Rahimi, Harris & Grote Show - Andy Johnson reflects on Rory McIlroy going back-to-back at the Masters

Episode Date: April 13, 2026

Leila Rahimi and Marshall Harris were joined by Shotgun Start podcast host and Fried Egg Golf founder Andy Johnson to discuss Rory McIlroy winning the Masters for the second straight year.

Rahimi Harris and Grody. We are family here. Midday's 10 to 2 on 104 3, the score. And here we go. His year again. Rory is a rare repeat winner at Acosta. I just can't believe. I waited 17 years to get one green jacket,

and I get two in a row. It's just sort of the way. I don't know. I think all of my perseverance at this golf tournament over the years. has really started to pay off. It was a tough weekend. I did the bulk of my work on Thursday and Friday, but just so, so happy to hang in there and get the job done. And Rory really did hang in there. He became a back-to-back winner at Augusta. And after an incredible final round of action, we go to our hotline. That is where we find

Andy Johnson. He is Andy T-F-E on 20. He is the founder of Friday Egg Golf and co-host of the Shotgun Start podcast. Thanks for joining us, Andy. Hey, Leila. Thanks for having me on. Longtime fan of the score I used to fall asleep at night to the score as a kid growing up in Chicago. So always a pleasure to come on. Well, hopefully you stay awake, but we are happy to bore you again should you need some Zs.

What did you think of the final round where we were laughing at it on Saturday? day when we were doing our show from Las Vegas, Rory had put together one of the great rounds for the ages in the lead after 36, burning his six of his last seven holes on Friday, only for that lead to be just enough to outlast a threat from Scotty Schaeffler. It was an amazing weekend. You know, after Friday, you thought it might be one of those snooze runaway winners where you don't get a lot of action on the weekend. But Rory didn't really have his A game all week. He was driving. driving it pretty wild.

Usually, you know, kind of the, his superpower is his driver. And it was off all week. You know, it got a little bit better on Sunday. But then it ended up in that kind of classic master's mold where you're coming down the back nine. It seems like there's, you know, three, four players. Any one of them, if they go out and just grab it, they can take the win. And I think Rory put a few key shots, you know, namely the iron on 12,

of a hole that often is where everything unwinded. He had just a great approach shot there and kind of took it while everybody else couldn't really make a run. And I'm curious, when you saw Rory's ability to stay at the top of that leaderboard for four straight days, we talked about earlier, just the fourth guy to do that, like how difficult is that mentally do you think on a golfer, even of his caliber? and especially after having broken through last season to get his first green jacket. Yeah, it's definitely the unique aspect of golf where, you know, you obviously, it's really,

it's not a reactive sport like everything else. It's kind of like I think the best comparisons are pitching in baseball or, you know, kicking field goals in the NFL where you like really have to think about every shot. and then you span it out over four days where, you know, you get done with the day, whether it's the morning or the afternoon you're playing, and you have to think about it all night and the next morning, and you get, you know, it just kind of weighs on you. And doing that over four days, I think it's super hard. And one of the things with Augusta being just such a demanding golf course where

if you hit great shots, you can really score out there. But the second you're just slightly off, it becomes very, very challenging. And with that aspect, it's really hard to play with a lead out there because you're subconsciously kind of, you kind of take your foot off the gas and you play conservatively. And that's the worst thing you can do at Augustin National. You kind of have to keep your foot on the gas. And it's really hard to do when you have the lead out there. We are talking to Andy Johnson, the founder of Fright Egg Golf, co-host of the Shotgun Start podcast on Rahimi Harrison Grotie.

And Andy, I did want to get into a little bit about what we saw in the third and fourth rounds out of Scotty Schaeffler to be one of the first players to go bogey-free since the 1940s. I believe it was 1942. You know, what do you think of just what he was able to in those last two rounds to challenge? Yeah, after the first two days, he kind of got the bad end of the draw where it was really, really hard on Thursday afternoon. definitely the players that went off in the afternoon on Thursday got the tougher aspect of the draw, but that's kind of part of golf. And you see them, you know, every tournament, there's this air that kind of hangs over the whole event

of when's Scotty going to make his run or who's going to beat Scotty. He's been the best player in the world for now going on three years, undeniably the best player in the world. and he keeps stacking more and more accomplishment. And this week, you know, he brought probably his B game the first two rounds, and he's 12 out of the lead. And then for him to end up one back, it's just astonishing. He's such a great player.

I think he's played the best golf since Tiger Woods the last three years. So, you know, he's just a historic player. And I think Rory adding one, adding a major, he gets to six. Scottie's at four. The next five years of golf, watching these two kind of go back and forth and seeing where each of them end up with their major count is going to be just an amazing thing to watch. Andy Johnson is the founder of Fried Egg Golf and the co-lose of the Shotgun Start podcast joining us here on Rahimi Harrison Grotian.

