GOLF: MEDIA REACTION NBC SPORTS' website probably stole the award for headline of the day – "Rory, Rory Hallelujah: McIlroy Wins US Open" – but it was, perhaps, ESPN's JA Adande who spoke for amateur players the world over, with notions about their potential, when he tweeted: "Haven't decided if Rory makes me want to work harder at golf . . . or quit entirely."
Inevitably, though, the bulk of the US media fixated on the question of whether or not McIlroy could now be declared Tiger Woods' "Eire apparent", as the New York Post's headline put it.
"Move over Tiger," they said, which didn't half peeve the paper's golf columnist Mark Cannizzaro. (He wouldn't have liked the back page of the New York Daily Newsmuch either: "Tiger Who?" it read, over a photo of a celebrating McIlroy).
“Young Irishman still not near Tiger’s world,” was the headline on Cannizzaro’s piece, in which he argued that “to suggest at this early stage of McIlroy’s career that he’s on his way to overtaking what Woods has done in the game is preposterous”.
While lauding McIlroy for his performance, the writer reminded anyone who’d listen that Woods was 13 majors ahead of the Irishman, and “is still alive and breathing”. “He will be back and he’ll win again. He’ll win more majors,” he vowed.
(“Whether or not the chap on Twitter was supporting or disputing Cannizzaro’s view depends on which snack you think is tastier: “Saying Rory will be better than Tiger is like saying that Tesco’s Cheese Puffs are better than Wotsits.”)
ESPN anchor Cassidy Hubbarth echoed what might just have been the consensus view on this media match-up: “Rory is great for golf . . . but comparisons to Tiger are just a sign of the times. Great sports moments aren’t given time to breathe anymore.”
While it would be hard to top Brandt Snedeker’s admission that “Rory has more talent in his pinky than I have in my whole body”, Paul Azinger, working for ESPN, produced one of the lines of the weekend when he described McIlroy’s shots as “landing like a butterfly with silver feet”.
NBC’s Johnny Miller, though, had trouble finding any words at all for what he was witnessing, running his eye over McIlroy’s swing and conceding, “man, that’s just too good to talk about.”
And after that rather sublime shot to the 10th in the final round, one Azinger said had given him “goose bumps”, anchor Dan Hicks concluded that “you are seeing a potential super, super, super, superstar in the making”.
Back in the print world, USA Todayseemed to reckon themselves that McIlroy was a bit on the super, super, super side. "Already a popular lad the world over, his star exploded 10 miles north of the nation's capital", they wrote. "Fitting right in with the White House, Supreme Court, US Capitol and the Pentagon, McIlroy became an iconic symbol of power on the grounds of the golf club named in honor of the US Congress".
The Washington Post, meanwhile, was taken by McIlroy's "authenticity . . . both in his golf swing and in his face". "From his understated gestures to his cocky-modest smile, from his twirl of the club as a perfect shot hangs in mid-flight to the image Sunday evening of his huge hug with his father beside the 18th green at Congressional Country Club, he makes us think, 'There's the real thing'."
Chicago's Daily Heraldwas impressed too, sufficiently so to put a photo the 22-year-old on its front page, under the heading "Flawless".
Alas, they declared the winner of the US Open to be one “John McIlroy”.
