Kyle Terada-Imagn Images
An inordinate number of golf fans were offended on Bryson DeChambeau’s behalf after he revealed Rory McIlroy declined to talk to him when they were paired up for the final round of The Masters. The coach of the man who finally won his first green jacket confirmed that account, but he denied there was any disrespect intended while addressing the overblown drama.
It seemed like there was a pretty good chance the final round of The Masters was going to be a battle between Rory McIlroy and Bryson DeChambeau, who hit the course as the last pairing after respectively heading into the final round at the top of the leaderboard at -12 and -10.
That did not turn out to be the case, as DeChambeua dropped three strokes during his round en route to finishing in a tie for fifth place and was out of contention by the time McIlroy fell victim to the collapse that forced him to face off against Justin Rose in a playoff before finally conquering Augusta National to complete the career grand slam.
DeChambeau (who is still in search of his first win at The Masters ahead of what will be his tenth outing at Augusta National next year) was understandably frustrated after his round.
He noted McIlroy refused to talk to him while recapping what transpired, and some people interpreted that as a thinly-veiled complaint from a man who seemed to take offense if you read between the lines (the two men don’t really have any history as far as bad blood is concerned, although Rory was one of the most vocal LIV Golf critics before he opted to back off).
Others were quick to point out that McIlroy seemed to be fairly cordial with Bryson before they teed off (they also both shook hands at the end of the round), and it was hard to imagine DeChambeau was truly offended by a strategy Tiger Woods has famously adopted on plenty of occasions in order to stay locked in.
According to the BBC, Bob Rotella, a sports psychologist who works with McIlroy, acknowledged the Northern Irishman did not go out of his way to interact with Bryson but noted any golfer who ended up playing with him would have gotten the same reception, saying:
“That didn’t have anything to do with Bryson,” Rotella told the BBC. “That was just the game plan all week, and we wanted to get lost in it.
We didn’t want to pay attention to what anyone else was scoring or shooting or swinging or how far they were hitting it. We just wanted Rory to play his game.”
Here’s to hoping that puts the matter to rest.