Rory McIlroy gets putter back on track after post-round work with Brad Faxon

ORLANDO, Fla. – With shirt untucked, and cap cocked precariously atop his head, Rory McIlroy looked exasperated after a difficult day on the greens at the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by Mastercard. He’d just shot 73 after teeing off in one of Thursday’s final groups, but instead of heading home as dusk fell on Bay Hill, he went to work.

McIlroy and Brad Faxon, the eight-time TOUR winner who’s now an NBC Sports analyst and occasional putting instructor, spent approximately an hour on the putting green at Arnold Palmer's Bay Hill Club & Lodge working on McIlroy’s stroke.

The work paid off. After losing more than three strokes on the greens Thursday, McIlroy gained the same amount a day later. He shot 70 in the second round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by Mastercard as he seeks to end a streak of three consecutive finishes outside the top 20. McIlroy’s results in his trio of PGA TOUR starts in 2024 stand in stark contrast to how he started the year, finishing first and second in a pair of DP World Tour events in Dubai.

In spite of a few short misses in his 2024 debut, McIlroy said he felt good about his putting as he left the Middle East. The poa annua greens of California can quickly erode anyone’s confidence, however, and McIlroy said that was the case for him after starting his TOUR campaign at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.

“Putting on that poa can, once you lose a touch of confidence, then you can start to … not feel great with the putter,” McIlroy said. “It felt much better today. … Ball-striking-wise, I feel really good. Thankfully that’s no issue. It’s just about making a few more putts.”

McIlroy leads the field in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee this week, and sits atop that metric for this year, as well. He also is first in Proximity to the Hole this week.

McIlroy missed two putts from 3-5 feet on Thursday and made just one of the 10 putts he faced from between 10-20 feet. He was 0 for 7 from 10-15 feet, as well. On Friday, he didn’t miss from inside 10 feet and made two of the three putts he faced from 10-15 feet.

What did he and Faxon work on? His speed and alignment, as well as the transition of his putting stroke.

“Just trying to be a little more assertive with my speeds,” McIlroy said. He also brought out his blade putter to ensure that he was starting his putts online. His mallet putter is so forgiving that it can mask mishits or improper strokes.

“Sometimes with the mallet, because it is so much easier to start it online, you get a little lazy,” he said. “So, I brought the blade out last night just to hit a few putts to sort of get a feel of what I need to do to get the ball to the start online with a real putter.

“Sometimes I can let the putter rise up a little bit too much on the way through,” he continued, “and then I can catch the ball sort of more on the equator, rather than like more of a level. Like, when I strike a good putt, it almost feels like the ball comes out of the top of the face instead of the middle of the face. So, yeah, focused a little bit on strike, a little bit on just that sort of transition.”

Friday was a step in the right direction.