Rory a victim of cowardly Monahan and it’s now affecting his golf

Should the CEO of any company be letting one of its employees speak for them?

PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan has had his leadership called into question on several occasions since LIV Golf drove a wedge into the golf ecosystem and this week’s The PLAYERS Championship was a cast iron example of a manager hiding behind somebody else.

Rory McIlroy’s name is synonymous with the game of golf, not just for his ability on the course, but now his authority off the course has both been lauded and criticised in equal measure.

For the best part of twelve months McIlroy has appeared to carry the fight for the PGA Tour towards LIV Golf and despite a few glaring losses to LIV he has stemmed the tide of elite PGA Tour players fleeing to the Saudi backed tour.

But now it’s becoming tiresome.

The PLAYERS Championship is the PGA Tour’s flagship event, ‘the fifth major,’ supposedly the strongest field in golf. It’s the tournament where Jay Monahan can address the world of golf from PGA HQ and assert his leadership.

Glancing at the interview schedule on Monday night, Monahan’s name appeared third on the list behind Jon Rahm and McIlroy.

And then McIlroy morphed into the unofficial PGA Tour Commissioner as Monahan edges back into the bushes and waits for the Holywood native to field questions about the PGA Tour changes, the players meeting, LIV Golf, never mind how he feels about the PLAYERS Championship.

Enter Monahan after a couple of hours to answer questions that have already been asked. Having listened to McIlroy and Rahm, he can’t be caught out, he knows the answers, the headlines have already been made.

Surely at PGA HQ, the flagship event for the tour, the Commissioner should be first up, front and centre?

Since last summer, McIlroy has been the pied piper with Monahan dancing to whatever tune he plays. Monahan has appeared as nothing more than a coward who lacks any sense of authority. It’s as if he’s a hopeless house elf in Harry Potter being beaten and ordered around by Lucius Malfoy.

Monahan’s name is rarely if ever mentioned in any jibes coming from LIV Golf CEO, Greg Norman who in fairness, has fronted up and represented his tour in this feud, like any leader of an organisation should.

For McIlroy this bravado aided him from a brief slump in form as he returned to what could be deemed close to the peak of his powers, if not the full monty.

However, the LIV Golf feud has grown tiresome and it has drained McIlroy who has been visibly more frustrated recently than at any point last season and his missed cut at the PLAYERS proved as much.

Being the superhero is toiling McIlroy who admitted that he feels the external factors (players meetings for example) have had a negative effect on his preparation and performances in tournaments.