OverDrive
Faxon on McIlroy's back-to-back Masters win, his elite skills and Scheffler's performance
13 Apr 2026
Chapter 1: What insights did Brad Faxon share about Rory McIlroy's Masters victory?
Rory was doing his thing post-round and post-championship, and he gave our next guest a big shout-out on that green. Here he is from NBC, the Golf Channel longtime PGA Tour pro. There's Brad Faxon. That must have been cool facts. Rory giving you a shout-out on 18 there.
Very cool. It's been pretty impressive the last couple of years for Rory. Everybody involved, his team. I mean, seeing how long it took him to finally secure a Masters victory. And I thought one of the comments he made, actually... He said he really wanted to make sure people didn't think of this first win as a fluke or he wanted to make sure this was a validating last year's win.
I think he put enormous pressure on himself going into Saturday's round. He had a six-shot lead. That was unprecedented. And he did it, you know, almost kind of smoke and mirrors. Didn't hit a lot of fairways. Hit less than half the fairways the first two days. And chipped and putted miraculously, really. Got himself out of jail.
He was making a ton of birdies, a ton of bogeys, which is kind of an exciting way to watch it. And, you know, when he said that about all of us, all the team, you know, we do a lot of stuff together in and around Rory all year long. And then when he... wins the Masters again, it was just superb.
Fax, where do you think his mindset was after giving up the lead on Saturday? As opposed to just saying to the media, I'm still in the lead, I'm still comfortable, where do you think he actually was? I mean, you probably really know where he was, but just give us some idea.
I don't think he was really comfortable. I think he knew, you know, he was getting away with some of the stuff. One of the statistics, he was playing the four par fives the first two days. He was seven under on the eight par fives without hitting one fairway. That doesn't happen very often there.
His wedge game was taken over when he had missed the greens, putted some beautiful putts there as well. And I don't think he was secure with his swing. You know, it... Golf Channel or on NBC, when we do a broadcast, we have a site we visit called datagolf.com, and they provide us with all kinds of incredible statistics.
And one of the links you can reach to is something called Pressure Tool, and it shows players in the past when they've been leading, how do they play versus the rest of the field. And when you see this, inevitably, players never play as well. And I mean never play as well when they're in the lead. An exception would be Tiger Woods.
And certainly Rory has had more experience than any players in that field leading. And even Rory got affected by that six-shot lead. And, you know, he went out again. And I said it. before last year, sleeping on the lead of a major championship is one of the hardest things to do in sports. You know, we're a four-day event like a cricket match. The test match is a five-day event.
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Chapter 2: How did Rory's mindset change after losing the lead on Saturday?
Now he's going to think, can I win this? You know, the two majors that I haven't won twice. Can I do the career Grand Slam twice? He's motivated by history. And Nick Faldo came out, you know, right as he got out of Butler Cabin and shook his hand, put his arm around his shoulder.
That was very meaningful to Rory to have a guy that he was he was trying to reach, you know, his level and he's done it.
Fax, can you talk about the tee ball on 13? I think it showed a lot about the stones that this guy has and the confidence in his own ability. Three days in a row he put it in the trees and he just stood up there and ripped one 350 down the right side. There were people on social media screaming at him saying, hit your three wood, hit a different club. But he said, you know what?
This is my biggest weapon. I'm going to use it to my advantage. And he pulled it off.
And that's the McElroy mindset. Honestly, you guys, this is... Every time I've played golf with him, and even when he visited Augusta National the three weeks prior to the event, he plays with driver everywhere. It's a tool for him that if he gets this thing going... You know, you can't beat him. And he he looks at ways to hit driver rather than not use it.
And I would go back and say a couple of things. First of all, last year when he had his three shot lead going into 13, he pulled a three without laid up and you saw what happened. He made a double. This year he gets to 11 and he makes an eight footer for a par. I think that was the biggest momentum putt that he made there because if he dropped that shot going to 12, that's dangerous.
So he kept the lead, hit the best iron shot of the week for him, that nine iron that he hit into.
uh to 12 to the to the back right to the sunday hole location which was the closest shot of the day makes that putt which is a left to right breaker the previous shot had been right to left and now he gets up on 13 having kind of pushed three drives in a row too far having to lay up every time and he hits what was the best drive of any of the par fives he hit of the four par fives all four days of the 16 t balls that was the best one because it got him up
It was even though it was in the first cut, it was past the banking part, the sloping part of the fairway where he was on a level like lie. And, you know, he played that conservative second shot, which you have to do trying to use the bank. And that two putt up and down was huge because Cameron Young was right next to him. Rory's was seven or eight feet below the hole with a putt.
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