Rory McIlroy struggles with putter at Pebble Beach Pro-Am, misses cut
Rory McIlroy’s putter failed him at Pebble Beach, he didn’t like the poa annual greens, but missing the cut at Pebble isn’t the worst thing in the world.
You could say expectations could not have been higher for Rory McIlroy in 2018. It’s his time to win multiple majors and tournaments many have predicted.
Coming off of the 18th green Saturday evening in round-three at the Pebble Beach Pro-Am Rory McIlroy threw his golf ball into the Pacific, having just birdied the Par-5. After three rounds he was done.
Playing with his dad Gerry, he finished 1-under Par, not good enough to make the 54-hole cut.
McIlroy’s putter failed him this week even though McIlroy said that was a point of emphasis during his offseason this winter.
The greens at Pebble Beach were not to his liking, he said after Saturday’s round that he started to let the poa annual greens “get into my head a little bit” and started to get “tentative”.
He struck the ball well but hit a rough stretch on Friday when he double-bogeyed hole five on a five-putt, (yes, a five putt, a single drive and five putts, scoring a six on the Par-4.) and bogeyed seven and eight. That left him playing from behind to make the cut on Saturday. He shot even par for the day and 1-under for the tournament, with the cut at 3-under.
McIlroy, ranked as the No. 8 golfer in the world prior to this week’s PGA Tour event at Pebble Beach, was pegged as someone who could take the reins as the best player in pro golf if he wanted to.
People like his personality and his game has global appeal. But the results haven’t been there. He didn’t win at all in 2016.
Granted, McIlroy hasn’t played on the PGA Tour since September where he finished tied for 58th at the BMW Championship, but missing the cut at the Pebble Beach was not expected.
It’s surprising but not a big deal. Realistically, Pebble Beach is not the end all and be all of professional golf, it is a great television event but it is not career defining.
Pebble is not the Masters, but it’s still a Tour event and one that a lot of casual fans consider the unofficial start of the 2018 season, at least in the United States. So the focus will be on McIlroy next week at Riviera (a.k.a the Genesis Open) followed by the Honda Classic the following week.
For McIlroy, his focus realistically was not to win the tournament but it was a nice starter to get back into tournament golf. He had the added bonus of playing with his father and that quite frankly is not the same as a regular tournament. Yes, the Pebble Beach Pro-Am is a Tour event but with the mixture of celebrities and others, it is exactly that, aPro-Amm.
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McIlroy hasn’t been in contention since The Bridgestone Invitational last August and The Open last July. Golf fans everywhere would love to see a Top 10 in the next two weeks. A strong performance in either of the next two events will make McIlroy’s performance this week at Pebble a forgotten memory.