Rory McIlroy’s PGA silence turned celebration into confusion

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — If you want to know how Rory McIlroy feels about skipping four consecutive days of would-be press conferences at the PGA Championship, you needn’t dig deep into the archives to find out.

His latest comments on the topic came just weeks ago. In his pre-tournament press scrum at the Masters, McIlroy responded to Collin Morikawa’s assertion that he didn’t “owe” the press “anything” by offering his own perspective on the issue. McIlroy’s answer left behind little room for interpretation.

“I think [Morikawa] could have worded it a little bit better, but look, every other athlete, whether it be in the NBA, NFL, they’re obligated to speak to you guys after a game,” McIlroy said. “We’re not. Whether that’s something that the PGA Tour looks to in terms of putting that into their rules and regulations, but as long as that’s not the case and we have that option to opt out whenever we want, expect guys to do that from time to time.”

Ultimately, McIlroy’s silence at this PGA Championship, against the backdrop of questions about his driver, is not the reason for this story. While there are words to be written about the responsibility pro golfers face in their relationships with the press, there is little doubt about the letter of the law. McIlroy exercised his rights this week at Quail Hollow by taking the fifth.

The root of this story is ambiguity — the same thing that McIlroy’s comments at the Masters extinguished. Ambiguity is a dangerous thing for an athlete of McIlroy’s stature. It leaves room for bad actors to seize control of the narrative and twist it into something it is not. It gives idiots oxygen. It surrenders the most powerful tool in any famous athlete’s arsenal: his or her perspective.

Let’s talk about what we know. The USGA, on behalf of the PGA of America, conducted routine driver conformance testing on a third of the field at Quail Hollow. According to reports, multiple drivers heads, including McIlroy’s TaylorMade Qi10, failed the testing, which, again, is not abnormal. McIlroy’s driving was demonstrably worse with his backup Qi10 than it has been over the last several months (though not all that different from how he played with his old head at the Truist Championship last week). Finally, in the four days following that initial report, McIlroy declined four interview requests from the assembled media at the PGA Championship, eventually departing Quail Hollow on Sunday afternoon without a word since his pre-tournament press conference.

If McIlroy’s driver failed USGA testing, the failed test would not suggest anything nefarious about McIlroy or his equipment setup. Pro golfers swing at unfathomable speeds and seek gear that pushes up against the allowable limits. After many repeated blows at high speeds, driver faces can creep past the legal thickness and sometimes even cave or crack.

“The results [of driver tests] are kept confidential to protect players,” PGA of America chief championships officer Kerry Haigh said in a statement. “[Players] are unaware the club has fallen out of conformance and not responsible for it falling out of conformance other than hitting the club thousands of times.”

So if the problem isn’t that McIlroy’s driver may have flunked the test, what is it? The problem is that we still don’t know what happened. Because McIlroy didn’t talk, a seemingly ho-hum equipment story has ballooned into one of the headlines of the week; everything else that happened in McIlroy’s first major start since that magical finish at Augusta National also has remained a mystery. Because of McIlroy’s zipped lips, a week of celebration has been replaced with confusion.

Even given his keen sense of his rights as a tournament competitor, it is unusual for McIlroy to be so camera-shy. The public knows this, which is why some of the internet’s more nefarious actors have already taken Rory’s silence as an admission of guilt or some sort of cover-up. Surely, there is something uncouth at play, the carnival barkers chirp, because why else would McIlroy not speak?

I do not share their concern. In my estimation, about the least interesting story surrounding McIlroy’s week at the PGA Championship is the state of his driver head. If Rory had spoken about the failed test Thursday afternoon, it’s likely that Thursday afternoon is the last time I would have thought about his driver — or anyone else’s.

By choosing not to speak, though, the driver head has remained in my head, and everybody else’s. McIlroy’s muzzle has generated uncertainty. Perhaps, the devil on your shoulder whispers, a bigger story is at play, and McIlroy put up walls to protect it.

Point is, I don’t know. Nobody does. McIlroy’s decision to invite such uncertainity is curious for a player who entered the PGA Championship fresh off the most historic week of his career and ready to spend the next several months riding a wave of triumph.

Maybe McIlroy is dodging questions about his driver. Maybe he’s making a point about player empowerment. Maybe he’s burnt out after so long in the center of the limelight. Maybe he’s already cashed in all his karmic chips. Maybe he’s just bored.

Whatever his reason, it’s possible McIlroy forgot why so many players who are not obligated to speak to the press still do: because it is advantageous for them to set the record straight in their own words.

At the PGA Championship, McIlroy chose silence. In the process, he produced noise.