Rory McIlroy at Arnold Palmer Invitational 2015: Daily Leaderboard Score Updates
Rory McIlroy needs something good to happen soon as he makes his final tuneup before The Masters. The next stop on his journey is at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, one of the biggest and most popular PGA Tour events of the year.
It's no secret that McIlroy has struggled on the PGA Tour this season. He's only played in two events prior to this weekend so far, missing the cut at the Honda Classic and finishing ninth at the World Golf Championships-Cadillac Championship.
There was nothing wrong with the Cadillac Championship showing, but everyone is still waiting to see that one breakout event to get everything rolling for McIlroy.
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Here's a look at the full leaderboard for the Arnold Palmer Invitational, as well as a recap of how McIlroy looked on the course.
Leaderboard
Day 4 Recap
Following a poor finish to Saturday's third round, Rory McIlroy capped off his 2015 Arnold Palmer Invitational in nondescript fashion Sunday as he carded a two-under 70 to finish 11-under for the tournament.
When the world's No. 1 player entered the clubhouse, he was tied for 10th place, which is certainly somewhat disappointing considering how well he played during the first two rounds.
McIlroy's fourth round wasn't unlike his third-round performance in that it started off quite promisingly only to drop off down the stretch. Despite his poor finish Saturday, McIlroy seemed to feel pretty good about his form entering the final round, according to BBC.com.
"I'm frustrated. I'm disappointed with the way I finished but I played well for the most part," McIlroy said.
The 25-year-old star's perceived solid play carried over to the early portion of the fourth round as he birdied the first two par-five holes on the course. After his birdie on the fourth hole, McIlroy also birdied the sixth to move to 11-under for the tournament, per Golfweek:
Things weren't looking good for McIlroy in terms of contending for the championship after entering the day seven strokes off the lead. But he was starting to build momentum, and Golf Channel's Justin Ray pointed out that he has overcome that type of deficit before:
Perhaps that prompted McIlroy to press a bit too much, though, as he went on to bogey the ninth hole, which put a damper on what was an otherwise successful front nine.
One day after a chip-in birdie on the ninth gave McIlroy and his fans hope for a run, a bogey in the fourth round did just the opposite.
In another departure from Saturday's round, McIlroy bogeyed the 12th hole one day after birdying it. That dropped him to even par for the day and nine-under for the tournament. With the likes of Morgan Hoffman, Matt Every and Henrik Stenson continuing to dominate near the top of the leaderboard, Rory's title hopes were essentially over.
He still had a chance to salvage a top-10 finish, though, which could have been viewed as a moral victory considering how up-and-down his weekend performance was.
After three consecutive pars, McIlroy had a golden opportunity to erase the two bogeys from his round, with an eagle putt from about 12 feet away on the par-five 16th hole.
Unfortunately, his attempt went begging, according to ByTheMin Golf on Twitter:
Rory did manage a birdie, however, which moved him back to one-under for the day and 10-under for the tourney.
After a par on 17, McIlroy finished the tournament on a high note by sinking a birdie putt on the par-four 18th hole to finish a respectable two-under on the day.
With The Masters set to commence April 9, the Arnold Palmer Invitational represented one of McIlroy's final chances to truly get ready for Augusta National.
There is no question he showed some positive flashes throughout the tournament that should help him in his pursuit of the green jacket, but he clearly has some fine-tuning to do over the next few weeks as well.
If McIlroy is able to take what he learned at the Arnold Palmer Invitational and apply it to The Masters, though, he certainly has a chance to be successful.
Day 3 Recap
Rory McIlroy's third round at the 2015 Arnold Palmer Invitational got off to an excellent start, but he was unable to maintain that form throughout, as he finished the day with a one-under 71.
McIlroy entered the clubhouse in a tie for 12th place at nine under for the tournament, which put him six shots behind leader Henrik Stenson. McIlroy entered Saturday five shots off the pace, and he didn't do himself any favors with a late-round swoon.
After parring each of the first five holes, McIlroy carded his first birdie of the day on the par-five sixth hole, and things really seemed to snowball for him from there.
The Northern Irish star birdied once again on the ninth hole in spectacular fashion by sinking a chip from just off the green, as seen in this video courtesy of the PGA Tour on Twitter:
McIlroy had a ton of momentum on his side at that point, and he was playing with the utmost confidence. Following a pair of pars to start the back nine, McIlroy registered birdies on the 12th and 13th holes to move into second place, per Golf Central:
That was as close as he would get to the lead, though, as the 25-year-old phenom carded his first two bogeys of the day on the 14th and 15th holes.
His effort on the 14th was especially disconcerting, as he missed what should have been a fairly easy par putt, according to Golfweek:
As pointed out by Justin Ray of Golf Channel, this has become a somewhat common occurrence for the world's No. 1 player:
Just when it seemed as though things couldn't get much worse for McIlroy, his round continued to unravel on the 16th hole. The par five should have represented an opportunity to get a shot back, but instead, he bogeyed with a six to drop to one under on the day.
It was especially surprising since the 16th had played out as the easiest hole on the course through the first two rounds, per Nick Feely of The Villages Daily Sun:
Following such a promising start, it was certainly a disappointing day for McIlroy. Most probably expected him to make a move after a strong second round, and that seemingly included tournament host Arnold Palmer, according to ESPN.com's Bob Harig.
