Nightmare Mcilroy slumps to 80
Ulsterman hits 10 over with two double bogeys Mickelson, Spieth and Woods struggle as well
In 139 major rounds Rory Mcilroy had never shot higher. Indeed, when put alongside par, this 10-over 80 was his worst 18 holes on the game’s biggest stages. Hapless in the Hamptons did not begin to describe it.
Mcilroy is outside the top 130 in the 156-man field, 11 behind the lead set by England’s Ian Poulter and world No 1 Dustin Johnson as well as two other Americans in Russell Henley and Scott Piercy.
This was Mcilroy’s worst start to a major, his highest score at a US Open and his second worst score in any professional event… the stats stacked up in golf ’s equivalent of a charge-sheet.
He signed for the same damnable number in the second round of the 2010 Open at St Andrew’s and, most famously, the final round of the 2011 Masters, but the Ulsterman was still a young pro back then. This was not meant to happen any more.
Granted, there was the consolation that the 29-year-old was far from alone in struggling in a first round when this Long Island layout restated its propensity to reduce the most garlanded golfers into quivering hackers.
Playing partners Phil Mickelson and Jordan Spieth struggled to a 78 and 77 – so much for this being “The Supergroup”, at a collective 25-over they were more Mamma Mia! than Abba – while world No 4 Jon Rahm and Jason Day fired a 78 and 79. Tiger Woods, meanwhile, is on eight over after a triple bogey on the first and then recording back-to-back double bogeys on the 13th and 14th.
Yes, Mcilroy was in the very best company. Yet the fact that, like Mickelson, he declined to talk to the media afterwards surely summed up his utter dismay. After coming in with such hope, Mcilroy’s third US Open missed cut in succession looms ominously. At the very least he needs to mount a second-round charge because he is far too adept to be bowing out on Fridays so meekly.
With so many of the big names crashing and burning, the United States Golf Association was coming under criticism from some quarters and that was inevitable after the last US Open here in 2004 when the governing body lost control of the course. But although, as Paul Casey opined after his 73, “the USGA didn’t hold back on the pin positions”, and the rough is three feet high just a few yards off the fairways, it could hardly be blamed for these crosswinds and the 20mph gusts. The landing surfaces are eminently forgivable and that is why Mcilroy hitting only seven fairways was so inexcusable. In contrast, Mickelson located 13 of the 14.
Mcilroy managed to miss the 50-yards wide expanse on the first (his 10th) and did so with an iron. Considering his talent, that simply has to be a mental problem. Bizarrely, Mcilroy still managed to reel off three birdies, two of them in succession on the fifth and sixth (his 14th and 15th) as he tried to launch some sort of rescue operation.
Alas, two bogeys followed just as quickly, compounding the five he made earlier as well as the two double bogeys. He should feel fortunate that his “thin” from the fairway bunker on the 16th (his seventh) did not bury his ball in the hay or else he would have threatened the 83 he shot at the 2007 South African Open.
Poulter suffered no such drama. The 42-year-old shrugged off his lengthy dislike of the major its organisers just love to call “golf ’s ultimate test” with three birdies, including a sweetly struck seveniron on the 11th which looked almost certain to drop for a hole-inone. Having won in Houston in April and notched up three top 12s in his five events since, nobody should be surprised at the resurgent world No 27.
Justin Rose was certainly not shocked by the form of his close friend. “Ian’s a great wind player so this suits him,” he said. “And his putter seems to be catching up with the rest of his play.”
However, if Poulter is to prevail then Rose appears confident he will have to fend him off first. The world No 3, who would top the rankings for the first time if he were to win his second US Open, was extremely composed in his 71. There were two birdies to go with the three bogeys and although there were a few yanked putts, in his words there were “a few miraculous up and downs” to right the scales.
“I enjoy the fight, the grind,” Rose said. “When I got here first thing and saw the flags were blowing dead straight in the wind,
I thought ‘ Whoa, this is going to be tough’. And when I see the scores of Rory, Phil and Jordan they make my round seem all the more better.”
The tortured trio should know that it could have been worse. They could have been Scott Gregory. The 2016 Amateur champion, playing in his first major as a pro, shot a 92, the first US Open score in the 90s in 16 years. Credit to the 23-year-old from Hampshire for stopping to talk. Others might take note. “The last time I didn’t break 90 was eight years ago or more,’’ Gregory said.