Steph and Rory hit Boston at the same time
BROOKLINE, Mass. — Rory McIlroy arrived on Monday. After a victory. Steph Curry will be arriving Wednesday. After a victory. OK, different sports and technically different cities — Boston literally is next door — but who cares?
We’re dealing with champions here, one involving the U.S. Golf Association, the other with the National Basketball Association, and with two of the biggest names in sports.
Both, through their own brilliance and the good fortune of timing, on course and on court within a few miles of each other in a small patch of New England.
This is always the week of the U.S. Open, golf’s moveable feast, which now will be at The Country Club — when the place opened in the 1890s, no other label was needed.
And it’s usually the week of the NBA finals, now shifting from San Francisco to Boston, where with the Warriors up 3-2, Game 6 will be played Thursday night.
A few hours after the opening round of the 122nd Open.
Without Tiger Woods, still worn out from his struggle last month in the PGA, and with Phil Mickelson more a controversy than a competitor, McIlroy becomes a focus for the Open, and for any major really, especially after his victory in the Canadian Open. Curry is the focus any time the Warriors play, especially since Game 5, when for the first time in his playoff career he did not make a single 3-point basket.
No parallel with McIlroy, although as any golfer he’s had his misses.
It did not take long for an interview with McIlroy, known for his opinions as much as for his success — he has won three of the four majors, other than the Masters — to be asked about the Saudi involvement in golf.
McIlroy stayed loyal to the PGA Tour, which announced those who choose to play the LIV Tour, financed by the Saudis, would be banned by the PGA Tour.
That has no effect on the U.S. Open, organized by the USGA, so people such as Dustin Johnson and Mickelson, who have gone for the Saudi money, whatever the human rights record, are able to compete in the Open.
“I don’t want to rub your nose in it,” a journalist told McIlroy, “but in February you said this thing was dead in water.” Rory responded, “The U.S. Open?” and the room filled with laughter.
When the questioner stammered, “No, no, no,” McIlroy came back with full force. “Oh,” said Rory, “I thought we were at the U.S. Open.”
Where golf is at is anyone’s guess — well, right now it’s in Massachusetts — but the reference is to the game’s future.
“I took a lot of players’ statements at face value,” said McIlroy, about mistaking how many would remain with the PGA. “You had people committed to the PGA Tour. People went back on that. That’s where I was wrong.”
The way he plays golf, the way he represents himself, McIlroy rarely is wrong. His confidence is tempered with just enough humility to come across as someone with a sense of fairness as much as a sense of self.
He’s been there, done that and would relish doing it again.
The talk had turned from the people who turned from the PGA Tour to the very real idea of winning. Someone wondered why McIlroy is, if unintentionally, a leader of remaining with the PGA Tour.
“Because in my opinion,” he said, “it’s the right thing to do. The PGA Tour was created by people and tour players who came before people like Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer. They created something and worked for something. And the PGA Tour has certainly given me a lot of opportunities.”
And like the other sporting star in town now, Steph Curry, Rory McIlroy has taken advantage.