With Tiger Woods sidelined, Rory McIlroy stands as the biggest name in professional golf right now.
That was already true heading into 2025, but McIlroy’s win at The Masters in April only added to his profile.
He also picked up titles at the Pebble Beach Pro-Am, the Players Championship, and the Irish Open, and played a key role in Europe’s Ryder Cup victory this year.
At this point, there’s no doubting his place among golf’s greats, and he’s even being compared to top athletes from other sports.
Gary Williams recently made the case that McIlroy shares similarities with both Patrick Mahomes and LeBron James.
Gary Williams compares Rory McIlroy to Patrick Mahomes and LeBron James
Williams believes McIlroy fits the mould of many global sports icons in that he tends to split opinion among fans, much like how other big names do.
Everything McIlroy says or does seems to get people talking, and there are always those who back him and others who take issue with him.
The same goes for Mahomes in football and LeBron in basketball – they’re always under the spotlight, whether they want it or not.
“I think with Rory, there’s a polarizing component to it,” Williams explained. “If you look at other sports, [Tom] Brady was polarizing. A lot of it was rooted in how much they won.
“And [Patrick] Mahomes, same thing. ‘I’m over this. Enough of him.’ LeBron [James], same thing. I don’t know if Aaron Judge and [Shohei] Ohtani get a lot of negativity.
“But Rory is a lightning rod for things because he’s righteous with his words. And then the Ryder Cup, I think, takes his profile in a broader sports sense into a much wider lane.”
Gabby Herzig also mentioned that the 2025 Ryder Cup at Bethpage Black, where McIlroy faced heavy scrutiny from the crowd, only raised his profile further.
A lot of people enjoyed seeing how he reacted to the American fans who tried to throw him off his game but others felt like it showed poor form on his part.
“Absolutely,” Herzig said when asked if this contributed to McIlroy’s growing fame “Especially the way that he reacted to a lot of the Ryder Cup drama around the crowd.”
“He wasn’t shy about responding to the criticism that he was getting out there or the heckling. And some people love it, some people don’t.”
Gabby Herzig explains why Rory McIlroy is more relatable than Scottie Scheffler
In 2025, the conversation about golf’s biggest names still centres around Rory McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler. While Scheffler has had more success lately, McIlroy continues to attract more attention.
Herzig thinks one reason for that is how much more relatable McIlroy seems compared to most top athletes.
He doesn’t always play it safe with his words or actions, and while he does make mistakes, fans seem to connect with that honesty.
“I look at Rory as more of a global superstar than Scottie Scheffler. And also, Rory has just been around for much longer in the golf ecosystem,” Herzig continued.
“I know this is very anecdotal evidence, but there was a trend going around on the internet a few weeks ago where golfers or people following the golf community asked their significant other or their friends who don’t necessarily know golf to name 30 golfers and see who they could come up with.
“I’m not sure if you saw this going around, but anecdotally, I think Rory was at the top of a lot of those lists, and Scottie Scheffler came a little bit downwards. That’s kind of how you see which names are seeping into the general news feeds of your friends and family who don’t necessarily play golf. So I actually thought that was a really fascinating exercise.
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“Scottie Scheffler is winning all the time. He’s the most dominant player in golf right now, but Rory has that human element to him where he really wears his heart on his sleeve. He describes himself as an impulsive person, and I think a lot more people can relate to that in terms of their two personalities as well.”
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