In the final act of one of the most tumultuous seasons in PGA Tour history, commissioner Jay Monahan met his greatest ally Rory McIlroy and handed him the most lucrative prize in world golf.
Both were beaming smiles and shared a brief word on East Lake’s 18th green. The fact that the weekend couldn’t have gone any better for either of them clearly not lost on the pair.
For winning the FedEx Cup for a third time on Monday, McIlroy pockets $A26.1 million, yet his victory feels like the PGA Tour’s, too.
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McIlroy has been the PGA Tour’s general in its war with LIV Golf, and he just edged out the world’s best player, Scottie Scheffler, to win the organisation’s biggest event of the year, the Tour Championship.
For a Tour that has taken many blows this year, and will need to absorb many more in the weeks and months ahead, it was a thrilling showdown to savour.
Many PGA Tour loyalists will feel like there is no more fitting winner than McIlroy who has become tied to the circuit tighter than ever since the emergence of its Saudi-backed rival.
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McIlroy has campaigned so tirelessly, and aggressively, for the PGA Tour in 2022 as colleagues were lured away by the promise of massive sign-on fees, and big tournament purses.
Much of that battle has been done through words, but it’s also been McIlroy’s mission to prove to the world’s best golfers on the course that the best place in the world to play is still on the PGA Tour.
As such, it’s no surprise to see McIlroy back to his best this year, consistently playing scintillating golf at the biggest events.
Whether or not that renewed motivation will deliver McIlroy a long-awaited fifth major feels like both the most important matter here and the most trivial.
The fact is that it’s hard to ignore what McIlroy’s form could mean at the most important four weekends of the year.
Ever since he burst on the scene in America as a curly-haired youngster has McIlroy’s narrative been heavily tied-up in the majors.
Having joined the tour in 2010, he won the US Open in 2011, the PGA Championship in 2012, while he won the latter again in 2014 along with the Open Championship.
At just 25, McIlroy became the third-youngest man to win three of the four majors, with only the game’s greatest-ever players, Tiger Woods and Jack Nicklaus, doing so at a younger age.
Curiously, McIlroy hasn’t won a major since.
That in itself is not unusual — many of McIlroy’s multiple major-winning contemporaries, like Dustin Johnson, Jordan Spieth, Bubba Watson and Brooks Koepka, have all come off the boil at some point.
What’s unusual about McIlroy’s eight-year major drought, providing a seemingly endless golf mystery, is that it has happened despite him remaining one of the world’s best players.
He’s spent 106 weeks as the world’s No.1 golfer, and won the FedEx Cup in 2016, 2019 and 2022.
There has also been a number of near-misses at the majors, including at this year’s Open Championship when Cameron Smith’s unbelievable eight-under final round snatched the Claret Jug from under his nose.
But the obsession of McIlroy’s pursuit for a fifth major, and possible grand slam, is somehow ever so slightly fading in significance.
This year, McIlroy has varied between coming close, and coming agonisingly close, to winning another major.
He came second at the Masters, T5 at the US Open and eighth at the PGA Championship. At St Andrews, he held a four-shot lead during the final round but his putter went cold as Smith stormed home.
The latter was arguably the cruellest blow McIlroy has ever suffered at a major, with the possible exception of choking at the 2011 Masters with a four-shot lead.
And yet, an aura of positivity still surrounds the Northern Irishman, who has a fire raging in the belly thanks to the threat LIV Golf.
That much has been clear painfully clear after his two wins this year.
After winning the Canadian Open, among McIlroy’s first comments was a swipe at LIV Golf chief Greg Norman.
“21st PGA Tour win — one more than someone else. That gave me a little bit of extra incentive today…” McIlroy said, referencing Norman’s wins record.
After winning the Tour Championship on Monday, McIlroy said that his victory meant far more than just a third FedEx Cup crown, and a massive payday.
“It means an awful lot. I believe in the game of golf, I believe in this tour in particular, I believe in the players on this Tour,” McIlroy said.
“It’s the greatest place to play golf in the world, bar none. And I’ve played all over the world.
“And this is an incredibly proud moment for me, but it should also be an incredibly proud moment for the PGA Tour.
“They’ve had some hard times this year, but we’re getting through it and that was a spectacle out there today: Two of the best players in the world going head-to-head for the biggest prize on the PGA Tour … I hope everyone at home enjoyed that.”
He later doubled down in his stance against LIV Golf, providing further insight into what has made him click in 2022.
“If you believe in something I think you have to speak up, and I believe very strongly about this. I really do,” McIlroy said.
“I hate what it’s doing to the game of golf. I hate it. I really do. Like it’s going to be hard for me to stomach going to Wentworth in a couple of weeks’ time (for the BMW Championship) and seeing 18 of them (LIV Golf players) there. That just doesn’t sit right with me.
“I believe what I’m saying are the right things, and I think when you believe that what you’re saying is the right things, you’re happy to stick your neck out on the line.”
McIlroy is playing for far more than himself.
The irony is that it’s doing wonders for his game, and future.
Winning the Tour Championship brought McIlroy’s season earnings for 2021-22 to $A38,868,355.
Next year will bring him the opportunity to win even more as the PGA Tour makes a series of changes aimed at beating LIV Golf at its own game.
There will be increased purses at eight invitational tournaments and a series of big-money, global events for the top 50. 2024 will then introduce a tech-heavy, stadium-based league for the PGA Tour’s best players.
The latter is the brainchild of both McIlroy and Tiger Woods.
These are all measures that were unthinkable even one year ago, but the PGA Tour has seemingly learnt — albeit very late in the piece — that to stand still is to move backwards.
And still, nothing means more to world golf than the four majors. Even the LIV Golf schedule tiptoes around them.
But they no longer mean absolutely everything.
As such, McIlroy’s career narrative is no longer just about the majors, but about his involvement in the war between golfing powers.
McIlroy has repeatedly insisted that nothing beats the PGA Tour. And although that might not be the case for every player on Tour, on Monday, McIlroy showed why it arguably still is for the world’s best players.
That message could ultimately prove to be more memorable than any of those major wins from a different era.
