The year 2025 will be remembered in the golfing world as the year Rory McIlroy finally achieved the Grand Slam after 10 years of trying. The Northern Irishman won the Masters, the major he was missing, in a playoff against his great friend Justin Rose and became only the sixth player in history to complete the circle of great tournaments.
During his appearance on the ‘Stick to Football’ podcast, he had time to extend an olive branch to LIV Golf players and to denounce Keegan Bradley’s passivity with the American public at the Ryder Cup, but also to tell some of the inside story about the obligations of a Masters champion.
About the green jacket, he confessed: “You have to sign a legal document to take it out of the club”. We already knew that the Masters champion can wear the iconic garment outside Augusta National for a year, but always with the club’s authorization; Rory adds that the ‘conditions’ must be signed. In fact, Jon Rahm was unable to wear the green jacket at San Mames when he took the honorary kick-off in December 2023 by Augusta’s decision, although here perhaps his signing for LIV had something to do with it.
Rory said he wore the jacket during his tour of India and Australia, and of course his native Northern Ireland; he also wore it on Halloween, he added. However, there are strict rules to follow. You have to wear a certain shirt, club tie and trousers; anything goes. The jacket can only be worn with dress shoes, in this case it is forbidden to wear sneakers. “You can’t just put it on and go out for a drink,” McIlroy explained, although there is no control over private acts.
All of this probably doesn’t matter to McIlroy and most winners, as it is part of the club’s codes. “That’s what makes it such a wonderful place. It’s like they know who they are and they stay true to their style,” argued the reigning champion. This year, Zach Johnson revealed in Golfweek that perhaps he was to blame for everything being well signed before starting to use the green jacket the year of champion. “I wore it in public with jeans; to protect it I used a garbage bag,” he confessed.
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