Returning to a scene of his prime, Rory McIlroy reminds us how hard majors are to win

McIlroy’s fellow Northern Irelander, Graeme McDowell, the 2010 U.S. Open champion at Pebble Beach, also qualifies as a reasonable man, but the happenings were so dazzling that he had to reach into the lexicon for that old adjective “Tiger-esque.” He said: “You know, it’s beginning to look a little Tiger-esque, I suppose. I said to the boys at the Open [when McIlroy won that], I didn’t think we were going to see the new Tiger era, as in someone creating their own Tiger-esque era just yet. I guess you could say I’m not eating my words, but I’m certainly starting to chew on them right now. … When the kid is playing well, he’s pretty tough to live with. Pretty special stuff.”