Andy, just to go back to what you just said. Is this what golf needs at this time is to have this kind of two-man game where you've got team Scotty Sheffler and you've got team Roy McElroy and now it can elevate the sport itself with two guys who have elevated themselves above the rest Yeah Obviously with Tiger

Tiger was such a force of nature You know Chicago sports fans Don't you know he's basically The Michael Jordan of golf And took golf to places It had never been and You know in his I would say Post playing career

At this point He you know golf has always been looking for the next big thing. And, you know, Scottie's personality is never going to, you know, jump off the page and win stands over, but his dominance does. And Rory, I think, has been, you know, he's the, now, I would say, undeniably the greatest European golfer ever. And it seems like we're in this kind of second run of his career where he's

starting to stack majors again. He won his first four majors really early in his career. and then went through an 11-year drought. And now he's got two in the last five majors, and seemingly is the best version of himself as he's ever been, and Scottie's as good as we've seen since Tiger. So it really sets up for great storylines. There's a lot of other, you know, really good players,

but these two have separated themselves out at the top. I think the one thing we haven't really seen from them, We've seen some great duels between Bryson and Rory in recent years. The one thing we haven't seen is that classic Scotty Rory duel at a major. And obviously, when we look back on this one 10 years from now, you're going to see, oh, Scotty finished one back. But it never really felt like Scotty was going to win the golf tournament. And if we get one of those kind of classic duels between these two,

I think it would really kind of set the sport off onto, you know, a whole new trajectory. But, you know, in recent years with obviously Steph Curry's been a golfer forever, but with like LeBron getting into golf, golf is caught kind of more of the public attention than it ever had. Scotty Schaeffler came so close on that long putty he had where he could have forced a playoff if it had just been an inch to the right. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, he made a great run. I'm not discounting it, but I think, you know, from the sense of where he, you know, he never made Rory earlier in the round feel him and put that pressure on.

I think, you know, where he probably would go back and feel like he missed some opportunities. You know, Friday, he played a really soft getable golf course. He shot over par. And, you know, he was in it, but he never made that kind of run that put him out. in front and made people think about it. You know, Rory was coming down the stretch with the two-shoe. Uh-oh. Did we lose Andy?

He broke up and his signal just gave out there. The Gremlins. Andy, you're back? Yeah, there you are. Thanks. Yeah, we lost you for a second. Yeah, yeah. I was just saying, yeah, Scotty just, I feel like he just, you know, in the middle of the round, he went about 10 holes without a birdie

and not making those at the birdies on on 13 really felt like kind of the dagger and his chances to win. Okay, so where do we go from here? I mean, golf schedule is kind of unfolding now after the Masters. We all look forward to this big event, but there's so much more to look at going forward. Where do we go from here with this group of golfers who've kind of declared themselves and made themselves known here with a weekend in Augusta? Yeah, I think, you know, obviously we're only about four weeks away from the next major

championship is the PGA championship aeronimic. I think it's going to be kind of Rory Fever. And obviously, Scotty's going to be storyline 1B, but it's going to be, you know, last year, Rory won the Masters, and then he went into kind of a lowly. He didn't play great golf and the rest of the year. And I think he talked about it a little bit in his press conference. He said, you know, he kind of thought that the career Grand Slam was the destination. And now he knows that he's got much more.

in, you know, ahead of them. And so I think, I think Rory's going to obviously be a huge storyline and that Rory, Scotty, you know, battle with majors, you know, Rory at 6, Scotty at 4, also Brooks Kepka is back on the PGA tour and really committed to playing golf. He's got five career major championships. And then you also have the emergence of a young player, Cameron Young, who played with Rory in the final group.

He won the players earlier this year and has really kind of elevated to his game to where, you know, he's probably the third best player in the world right now. And Andy, I know we asked about what's next, but I do want to spend a little time laughing about Sergio Garcia throwing an absolute temper tantrum. You know, what did you think of Sergio getting a coat of conduct warning? I mean, it's been an incredible career of temper tantrums from Sergio. You know, he's 45 at this point. and, you know, he hasn't grown up.

He's been throwing this name temper tantrums as he was 20 years old. Famously, you know, right before he went to the live tour, he was upset with a ruling on the PGA tour. And he was, you know, these people travel week to week together. And he was saying to the rules officials, oh, I can't wait to be out of here. I can't wait to never see you again. And then obviously this week, this week he smashes his driver on the second hole.

He wasn't even in contention. You know, he was so far out of the tournament. He smashes his driver on the second hole. He has to play with a three with the rest of the day. I found it. I was laughing. I was out there, and I saw, you know, the ninth hole has this big hill, and everybody smashes driver down.

It gets you to the slap part. And Sergio there is, you know, 25 yards behind his playing partner, John Rom. And he's on the downslope of the hill, and I was just laughing to myself. I'm like, I bet he wishes he had his driver. So, you know, Sergio, Sergio, you always say the kids never grow up. Well, Sergio's never matured. And he remains one of kind of golf's most misbehaved golfers.

It's kind of comical at this point. Well, he was pretty petulant afterward, too, when he was available for the post game, whatever you want to call that. And then he's post, post getting the code of conduct. Well, and then he's like, I use my three, what, it was fine? Was it? Like, he didn't sound conciliatory at all. My favorite was when people were asking him about, like, what did the official stay at you?

And he was like, I'm not going to tell you. I'm not going to tell you that. I mean, he's acted this way for his entire career. It is truly amazing that, like, through marriage, through fatherhood, he has not matured at all. He's, you know, a 45-year-old man that still acts like a, you know, a 13-year-old at a junior golf tournament. I'd say I find my fair share of those out in the wild. Andy, thank you so much for coming on with us. Thanks, guys.

Huge fan. And talk to you soon. Thank you, Andy. That was Andy Johnson. He is the founder of Fried Egg Golf. And he is the co-host of the Shotgun Star podcast talking masters with us. I don't think I realize that Sergio Garcia was 45 years old, by the way. That tells you right there, right?

Well, unfortunately for me, I'm laughing because I'm like, how can a former champion behave like this? And then that's when you realize it was 2017. And 2017 was not three years ago. This is in 2020. It was nine years ago. It's been some time. Yeah, just antics.

That's all that was out of Sergio. Coming up next year on Rahimi Harris and Grotie, a lot has happened for the Chicago sky since the Angel Reese trade. We have a lot to discuss. The WNBA draft is 10. tonight and they've put together some really compelling moves. So we will figure out who this team is next.