PONTE VEDRA BEACH — A lot of nothing is what Rory McIlroy has been up to the last few days as the Northern Irishman has worked with trainers to nurse a balky back into decent enough shape to defend his title at the Players Championship.
McIlroy withdrew from the Arnold Palmer Invitational ahead of Saturday’s third round, a morning gym workout triggering muscle issues. “It’s not structural, it’s not joint, it’s fine,” McIlroy said. “It’s purely muscular sort of discomfort and fatigue.”
But it’s also not 100 percent, the self-described “sensitivity” he is feeling delaying McIlroy’s arrival at TPC Sawgrass until Wednesday afternoon.
And after hitting a few balls on the practice range—hitting only up to a 6-iron—McIlroy was still on the fence as to whether he’ll make his 1:42 p.m. first-round tee time with Xander Schauffele and Hideki Matsuyama rolls around on Thursday.
“Probably a game-time decision, but all indications are pointing in the right direction,” McIlroy said. “So hopefully good night tonight. The drugs are working wonders, and then just keep it going from there.”
Beyond getting treatment, McIlroy has been laying low, trying to stay off his feet in hopes of speeding up the healing process. “I watched a lot of press conferences the last couple days,” he joked.
McIlroy was traveling Wednesday morning to TPC Sawgrass, though, during the most anticipated press conference of them. That’s when new Brian Rolapp spoke about changes under consideration to the competitive structure of the tour. The new PGA Tour CEO outlined six themes emerging from the discussion of the Future Competitions Committee, chaired by Tiger Woods, as it tried to reset the tour model.
While McIlroy didn’t hear the address live, he got an early listen to Rolapp’s presentation on Monday, the two talking on the phone for an hour after a face-to-face meeting had to be postponed.
“He just sort of took me through everything that he was going to say to you guys,” said McIlroy, describing the changes on the table as “positive.”
“I think what he said today was … it’s obviously a really good direction of where the tour should be going, I think.”
Mind you, nothing has been finalized, Rolapp saying that the hope is by June he’ll have more specifics about what’s in store for 2027 and beyond. With many players anxious to know what’s in store for their futures, the wait is something they have to bear with, and one that McIlroy isn’t necessarily surprised about given his time serving on the PGA Tour Policy Board.
“I think he’s got into this job and realized how difficult it is to turn this big ship around, and there’s a lot of cooks in the kitchen and a lot of opinions. So he’s obviously navigating that.”
This article was originally published on golfdigest.com
