BMW CHAMPIONSHIP

August 19, 2022

Rory McIlroy

Wilmington Country Club

Quick Quotes

Q. A nice finish to the round there. Overall how would you characterize it?

RORY McILROY: Yeah, it's funny, I probably didn't play quite as well today as I did yesterday but ended up shooting the same score. I'm probably coming off the golf course a lot happier than I was last night after dropping a few those last few holes and today picking a couple up.

Yeah, really happy with how I played today. I bounced back well. I made an early bogey, was able to bounce back after that, made a bogey on the par-5 14th, bounced back with two nice birdies the last four holes.

Yeah, good. It's getting tricky. It's getting firm. It's only going to continue to get that way over the weekend, so it's nice to be in position.

Q. What was it like to get your revenge on 15?

RORY McILROY: It was nice. I had a much better yardage today. Yesterday it was like 5-iron, but I need to take some off it and cut it, and today it was just a step up there and make a good swing with a 6-iron, and if I strike it well, there's no chance of it coming up short, but at the same time, it wasn't really going to go long, either. It was just a really nice yardage.

Yeah, most improved on that hole. Yeah, and hopefully I can -- I said to Harry walking off the green, if I can make two more 2s on that hole, we'll play it even par for the week.

Q. How gratifying was the crowd reaction on 18 with the chip-in?

RORY McILROY: Yeah, the crowds have been great all week. This is obviously a big golf tournament coming to Delaware. I'm not sure the last time that happened or if it's happened in a long time. So it's great to see the crowds out here and so excited to watch us play. I feel very fortunate I get pretty good support everywhere we go, but seems like there's a lot of Irish people in the Philadelphia area, so probably a few extra cheers.

Q. When you talk about the course getting firmer, what will that do to make the course a little trickier in your opinion?

RORY McILROY: I probably need to throttle back a little bit with the driver, maybe hit a few more fairway woods. Yeah, even just I hit it in the first cut on 18 there and just had a lob wedge in my hand and just had no control. You've just got to put the ball in the fairway off the tee to control it going into these greens and how firm they're getting and they're sort of up on little ledges and plateaus.

Playing this golf course Saturday, Sunday, last week, it was playing long. It was still sort of soft. It's changed a lot over the last few days. Strategy and game plan, just have to adapt a little bit.

Q. There just was news today that Jason Gore is returning to the TOUR as senior VP of player relations. Can you talk about that move and how he helped obviously with the USGA over the last few years?

RORY McILROY: I think about how contentious the relationship was between the players and the USGA, so much so that in 2013 there was massive talk of a player boycott at Merion, right. So for it to -- it's done a complete 180. It's probably, I would say, if you polled players, I would say it's probably one of the top two majors now in terms of how the players are treated and the feedback that they can give and Jason has been a massive part to do with that. And the team that sort of worked with Jason, too.

But I think having a sort of player advocate nearly, someone that knows what it's like, has been in your position, and he did a great job. As I said, the relationship between the players and the USGA is so much better than it used to be. I think Jason coming back into the fold, especially with everything that's happening in the world of golf right now, I think it's a really -- I'm surprised the USGA let him go because he is so good, but it's a great addition to the TOUR.

Q. Did the PGA TOUR need someone like him who's got that experience of playing between the ropes to be more involved in TOUR decisions?

RORY McILROY: I think so. We're not looking for former players to run this. The players are players and management are management and they're executives and they're trained to run businesses and run -- that's not what we do.

But I think just maybe that missing link where Jason can take ideas from players and maybe articulate them better to Jay and his executive team and the board and everything else. Again, he's a player advocate. He wants to do everything as well as possible to make the players as happy as possible, and it's a good addition.

Q. Which do you think is easier, for a businessman to come in and learn what it's like to be a player or a player to learn what it's like to run the business?

RORY McILROY: I would say it's probably more difficult for a player to come in and try to figure out how to run -- especially a business as complicated as the PGA TOUR that's a 501(c)6, but all the tournaments are 501(c)3s, and then all the different -- yeah, look, I've only been on the board for a year, but I mean, all the executive team came to my house and spent four or five hours with me just sort of bringing me through the entire TOUR business and sort of trying to help me understand how everything works. So it's been a massive education for me this year, and I'm still trying to get my head around all of it.