BRADENTON, Fla. – Rory McIlroy always speaks his mind.
Sometimes to his detriment, but mostly, he gives thoughtful, wise response and never sounds like his answers are washed through a P.R. machine. He doesn’t shy from any question nor does he hide from any answer given.
He’s an emotional sort, too, so it wasn’t surprising McIlroy became a tad irritated during his conference call with reporters Wednesday ahead of the World Golf Championships-Workday Championship at The Concession Golf Club when a couple questions irked him.
“He’s not Superman,” McIlroy said when asked if Woods was the guy who can come back from his horrific car crash that left him with multiple, serious injuries to his right leg, ankle and foot.
“He’s a human being at the end of the day,” McIlroy continued. “And he’s already been through so much. At this stage I think everyone should just be grateful that he’s here, that he’s alive, that his kids haven’t lost their dad.
“That’s the most important thing. Golf is so far from the equation right now, it’s not even on the map at this point.”
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Woods, 45, was involved in a single-car rollover crash early Tuesday morning in the Los Angeles area. He was awake and responsive after surgeons at the Harbor-UCLA Medical Center operated on his right leg; he shattered the tibia and fibula and suffered significant injuries to his right foot and ankle. A rod was inserted to stabilize his tibia and a combination of screws and pins were used to stabilize the ankle and foot.
McIlroy, 31, also was miffed about a query wondering if there was any talk about paying tribute to Woods during the tournament.
“Like you say ‘pay tribute to him.’ He’s not gone,” McIlroy said. “He’s been in a very bad accident. We’re very lucky that he’s still here. I feel like we should pay tribute to him every day for being on the PGA Tour and what he’s done for golf.
“It’s always great when he plays at a tournament or is out here because it gives that tournament an extra dimension that it usually doesn’t have. We’re all sort of heading towards that day that Tiger wasn’t going to be a part of the game. I’m not saying that that was soon. Before this accident, he was rehabbing a back injury and hopefully going to come back and play this year. It’s inevitable that one day he won’t be a part of it, and that’s going to be just something that the game of golf and the Tour is going to have to deal with and adapt to.
“Obviously, hopefully, he comes back and is able to play, but if he’s not, I think he’ll still be a part of the game in some way, whether it’s obviously his design business and his foundation and hosting golf tournaments. It may be the end of seeing the genius at work with a club in his hand, but there’s still a lot of other ways that he can affect the game in a great way.”
As for his own game, McIlroy, the former world No. 1 and four-time major champion, hasn’t won since the fall of 2019 and is coming off a missed cut in last week’s Genesis Invitational at Riviera Country Club north of Los Angeles. But in his next start after missing his last five cuts, McIlroy has two wins, a second, a fourth and a tie for 12th.
“It’s funny, it’s going to sound really weird, I worked so hard the week before Riviera in that week off, but I felt so unprepared to play, if that makes sense,” he said. “I stood on the range for hours a day hitting golf balls and working on my swing but didn’t play golf. Didn’t chip, didn’t putt, didn’t do any of the things that you need to do to shoot scores.
“So even though I worked hard and worked on some stuff, I feel like it’s sort of like clockwork. I have these weeks where I want to work on some things and fix some things and I try to cram everything in in the space of a week when it’s probably something that should take two or three months to iron out.
“I went to Riviera after feeling like I worked hard but was completely unprepared because I had sort of neglected sort of all other aspects of the game. I think I learned a couple of things last week. I was thinking way too much about the golf swing last week, even when I was out on the course.
“So I need to play with more freedom and I need to be able to swing away.”