Jack Nicklaus wrote a congratulatory letter to Rory McIlroy after the Northern Irishman won the Masters in April and completed the career Grand Slam. Nicklaus is still waiting to hear from McIlroy about his decision to skip this week’s Memorial Tournament.
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The Golden Bear, who this week hosts the 50th edition of the tournament he launched in 1976, was reluctant to talk about the McIlroy snub—“I’m not throwing Rory under the bus,” he said—but he was asked about it enough to finally say more than a few words he initially had offered when the subject came up.
McIlroy, it turns out, not only decided to skip the Memorial, but he did not reach out to Nicklaus to let him know that he wasn’t entering. Instead, McIlroy will play in next week’s RBC Canadian Open before heading to Oakmont, near Pittsburgh, for the US Open.
The decision to bypass this week’s $US20 million signature event was a stunner because it’s Nicklaus’ event. It was Nicklaus, the six-time Masters champion, who sat down with McIlroy prior to this year’s Masters and offered a bit of guidance on how to approach Augusta National Golf Club. McIlroy went on to win his first green jacket in a sudden-death playoff over Justin Rose. It seems like the least McIlroy should have done is reach out to Nicklaus as a courtesy to give him a heads up about missing the Memorial for the first time since 2017.
But that didn’t happen.
“I didn’t have a conversation with him, no,” Nicklaus admitted.
Did that surprise him? “A little bit,” he replied curtly.
It wasn’t like McIlroy didn’t know where to find Nicklaus if he couldn’t reach him by phone. McIlroy, like many tour players who live in the Jupiter, Florida area, has a courtesy membership at Nicklaus’ The Bear’s Club. The fact that McIlroy decided not to play at Muirfield Village, where he has five top-10 finishes and nine in the top-25 in 13 appearances—but no wins—did catch Nicklaus off guard. But he understood the thought process.
“Guys have got schedules and got things they do. And I haven’t talked to him for him to tell me why or why not. It’s just his call [on the decision],” Nicklaus, 85, said. “I don’t hold anything against Rory for that. He did what he likes to play. I know he likes to play so many in a row. He likes to play the week before a US Open. And so that’s what he’s doing. So, I really don’t have a comment on it. It’s very difficult, very difficult. I mean, I’m a big Rory fan, I always have been. I’m sure that I will remain that way.”
It’s the third time this year McIlroy has skipped a signature event, following not playing in the season-opening Sentry and RBC Heritage the week after the Masters. It’s a bit strange, considering he was one of the leading proponents of the lucrative, limited-field series of tournaments on the PGA Tour.
Nicklaus declined to take anything other than the high road, even when he has not heard from one of golf’s biggest stars whom he also considers a friend.
“I know hee has to make what’s the schedule for him and what works for him and what he has to do. And I understand that. I did the same thing, but I had to do that sometimes and we just weren’t included this year.
“I’m not going to throw Rory under the bus. I like Rory too much. He’s a good kid,” Nicklaus added.” He’s played some great golf. He’s had a lot of situations that have happened to him. He’s got to make his own calls on things. Could he have done ’em differently? Probably. But that’s all right. I probably could have done some of mine differently too. So I’m not complaining about Rory.”
