Can We Please Wait to Crown Rory McIlroy the Next Golf King?

First off, congrats to Rory McIlroy for lapping the field at Congressional last week to win this year’s U.S. Open.  He played remarkable golf for four days to win by eight shots on a course that played a little easier than expected.  The USGA aims to have the winning score for the four rounds at even par, but this year on a wet course, 22 golfers finished at even par or better.  All that said, McIlroy decimated that course, finishing every round in the 60s.

Congrats to Rory on winning a major, it really is a great accomplishment, something that only a small fraction of professional golfers ever do, but let’s not anoint him as the Next Best Thing quite yet.  Is his future bright?  Absolutely, but let’s not lose site of the fact that this was only the third victory of his career.  Someone on ESPN’s PTI or Around the Horn (I apologize for not remembering who) said that until Rory wins another major he’s merely Todd Hamilton (little known/remembered 2004 British Open Champion).  It’s a great point.  Rory has all the potential in the world, but he’s got a lot of ground to make up if he wants to catch the career win totals of Jack Nicholas or Tiger Woods.  To catch Tiger, Rory needs to win 68 more titles, including 13 more majors, and to catch Jack he needs to win 71 more titles, including 17 more majors.  Daunting?  Yes.  Impossible?  Can’t say impossible, but improbable?  Absolutely.  Nicholas holds the distinction as owning the most major titles, but it’s the legendary Sam Snead with 82 total PGA Tour wins that everybody’s chasing.

We live in an instantaneous society, where everybody wants immediately to crown the Next Best Thing, but Rory’s one major win isn’t causing Jack, Tiger, Phil or any of the two plus time major winners to lose any sleep.  Let’s see how Rory does at the majors over the next two years.  I say two years because it took Tiger from the Masters in 1997 until the PGA in 1999 to win his second, but after that, Tiger put on an absolute clinic, winning four of the next five to complete the Tiger Slam (held all four major titles at the same time, but not won in a single calendar year).

Will the success of winning one major cause Rory to settle or will it stoke the fires inside like it did for Tiger?  It’s going to take a bonfire inside Rory for The Sports’ Question Mark to crown him the Next Golf King.  I promise, when he wins his 19^th major, I’ll be the 355^th to crown him once he’s completed all of his mandatory post round interviews.