‘Absolute genius’ Harmon will have told McIlroy no one will beat him at Masters
Rory McIlroy ex-agent Chubby Chandler thinks Butch Harmon will have got him ready to complete the career grand slam at The Masters.
Rory McIlroy's former agent Chubby Chandler believes the Northern Irishman's decision to pay a quick visit to 'absolute genius' Butch Harmon will see him 'make a big run' at The Masters.
Chandler, who has worked with the likes of McIlroy, Lee Westwood and Darren Clarke through the years, considers Tiger Woods' former long-time coach Harmon as the best in the business at getting players to believe in themselves before a tournament.
McIlroy jetted off to see Harmon for a couple of days last week, something he does 'every few years' when he needs a second opinion.
The World No.2 has been struggling with his iron play of late, hitting a number of short iron shots to the left of his target.
Chandler not only thinks McIlroy will win his first Valero Texas Open title on the PGA Tour this week, but he also thinks he will go very close to finally completing the career grand slam at The Masters next week.
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The golf agent believes McIlroy will go back to his 'nice big loopy draw' and Harmon will tell him everything is rosey in the garden.
Chandler told BoyleSports:
"I think he’ll win this week (Texas Open) as the Butch effect will kick in this week.
"What does Butch do? Butch caresses their ego, takes them back to where they were, tells them how good they are, pats them on the a*se and sends them out and says ‘nobody is going to beat you next week’.
"Lee (Westwood) and Darren (Clarke) both had a lot of Butch. Lee was always together mentally than Darren. Whoever was coaching Darren, he could hit 20 nine-and-a-half out of 10 shots, and then he’d hit a s*** one, and the s*** one would ruin the day. He’d look up at me and ask why he did that?
"When he was doing that with Butch, he hit the 20 top shots and then hit the seven out of ten shot, is about to lose it and then Butch starts telling him a story about when he did this or that. Five minutes later Darren has forgotten about the bad shot, we’ve all had a chuckle and it carries on. Butch is an absolute genius at that, genius.
"This is just me knowing Rory a bit, knowing Butch a bit and knowing golf a bit. I would think you will see Rory going back to drawing the ball, giving the nice big loopy draw. It will be a nice big, free swing and it will all be like it was 10 years ago. That’s what Butch is very good at. That’s what he did with Rickie Fowler.
"The only person coach wise who would make a visible difference to a swing was David Leadbetter. If somebody goes to Butch you can’t see the difference. What Butch does is take the naturalness back and then tells you how good you are for three days, then off you go and you feel great. It used to be fantastic seeing him work with people.
"The Masters is everything for Rory, Augusta will make him go back to how he used to play.
"I wouldn’t be surprised if Rory makes a big run at it next week, because his game will go back to how he used to play, he’ll have Butch’s words of encouragement in his mind and he’ll have been told how good he is for three days.
"Even in Rory’s world you need to be told how good you are every now and again.
"The Masters was in the palm of his hand in 2011, suddenly he lost it and then it became the one he hasn’t won. The whole set of circumstances conspired against him and now The Masters is everything to him."
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