"I'm very happy to have him here," Palmer said. "I think it's nice that he has come. He told me earlier that he was coming, and I think he'll snap things up and make it very interesting and he'll play well. I'm sure he'll play well here."
McIlroy still has an opportunity to finish strong, but winning the title will be an extremely tall order with so many golfers playing well in front of him.
Even though he has been far from his best, he is still in a decent spot on the leaderboard, and a top-10 or even top-five finish is very much within reach.
McIlroy clearly hasn't found his desired form yet, but perhaps he will be able to learn from some of the mistakes he made Saturday.
Day 2 Recap
If Thursday was the stepping stone McIlroy was looking for to get his mojo back, Friday saw the world's top-ranked golfer put all the pieces together. With a lot of low scores available at Bay Hill, he fired a six-under 66 to end the second round at eight-under par.
The only bad part of McIlroy's day is the three players ahead of him on the leaderboard shot between 65-67, so he's still five shots behind Morgan Hoffmann heading into the third round. That's just nitpicking what was an otherwise sensational day.
It was clear McIlroy was in for a good day early when he fired five consecutive birdies on holes two through six. Per Justin Ray of the Golf Channel, that was McIlroy's longest single-round run of birdies in his PGA Tour career:
His only misstep was a bogey on No. 8, but he made up for it with two more birdies on the back nine to complete his best PGA Tour round of the season.
As McIlroy was going on his run of birdies, Jason Sobel of the Golf Channel offered several possible explanations for why it was happening:
My guess would be McIlroy is just really good and finally has his swing working, but maybe the golf gods were so tired of being smiteful after he struggled in the previous two events he'd played.
The interesting part of McIlroy's day, per PGA Tour Media, is it worked in opposition to what he did on Thursday:
In the first round, McIlroy hit 17 of 18 greens in regulation but didn't get the necessary help from his putter to post a low number. If he's got the short game working in sync with the driver and irons, this could be the start of a big run over the next 36 holes.
You could tell McIlroy was gaining confidence in himself after the first round based on what he said. That continued today with these comments to ESPN's Bob Harig after round two:
"It was good," McIlroy said. "I didn't play as well as yesterday tee to green. But the putter is a great equalizer. I played the par-5s better. Maybe I can creep up the leaderboard a little bit the next two days."
In case you need visual evidence of McIlroy's brilliance on Friday, here's a highlight showing how well his up-and-down game was working:
Now that McIlroy has the great round out of his system, it's time to build on it. This means nothing if he falls right back into a pattern of rounds in the 70s for Saturday and Sunday. He's using this event as his final competition preparation for Augusta in three weeks.
McIlroy's eyes are on the big prize, but that only works if he's making strides in the events beforehand. It didn't look like he was going to find success based on results at The Honda Classic or Cadillac Championships. It's starting to seems like his focus is back on point, which is bad news for the rest of the PGA Tour.
Day 1 Recap
One of the worst words that can be used to describe an athlete is "fine." It's just an uninspired word, even though it doesn't mean anything bad. It's also the word that could be used to sum up McIlroy's performance in the first round with a two-under 70.
There was additional pressure on McIlroy, since the event's host believes this weekend is going to be his breakout effort of 2015, per Golf Channel:
The 25-year-old was playing a crisp round for most of the day, hitting two birdies on holes six and eight before a bogey on No. 16 dropped him down to one-under par. He ended on a high note, hitting a birdie on No. 18, finishing in a tie for 34th place at two-under par.
This could be construed as a disappointing round because there were a lot of low scores on Thursday, led by Morgan Hoffman at six-under par, but McIlroy has only had one round under par in PGA events this season. Let's call this progress, in some weird way.
As noted by the PGA Tour, which included a highlight of his birdie on eight, McIlroy was hitting the ball well and where he needed to:
Keeping with the same theme of hitting greens, Justin Ray of the Golf Channel noted McIlroy was looking to do something he had never done and that hadn't been done on this course in 20 years:
For the record, McIlroy didn't make it to a perfect round by going 17 of 18 greens in the first round, but it was still a strong showing.
As Ewan Murray of The Guardian noted, McIlroy's main problem in the first round was what happened when he got on the green by leaving some numbers out there:
When McIlroy is hitting greens, as he did 17 out of 18 times on Thursday, you can sense that his swing is coming together. That's why his showing today could end up being better than it looks right now. This is a step up from shooting over par in five of his first six PGA Tour rounds.
As long as the putting comes around, though Murray acknowledged the course wasn't helping anyone in that regard, the next three rounds will tell if McIlroy is ready to play like he was on the European Tour.
McIlroy said before the tournament, per Irish Examiner, that he does like where his game and swing were headed.
"I am feeling much better with my game than I was walking off Doral 10 days ago," McIlroy said. "I am excited in the direction it’s going and to be here and get one more competitive outing and try to get myself into contention."
Perhaps that's a way to alter expectations for McIlroy. Granted, he's brought all of them on himself by being so great, but there are going to be times for any great athlete where he has to adjust. The only way to do that is playing, even if the results aren't great.
McIlroy's eyes are on Augusta, as nice as winning at Bay Hill in front of Palmer would be, so getting his swing in order as he prepares to train for the main prize over the next three weeks is essential. He's off to a good start with a solid-if-unspectacular first round.
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