It’s no secret that Rory McIlroy is a media darling. Along with his robust game, he’s intelligent, more open than most and funny. He’s my favorite professional golfer, although I’m not sure if that’s the sort of thing I’m supposed to admit. Everything is more exciting when Rory’s involved, and win or lose, he’s one of the more interesting personalities in the sport. Maybe that’s why his recent struggles seem to have been spun by secret consensus into a broader, kinder narrative about mundane flaws within his game that are simply one revelation away from resolving, rather than the crueler but perhaps truer narrative: That he’s put himself in contention plenty of times, just like in the glory days of 2014, but that he no longer possesses the steel to close. It’s not the skill that has faltered, perhaps, but the nerve.