Rory McIlroy is very much living in the real world, yet he used an analogy from the fictional television character Ted Lasso – “Be a goldfish” – in explaining how he hoped to move on in learning from his mistakes at last week’s St Jude Championship. He is now aiming to be more competitive at the $20 million BMW Championship at Bellerive Country Club in St Louis, the penultimate tournament of the FedEx Cup playoffs.The world number two finished 66th in Memphis last week, with only two players finishing behind him. He retreated home to Florida to work with his coach Michael Bannon and caddie Harry Diamond ahead of the trip to St Louis and next week’s Tour Championship in Atlanta – which will be his last tournament stateside before returning to the DP World Tour for events in Europe, India and the UAE.What McIlroy will turn up for this tournament? Well, he as much as anyone would like to know, although the wider and softer fairways will likely prove helpful if he has managed to straighten out the driver.Certainly, Scottie Scheffler – the runaway winner in Memphis – has his own level of respect for McIlroy. As Scheffler put it: “Rory’s a guy that when you look at when he won his first tournament to where he is now, he’s a guy that’s just been one of the best players in the world and sustained it for a really, really long time. He works extremely hard. He’s a guy that I always see in the gym, on the practice range, he’s always doing the things that he needs to do in order to play well. “He’s definitely a guy that I look up to in a sense, just because of how long he’s been able to do it for. It’s quite impressive.”McIlroy’s own hope, in part, is that a return to a “big course” like Bellerive will help his cause. “This course gives you a little bit more room than Memphis did last week, so that’s good for me at the minute,” he said.“I’ve historically done pretty well at this tournament. I feel like we go to golf courses where they set up well for me and I feel like that’s the same this week. Obviously I need to improve a little bit from where I was last week to have any sort of a chance.”Scottie Scheffler with Rory McIlroy after their second round of the St Jude Championship in Memphis, Tennessee. Photograph: Stacy Revere/Getty Images And in playing the Ted Lasso goldfish card, McIlroy said: “I need to remember things from Memphis because I need to know what to learn from and what to work on. So, yes, you learn from your failures and then you try to do better the next time. And I feel like over the course of my 18-, 19-year career I’ve been able to do that pretty well.”That experience has taught McIlroy to be wary, too.[ Ireland’s soaring green fees: Some golf courses doubled prices since 2022Opens in new window ]“I think if you come into events and all you’re thinking about is winning, then it’s not [feasible], like there’s a lot more to golf than that, right? It’s not as binary as you win or you lose. I’ve had fifth-place finishes that have felt like wins to me because I haven’t played very well during the week, but I’ve got as much out of my game as I can. “Look, if I somehow am able to put myself in a position to win this week, that would be amazing. But I think just seeing some progress this week from where I was last week would be a win for me. It’s a process, it’s a journey. Obviously you try to build up to those moments where you do put yourself in position to win, but I played 290 PGA Tour [it’s actually more than 340] events, I’ve won 30 of them. So there’s a lot of times where you walk away where you don’t win and you have to take the positives from those as well.”And McIlroy – who will play five of the next six weeks, in a run that will also take in next month’s Irish Open and the BMW PGA Championship in playing both tours – sought to put some perspective on his priorities:“Over the course of a calendar year, I still play more than most of the top guys, because I play on both tours. But it’s just trying to find that balance and then trying to be home enough. It’s Poppy’s first day of school today. I would have loved to have been home for that, but I’m here. Just stuff like that, you know, things I didn’t have 10 years ago that I have these days. I’m in a different spot in my life.”Lowdown – BMW ChampionshipPurse: $20 million (€17.2 million); $3.6 million (€3.1 million) to the winner.Where: St Louis, Missouri, US.The course: Bellerive Country Club – 7,448 yards Par 70 – is a historic Robert Trent Jones snr design which is something of a bombers’ course which will reward the longest hitters. There is a three-hole stretch of holes on the homeward run known as “The Ridge” which showcases the demands on players: the Par-4 14th has an infinity green, the Par-4 15th played as the toughest statistically in the 2018 US PGA and the Par-3 16th is all of 237 yards.The playoffs: This is the second of three tournaments to close out the PGA Tour season. The FedExCup Playoffs feature a progressive cut with the field down to 50 for this week’s tournament, which will be further whittled down to just 30 for next week’s Tour Championship (East Lake Golf Club, Atlanta, Georgia), where the FedExCup champion will be determined. The field: Scheffler is already assured of the $23 million bonus awarded to the player heading the FedEx Cup standings after the BMW Championship, his win in the St Jude Championship strengthening his position at the top to an unassailable one. In fact, there could well be as much interest on those positioned on or around the bubble with only the top 30 progressing on to Atlanta. Rickie Fowler occupies that 30th position, just two points ahead of Gary Woodland. Bud Cauley (29th) and Kurt Kitayama (28) also need decent performances to remain inside the top 30. Irish in the field: McIlroy is the lone Irish player in the 30-man field after Shane Lowry’s hopes were quashed with a poor showing in the St Jude. McIlroy is paired with Xander Schauffele for the first two rounds (Thursday, 6.20pm Irish; Friday, 3.47pm).Quote-Unquote: “This is a big boys’ golf course” – Viktor Hovland on getting his first experience of playing Bellerive in the practice rounds.Betting: Scheffler is understandably the market leader at 3/1 as he seeks to back up his win in St Jude, with some daylight between the world number one and the next three in the market – McIlroy, Ludvig Aberg and Schauffele – who are priced at 14/1. Si Woo Kim, though, looks best value at 22/1 each-way in a season where he has been runner-up three times.On TV: Sky Sports (from 3pm).