ATLANTA — We come here today not to bury Rory McIlroy. Even when he duck hooks it in the rain with his very first shot in this Tour Championship, his tee ball jumping the East Lake fencing, making a break for Alston Drive, you dare not put pennies on his eyes and declare him the Late, Great Two-Time FedEx Cup Champion.
Say this for the man, he can author scorecards that read like a Jack London adventure. McIlroy should have been an afterthought after going triple bogey-bogey on his first two holes Thursday, as he already was spotting the leader six shots in this staggered scoring mutation of a tournament. All he did with his next four holes was go birdie-bogey-birdie-eagle. He went 4-under 31 on the back nine, tied for the lowest score in that stretch. He had but four pars for the day, those being so very ho-hum, and not particularly useful.
Yes, he lost ground to FedEx points leader Scottie Scheffler (who shot a sporty 65 on Thursday), but at eight back, McIlroy can’t be fully counted out of becoming the first to win three of these FedEx Cup finales. We’ll leave his status at highly unlikely — somewhere between the Marlins winning the NL East and Arby’s going all vegan.
