to LIV.  Remember the altercation in the parking lot with Bones?  Who is this guy?  Remember - “I HATE LIV”.  SO all this hyper aggression affects his play, especially under pressure.

Third reason:  Are you familiar with a clothing sunglasses brand called Stussy?  Well the third reason is what I call “The Power of the word that rhymes with Stussy”.  It affects all major athletes, all major celebrities.  It affected Tiger, it affected Rory.  That crazy split with Caroline Wozniowski?  Now he’s filing for divorce.  This to me, is just an issue from becoming so super famous, women throw themselves at you, you can’t help but get this godlike complex.  I think this affects his game, your mind wanders, you can’t help it.  You can try and put all that stuff out of your mind, but it really affects your game.  And when pressure time comes, it’s only a negative.

Finally - the obvious 4th bonus reason;  the clock is ticking,  The longer he goes without winning the Masters, the harder it gets.  Add in all those other factors, it’s gonna make it very hard for Rory to contend.  It’s already hard enough, add in all that other stuff, forget it.

I hope I’m wrong.  I like Rory, he’s good for the game.  But I’ll be honest - I like the old Rory better.  The pre-buff, the pre-hyper-macho-anti-LIV Rory.
 

[iacas]

5 hours ago, TommyRude said:

Now Rory - he can still play of course, but look at him - he’s over buffed, it looks unnatural.  His chest is really thick back to front.  His upper body is super buffed - too much.  You can see it when he stands over shots, he’s all tensed up, WAY too much,  The old, younger Rory, loose as a goose, really flexible.

File under "tell me you've never seen Rory McIlroy in person lately without saying it."

And since your second point is based on the first… meh.

Now, predicting that a 35-year-old will never win a tournament? Sure. But he's almost won two or three majors the past few years. So… good luck with your take here.

[dennyjones]

@TommyRude Welcome to TST.   We're glad you've joined.  

I hope you're wrong.  His win would be great for the game.

[woodzie264]

1 hour ago, dennyjones said:

@TommyRude Welcome to TST.   We're glad you've joined.  

I hope you're wrong.  His win would be great for the game.

Agreed - I wasn’t a fan of his in the early years, but I’ve grown to have more respect for him than nearly everyone else on Tour. His last few holes today were so deflating 

7 hours ago, TommyRude said:

 I like the old Rory better.  The pre-buff, the pre-hyper-macho-anti-LIV Rory.
 

I prefer older Rory better, the Anti-LIV Rory

[Zeph]

11 hours ago, dennyjones said:

@TommyRude Welcome to TST.   We're glad you've joined.  

I hope you're wrong.  His win would be great for the game.

Agreed. He’s probably the biggest name now that Tiger’s not around, and he’s been a fun player to watch all these years. I really hope he gets the jacket one day.

10 hours ago, woodzie264 said:

Agreed - I wasn’t a fan of his in the early years, but I’ve grown to have more respect for him than nearly everyone else on Tour. His last few holes today were so deflating 

I prefer older Rory better, the Anti-LIV Rory

Ugh, I could do without those two doubles. Good tee shots, then missing greens and not getting it done with the wedges. At least he didn’t dunk two like Cantlay, but four dropped shots in three holes is rough. He’d been going at it very well up to that point.

The greens seemed very quick yesterday, as many on the course reported.

As for Rory and The Masters, it’s 50:50. He’ll either win one or not, but ruling out the 35 year old world number two is just silly. This “super buffed” talk reminds me of when Tiger got some muscle and people thought he was huge. He wasn’t and Rory isn’t. You don’t have to gain a lot of muscle before it shows, especially in tight fitting t-shirts.

He’s got the game to win it. Just have to make it work those four days and not let his head get in the way. Winning professional tournaments is difficult. Winning a major is even more difficult. The good news for Rory is that The Masters has the weakest competition of the majors. The top players are all there, but it’s a smaller field than the other majors.

[colin007]

I did it all for the Stussy.

[GolfLug]

I hear the points from OP (@TommyRude, decent first post BTW), but these 'never' takes are almost always illogical. Masters is the one of those places where an 'older' player has the best chance.

Having said that the second shot on 15th IMHO was a bit of gamble which I think in some way could be labeled as lack of discipline. It seemed even short irons/wedges were bouncing off this green. A 4-iron seemed like a very low percentage shot from 230 out. Bit surprised Harry D agreed with the choice. 

20 hours ago, TommyRude said:

you can’t help but get this godlike complex.
 

Yeah, well we have a player who has been playing like a god for last couple of years without a complex (seemingly) and people would rather watch cardboard decompose. So, yeah, Rory serves what we ask and hope you are wrong.

[klineka]

If you're going to make claims, back them up with facts.

On 4/10/2025 at 12:48 PM, TommyRude said:

The current Rory - that buffed tenseness affects some of his shots, especially under pressure, he’ll yank shots to the left, and then overcompensate and push shots to the right.

Do you have any facts that support this claim that Rory does this when under pressure? 

 

On 4/10/2025 at 12:48 PM, TommyRude said:

SO all this hyper aggression affects his play, especially under pressure.

Did the hyper aggression negatively affect his play when he won The Players this year making that 2 wins in 4 starts for him at that point? Can you provide some evidence directly showing how his hyper aggression has negatively affected his play?

