Standing on the 18th tee of Pebble Beach Golf Links last February, Rory McIlroy had a decision to make—wow spectators with a risky drive on the fairway adjacent to Carmel Bay or play it safe. He played it conservatively, hitting a 5-iron onto the imposing fairway, laying up and knocking a short pitch shot onto the green for a par and a two-stroke victory. He pocketed $3.6 million for the win over Shane Lowry.
It was McIlroy’s first appearance on the PGA Tour in 2025, his first win at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and a momentous start to a much-heralded and bumpy year as he navigated obstacles on and off the course. He went on to win the Players Championship in a three-way playoff at TPC Sawgrass in March and his first Masters at Augusta National in April, thus completing the career Grand Slam (Masters, U.S. Open, British Open and PGA Championship). The crowning achievement for the 36 year old was leading the European Ryder Cup team with 3.5 points to a 15-13 victory over the USA team at Bethpage Black in New York in September. But he also was embroiled in a divorce filing and reconciliation with his wife and the ongoing rift between the PGA Tour and the Saudi Arabian-backed LIV Tour.
To say that McIlroy was as calm as his stroll down the fairway at Pebble Beach in February when he tried to tee off at the Ryder Cup in September is a paradox. How else does one describe the chants of “[obscenity] you, Rory” by American loyalists in the gallery and his one-finger salute in response?
McIlroy’s final gesture certainly completed a signature year—more than $31 million in winnings worldwide, ranked third on the PGA Tour money list with $18.6 million and a green Masters jacket to wear home, and becoming the second player since Tiger Woods to top $100 million in career winnings. The question is, will McIlroy be on offense at Pebble Beach, what he called one of the “cathedrals of golf,” when he defends his AT&T title February 12-15?
“Here, Augusta, St. Andrews, obviously,” McIlroy said in February. “Maybe a few more you could add in there. And I had a big fat zero on all of those going in here. So, to knock one off of Pebble is very cool.”
That knockoff was a result of shooting 66-65-70-66—267 or 21-under par, heading the elite field pursuing $20 million in prize money. McIlroy sewed up the victory on the 14th hole, a par-5 with a treacherous green. He ripped a fade driver over the corner, followed up with a 7-iron to the green and sank an eagle putt. He didn’t look back, playing conservatively on the last four holes to beat Lowry by two and Justin Rose and Lucas Glover by three.
It was McIlroy’s 27th PGA Tour win, but missing in the field was the world’s top player, Scottie Scheffler, who sat out events in January and February as he recovered from cuts on his hand from a wineglass he broke while making ravioli dough. Some “punn-dits” on the tour joked, “Schef, get a chef.”
McIlroy followed Pebble Beach with a win at the Players, but he still needed a win at Augusta to complete the career Grand Slam. And, a win there would remove the haunting memory of his first Masters 16 years before in 2009, when 19-year-old McIlroy was seeking his first major victory. Heading into the final round, he had a four-stroke lead, but his drive on the 10th hole duck hooked so far left that his ball might have rattled off the door of Butler Cabin where the winner puts on the coveted winner’s green jacket. McIlroy carded a triple bogey on 10, and a double-bogey five on the 12th. He ended up with a horrific 80 and a tie for 20th.
A native of Holywood, Northern Ireland, McIlroy knew well the political suffering his family endured through the 1980s and ’90s. It was Tiger Woods’ 1997 victory at the Masters that inspired him to play golf.
As McIlroy put on the green jacket, he said “It feels incredible. This is my 17th time here, and I started to wonder if it would ever be my time…I’d say it was 14 years in the making, from going out with the four-shot lead in 2011—feeling like I could have got it done there. There was a lot of pent-up emotion that just came out on the 18th green. But a moment like that makes all of the years and close calls worth it.”
The creation of the Saudi Arabian-backed LIV Tour lured such luminaries as Bryson DeChambeau and Brooks Koepka with lucrative bonuses. To keep McIlroy and others in the PGA Tour corral, purses were increased, bonuses issued, and shares of stock in a new PGA Tour Enterprises (backed by American investors) were given. The AT&T in February will again have a $20 million purse and an elite field of 80 players in what is called a “signature event.” The format emphasizes the professionals and has reduced amateur play to two of the four days.
At the 2025 U.S. Open, McIlroy finished tied for 19th, and philosophically opined afterward that he had lost his motivation since winning the Masters. “I climbed my Everest in April, and I think after you do something like that, you’ve got to make your way back down, and you’ve got to look for another mountain to climb.”
McIlroy won 3.5 points in the Ryder Cup, despite losing 1-up in the singles to Scheffler, the world’s number one player who had six PGA Tour victories in 2025.
McIlroy has tempered his strident stance on LIV, now looking forward to reunification. “We don’t look behind us. We don’t look to the past,” he says. “Whatever’s happened has happened and it’s been unfortunate, but reunification, how we all come back together and move forward, that’s the best thing for everyone…”
Perhaps the troubles will be a thing of the past for McIlroy in 2026.