Rory McIlroy surges on Moving Day as a clogged PGA Championship leaderboard promises a dramatic Sunday
By Dana O’Neil, CNN
Newtown Square, Pennsylvania (CNN) — With his own third round of the PGA Championship finished by midafternoon, Rory McIlroy got to think about how to spend the rest of his Saturday afternoon.
He did not, understandably, have grand plans.
“I’ll watch a little bit (of the golf) and go back to the house and put the feet up,” McIlroy said. “I started ‘Batman: The Dark Knight’ last night, so I’ll try and finish that. That’s one of my go-tos to try to forget about things.’’
At the risk of playing spoiler to McIlroy’s plans, the movie ends with a plot twist in which the superhero intentionally poses as the villain, launching a Gotham-wide manhunt to find him.
Sometimes life can, in fact, imitate art.
Save for US-based Ryder Cups, McIlroy almost always plays the good guy role. So popular is McIlroy here at Aronimink Golf Club, you’d think rainbows and daisies might sprout in his wake.
As he approached the 11th tee on Saturday, two little boys crouching behind the ropes feverishly waved at the Northern Irishman like he was in a parade, not the No. 2 golfer in the world headed to work.
But on Sunday, when he returns to the course for the final round of the PGA Championship, McIlroy will be the evil force everyone else will be trying to stop. Already the owner of this year’s Masters title, McIlroy will look to greedily become the first player since Jordan Spieth in 2015 to start the year two-for-two in majors.
Claiming every inch of moving day, McIlroy charged from plus-1 to minus-3 for the tournament with a 4-under round of 66 on the day, moving him to just one back of the leaders when he exited the 18th green. It’s his 25th major championship round of 66 or better. Only Tiger Woods, at 28, has more.
There is, admittedly, a crowd at the top and some big names to contend with – Alex Smalley leads at 6-under after three rounds, sporting a two-shot lead over a five-player pack that includes Jon Rahm, Ludvig Åberg – but McIlroy is again in contention just three shots back.
“I feel like I did enough to think I have a chance going into tomorrow,” he said.
He put himself in such an enviable position after turning both his game and the Aronimink Golf Club on its ear. Or maybe, in his parlance, on its arse.
It was, after all, a mere three days ago that McIlroy sat down behind a news conference microphone and promptly described his opening round 74 indelicately and yet accurately with the Irish version of a favorite American curse word. Ours rhymes with lit; theirs with right. McIlroy’s game was neither lit nor right; it was the other.
On Saturday, when asked to describe his round, he smirked. “Better,” he said. “I said no profanity today, so keeping it clean.”
His turnaround came on a sun-splashed Saturday when the previously unforgiving course seemed to yield ever so slightly in the morning before punishing the afternoon players with gusty winds.
The real villain of this tourney has been Aronimink itself, or at least the PGA of America’s treatment of it. Players have kvetched – nay whined? – about impossible pin placements. They have argued that, while it’s made the tournament entertaining, it hasn’t made the golf great. Scottie Scheffler said Friday’s pin placements were the toughest he’d ever seen on the Tour.
“I mean, kind of absurd,” he added.
McIlroy chimed in with his own gripes, arguing that pars were too easy, birdies too hard and bogeys the worst anyone could do, all of it adding up for a clogged leaderboard rather than some lines of delineation.
That leader board certainly stayed clogged through most of Saturday. As Moving Day turned Moving Evening, five players were tied for the lead at 4-under for the tournament and seven – including McIlroy – were a shot back from 3-under.
It was Smalley who eventually made the move to separate himself from the pack of challengers, carding seven birdies that helped erase five bogeys, and closing his day with birdies on three of the last four holes.
After better results, McIlroy softened his stance, if he didn’t back down entirely. He argued against the use of the word “manipulated” to describe how it all affected scoring, preferring instead “protected.”
“I think there were a lot of guys that were frustrated yesterday coming off the course,” he said. “Again, it’s frustrating to us, but at the same time, it creates a helluva entertaining championship. If I wasn’t playing in it, I’d love what’s going on.”
Although, to be clear, he seemed to love it a whole lot more than he did earlier in the week.
Despite his disappointment on Thursday, McIlroy afforded himself a little grace. He knew by experience that he would likely do better as he learned the course more. Prior to this week, he’d only played four competitive rounds here and aside from a quick Friday popover visit last month, was largely flying blind.
He also had some convenient muscle memory to rely on. A little more than a year ago, McIlroy stood seven back – just as he did here – after the third round of the Masters. He came back and won to finally and cathartically complete his career Grand Slam.
The secret, he knew, was to not try and do everything all at once. Instead, McIlroy aimed to chip away at the leaders and made manageable and makeable goals for himself each day.
He didn’t like the way he drove the ball on Thursday and aimed to improve that on Friday, with time on the range. He worked to make sure his right shoulder relaxed more in transition rather than putting the club in front of him and made conscious efforts to adjust to the winds that have been whipping around all week.
On Friday, he aimed to get back to even par, and on Saturday hoped to push himself to 5-under and put real pressure on the leaders. He came up short both days, leveling his only real disappointment in Saturday’s round on the last two goals.
Having pushed into the lead with a -5 for the day, he dropped a shot into the bunker on 17 and his chip out fell way shy of the green. He shoved his club into the ground in frustration, carding only his second bogey of the day. On 18, he left a shot out of the rough, similarly short but at least saved par with a long putt.
It could have gone better; but he also knows, it could have gone a lot worse.
“I’ve climbed my way out of that hole a little bit,’’ he said. “I’m proud of myself for doing that. But there’s one more day left, and I feel like I can be close enough to the lead, I feel like I’ve still got a good chance.’’
This story has been updated to include the results of the conclusion of Saturday’s third round.
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