‘I wasn’t going to wilt’: Rory McIlroy reveals Masters spat with Bryson DeChambeau in new doc

If you thought you knew everything about Rory McIlroy’s historic final round at the 2025 Masters, think again. In a new documentary, McIlroy made at least one big revelation about that wild day, and it involves his rival Bryson DeChambeau.

McIlroy and DeChmabeau dueled for the green jacket in Sunday’s final pairing last year at Augusta, and both players reported that they didn’t speak at all that day. But now we know that’s not true.

In a clip from “Rory McIlroy: The Masters Wait,” an upcoming Amazon Prime documentary about McIlroy’s Masters triumph, McIlroy revealed that he and DeChambeau got into a tense standoff over who would putt first halfway through the final round, in what McIlroy described as “a really big moment.”

Here’s what you need to know.

McIlroy-DeChambeau get in tense debate on Masters Sunday

When the third round was over at last year’s Masters, McIlroy found himself with a two-shot lead and his best chance in years to capture his first green jacket. But he would have to survive a final-round pairing with his chief rival and, on the leaderboard, the biggest threat to his career Grand Slam dreams: DeChambeau.

The two had gone toe-to-toe on major Sundays before, with Bryson coming out on top in a heated battle at the 2024 U.S. Open.

When McIlroy opened Sunday’s finale with a shocking double bogey, the two superstars were suddenly tied. DeChambeau took the lead briefly with a birdie at 2, before McIlroy settled in with back-to-back birdies at 3 and 4 (Bryson made bogeys at 3 and 4).

As the pair arrived at Augusta’s difficult 9th green, McIlroy’s lead had grown to three. Both players were facing birdie putts from a similar length. So similar, in fact, that they each believed the other player’s ball was closer to the hole.

The stakes could not have been higher. If DeChambeau sank his putt and Rory missed, Bryson would be within two shots of the lead with nine holes to play. If the opposite happened, Bryson would be virtually out of the running.

That’s where the dust-up began, as McIlroy revealed in the clip from his new documentary.

“I thought it very clearly was my putt. I thought his ball was slightly closer than mine,” McIlroy begins in the clip. “We sort of look at each other, and I’m like, ‘Well I think it’s me to go.’ And he’s like, ‘Well I think it’s me to go.’”

McIlroy then explained that both he and DeChambeau saw it as an advantage to putt first in that moment.

“It’s a very gamesmanship-y, match-play thing. Really, both of us want to putt first. Because if you can hole that putt before your opponent, it puts pressure on them,” McIlroy said.

That led DeChambeau to offer up a compromise… they could just flip for it. McIlroy did not take kindly to that suggestion.

“He goes, ‘Well why don’t we just throw a tee up for it to see who goes first?’” McIlroy said. “And I’m like, ‘No.’ This is the final round of the Masters. This isn’t some game on a Tuesday afternoon somewhere. I’m like, ‘No.’”

He continued: “I wasn’t going to wilt in that situation. I was just going to stand firm.”

So Rory suggested they get an official measurement to determine who would putt first, and that’s when DeChambeau finally backed down.

“So I said, ‘There’s a ref… why don’t we get him up to come and measure?’ And he said, ‘No, no. It’s fine. You can go anyway. I don’t care.’ And I just felt like that was a really big moment.”

A big moment indeed. With the debate concluded, McIlroy stepped up and drained his birdie putt to move to one under on the day. DeChambeau followed and missed. And with that, McIlroy had a four-shot advantage heading to the back nine.

“I was proud of myself for holding my ground,” McIlroy concluded.

Of course, the drama wasn’t over. McIlroy kept things interesting with a bogey at 11, a double bogey at 13, a bogey a 14, birdies at 15 and 17 and a final bogey at 18. That forced him into a playoff, but with Justin Rose, not DeChambeau. Bryson made a double and two bogeys of his own on the back to shoot 75 and finish T5.

The new documentary, “Rory McIlroy: The Masters Wait,” debuts March 30 on Amazon Prime. The 2026 Masters begins April 9.