What makes McIlroy tick? Look to his roots

June 10, 2011|John Leicester, AP Sports Writer

FILE - This is a Saturday, Oct. 2, 2010 file photo of Europes Rory McIlroy… (AP Photo/Peter Morrison,…)

“Catch yourself on!’’

That’s the melodious phrase people in Rory McIlroy’s homeland of Northern Ireland direct at those they suspect have let their egos get the better of them. It means “Get real!’’ or “Come back to Earth!’’

That phrase, and the peer pressure it describes of not getting too big for one’s boots, offers a vital clue to how McIlroy has managed to juggle the expectations of possibly being golf’s Next Big Thing without taking on the surliness of Tiger Woods at his worst. The prodigious talent has big ambitions, big hair but, so far, no big head.

When he finally wins his first major — perhaps at next week’s U.S. Open — and his earnings go from merely huge to ridiculously stratospheric, the expectations behind that phrase also explain why those who know McIlroy think they’ll still be bumping into him at normal places like the Dirty Duck Ale House in his hometown of Holywood, perhaps sinking a pint and a plate of sticky toffee pudding while gazing at the choppy waters of Belfast Lough where the Titanic launched a century ago.

From his uncle, friends, his swing coach and former school headmaster, the verdict is unanimous: Even as his fame and wealth rocket skyward faster than a tee-shot, McIlroy hasn’t really changed. Nor will he, they say, in part because he’s always been mature beyond his age but also because the 22-year-old makes a genuine effort to stay as grounded in Northern Ireland’s earthy culture as the rhododendrons that sprinkle pink petals on the fairways where McIlroy’s father introduced him to golf as a baby.

“The worst crime you can probably commit in Northern Ireland circles is to ‘bum’ or ‘blow’ about yourself, as we would say. To be pompous, airs and graces, have an overblown sense of your own importance, to take yourself too seriously … and Rory is steeped in that culture,’’ explains John Stevenson, the recently retired principal of Sullivan Upper School in Holywood where McIlroy was a star pupil.

Which means that if his uncle, Colm, teases McIlroy with a cheeky text message after he’s flopped at a tournament, the young star takes it with the humor with which it is intended, not with a “Don’t you know who I am?’’ sulk.

“He would text back, ‘Well, I’m lying in a five-star hotel. What are you doing?’’’ Colm says, laughing. “He’s changed very little. There’s obviously things you have to change, you know? There’s a lot of those hangers-on now. But, you know, family-wise and friends-wise, you couldn’t have it better.’’

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