 

On 4/10/2025 at 12:48 PM, TommyRude said:

Now he’s filing for divorce.

This isn't even accurate anymore, they called the divorce off. 

If you're going to criticize someone at least get your facts straight. 

Edited April 11 by klineka

[GolfLug]

25 minutes ago, klineka said:

Did the hyper aggression negatively affect his play when he won The Players this year making that 2 wins in 4 starts for him at that point? Can you provide some evidence directly showing how his hyper aggression has negatively affected his play?

Phil M was (is?) was a total cowboy in his day but served him well at the Masters it seems. 

[TommyRude]

9 hours ago, Zeph said:

This “super buffed” talk reminds me of when Tiger got some muscle and people thought he was huge. He wasn’t and Rory isn’t. You don’t have to gain a lot of muscle before it shows, especially in tight fitting t-shirts.

Tiger buffing up hurt his career as well.  Tiger could have should have won 8-10 Masters and 100 tournaments.  He started the insane workout pump up buff out craziness whilst hanging out with the military guys, Rangers or Seals?  Hey that’s what he wanted to do, but it definitely hurt his career, especially right during his prime.

Same thing with Rory.  He could have should have won several Masters by now.

Both Tiger and Rory, they have incredible talent, and their talent helped them to be the best players of their generations.  I’m just saying they could’ve won even more if not for the factors I’ve listed out.

[klineka]

3 minutes ago, TommyRude said:

 I’m just saying they could’ve won even more if not for the factors I’ve listed out.

You don't know that for a fact. 

You can't even provide evidence that supports the factors you listed out. 

[TommyRude]

7 hours ago, GolfLug said:

Yeah, well we have a player who has been playing like a god for last couple of years without a complex (seemingly) and people would rather watch cardboard decompose. So, yeah, Rory serves what we ask and hope you are wrong.

True.  Scotty is not playing the field (so to speak), he’s happily married (best we can tell), and seems to have the personality to kind of ignore all the hoopla.  The strange thing with Scotty is it seems he can’t crack the code to have the love of the crowd - - he’s definitely cracked the code to winning everything in sight.  Albeit the bizarre situation where he got arrested, but remember how that all went down, the guy reached in and punched him in the face (I believe), and Scotty seemed to take it all very very low key. 

1 minute ago, klineka said:

You don't know that for a fact. 

You can't even provide evidence that supports the factors you listed out. 

Evidence?  Open your eyes, look at the results, look at the trends.  There’s 15 years of evidence!

1 hour ago, GolfLug said:

Phil M was (is?) was a total cowboy in his day but served him well at the Masters it seems. 

Phil total cowboy?  Hadn’t quite heard it put that way - I guess you’re talking about the gambling?  or the move to LIV?  In any case, a very different type of scenario for Phil.  I’d say that Phil optimized his talent and probably got as much out of his career he could.  If anything, Phil was not so great physically for quite a while, but he trimmed down and extended his career

[GolfLug]

43 minutes ago, TommyRude said:

the guy reached in and punched him in the face (I believe), and Scotty seemed to take it all very very low key. 

Bro.. you trollin?😂

[TommyRude]

8 minutes ago, GolfLug said:

Bro.. you trollin?😂

no troll!  isn’t that what happened?

[klineka]

58 minutes ago, TommyRude said:

Evidence?  Open your eyes, look at the results, look at the trends.  There’s 15 years of evidence!

Show me the evidence for the following please

• especially under pressure, he’ll yank shots to the left, and then overcompensate and push shots to the right.
• all this hyper aggression affects his play, especially under pressure.

Until you do that I'm going to consider you to be trolling because you're just spewing nonsense and not backing it up with facts.

1 hour ago, TommyRude said:

 I’m just saying they could’ve won even more if not for the factors I’ve listed out.

You can't prove this to be true. We don't know how their careers would have unfolded had they made different decisions about their bodies and fitness. 

[GolfLug]

33 minutes ago, TommyRude said:

no troll!  isn’t that what happened?

Long, well documented public story, but no. No physical assault that anyone knows of.

Tell your cousin they are full of shit..

[TommyRude]

9 minutes ago, GolfLug said:

Long, well documented public story, but no. No physical assault that anyone knows of.

Tell your cousin they are full of shit..

thought he got punched by the officer…. here’s a vid, maybe not punched, but looks like he got a bit roughed up.  In any case, he was very low key around the entire incident, that was my point

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/ZpkOHQqAeO8

[TommyRude]

38 minutes ago, klineka said:

Show me the evidence for the following please

• especially under pressure, he’ll yank shots to the left, and then overcompensate and push shots to the right.
• all this hyper aggression affects his play, especially under pressure.

Until you do that I'm going to consider you to be trolling because you're just spewing nonsense and not backing it up with facts.

You can't prove this to be true. We don't know how their careers would have unfolded had they made different decisions about their bodies and fitness. 

sigh… here are some facts and evidence on the fitness point

Fact:  Early career success, pre-transformation:  Rory won 4 majors between 2011-2014.  

Fact:  Around 2014-2015, Rory started working heavily on strength and conditioning, significantly increasing his gymwork, 

Evidence:  Rory himself has shared his intense fitness routines on social media, interviews, including heavy squats and lifts

Impact:  The increased muscle mass can alter swing mechanics and timing, problematic compared to the fluidity and feel he exhibited prior to the bulking up.