Rory McIlroy plays in this week’s Houston Open acutely aware that, regardless of his performance at Memorial Park, he will arrive at Augusta in a fortnight in unprecedented form.
The Northern Irishman’s recent victory at the Players Championship ensured that for the first time ever he will tee it up at the season’s opening major with two titles already this season.
It is fair to say that purely when looking at the results sheet - and, of course, with McIlroy at the Masters it is not that straightforward - his chances of finally completing the career grand slam are better than ever before in the last 11 years.
In that sense it must have been tempting to go directly from Sawgrass to Georgia. But, after visiting Augusta National for his annual reconnaissance at the start of this week, McIlroy jetted to Houston and stressed ‘three weeks without competition would be too much for me”
Furthermore, while he came away from Ponte Vedra in euphoric mood, there was also the nagging sense that “there were things I definitely could work on”.
“Look, it was great to get that win a couple weeks ago but I still feel I could have played a lot better,” McIlroy said in Houston on Wednesday.
Here Telegraph Sport analyses the three aspects in Houston that could make his Masters candidature yet more tantalising.
Straighten out the driving
What made his second Players success all the more remarkable was that McIlroy missed more than half of the fairways.
And in the 51-year history of the PGA Tour’s flagship event, only Australian Cam Smith has prevailed while being so erratic with the driver.
Smith is renowned for his recovery powers and ability to score in spite of his long game. McIlroy is the opposite. His entire game and golfing self-belief system is based on his driving and although he was delighted to prove that he can triumph when his strike weapon is misfiring, he will be desperate at the municipal course to fix the radar.
Jordan Spieth opined last week that, at Augusta, too much focus is placed on form off the tee – “your driving accuracy is less of a problem there than it is at other majors” – but for McIlroy it appears paramount. Even when this aspect of his game is off, it invariably still provides the winning shots.
At Sawgrass, in the first hole of the Monday play-off against JJ Spaun, it was the 366-yard monster that essentially broke his rival, just as his outrageous 353-yarder on the 14th at Pebble Beach in February set him on course for his first success in 2025 at the AT&T Pro-Am. It is how he gets his kicks and how he kicks away.
Can he return it to its past glories, to the standard that has identified the Northern Irishman as one of the greatest drivers golf has seen? McIlroy is confident he can - and with good reason.
He erroneously switched from a TaylorMade Qi10 to the new Qi35 the week before The Players - “I led Strokes Gained: Off the Tee at both Pebble and Torrey [Pines, which staged the Genesis Invitational] so, yeah it was a really, really good idea to change,” he sarcastically told Golfweek - before reverting for Sawgrass.
His “feels” were off, but that is normal as Pete Cowen, his former coach intimated. “It sometimes takes a little while to reacclimatise yourself with a club you’ve discarded, no matter how big a favourite it was,” he said. “But a week or so on the range is enough to root out the gremlins that the switch to a new club might have introduced.”
Memorial Park is, in McIlroy’s description, “bombs away off the tee”. And that is exactly how it likes it. “This is a golf course that’s right up my alley,” McIlroy said on Wednesday. “Suits my game and suits my style of play.”
Maintain short-game excellence and control over half-shots
There are two areas of McIlroy’s game that seem transformed this season - his course management and his approach play from 150 yards in.
And these just happened to be the weaknesses that astute judges such as Sir Nick Faldo believed held him back at Augusta.
“It’s that ability to steer yourself around the course and get the best out of your round,” the three-time winner told Telegraph Sport. “And it’s about being able to fashion the right shot at the right moment. Rory is brilliant, but sometimes he lacks in these departments.”
McIlroy palpably did not at Sawgrass. The knock-down nine-iron he hit into the island-green 17th in the play-off screamed of a performer who has worked out how to exert control in the heat (an attribute Faldo had in abundance).
And the manner in which he and caddie Harry Diamond calmly negotiated their path to victory was in contrast to some of McIlroy’s most painful defeats over the last few years (the plainest exhibit, of course, being the loss at last year’s US Open after being two strokes ahead with four to play).
McIlroy had the luxury at the Players of being able to count on a short game that, quite simply, is getting better and better. His chipping, pitching and greenside bunker play is peaking and with Brad Faxon, as his putting guru, he has never looked as comfortable on the greens.
This week’s Houston Open - where McIlroy notes “the green complexes are pretty severe in areas” - should be ideal in retaining this sharpness. Marry that up with an improved driving display and the mix could be irresistible.
Keep Scottie Scheffler winless
When it came to talking about Scheffler on Wednesday, McIlroy remained as effusive as he has been in the last year, saying he is “great for the game” and declaring “his season last year is up there with one of the all-time great seasons in the history of the game and doesn’t get talked about enough”.
No doubt, McIlroy genuinely believes this, but he will also be thinking that 2024 was then and that 2025 is now and no matter how much he “respects and admires Scottie”, the world No 2 will be thrilled that the world No 1 is without a win so far in this campaign.
Granted, it is only March, but Scheffler has not stood on the top podium in an official event since the Olympics last August.
If McIlroy can achieve his hat-trick in Houston not only will it send him to the Masters as the favourite, but it will ensure that it will be eight months without a title for Scheffler.
And for the Texan, that would almost represent a drought. Any uncertainty or even insecurity will naturally be a boon to McIlroy’s Masters hopes.
Furthermore, it might allow McIlroy to play at Augusta knowing that if he was at last to don a green jacket, he could take the No1 tag off Scheffler, a scenario that was thought to be impossible just a few months ago.
McIlroy clearly does not require added motivation for Augusta and his detractors will claim that the less pressure the better. But if he is going to do it, then why not do it when everything is on the line?
Never mind scar tissue. Houston could help to spell out to the 35-year-old that no, he does not have a problem.