An Interview with Fred Couples
& Jay Haas
March 27, 2008
FRED COUPLES: Well, I got the announcement, not only are you
No. 1 Senior Tour players, but you're my No. 1 pick for my
assistant captain. So I talked to several of the guys who are
going to make the team or make every team, and -- the only thing
that happened, they were more excited than they were when they
heard I was going to be captain. So it kind of hurt my feelings
a little bit, but I'm okay. How are you?
JAY HAAS: I'm great. I'm really looking forward to it. I
appreciate you thinking of me. I know we talked about this maybe
at dinner in Ireland, do you remember that, at the American
Express tournament.
FRED COUPLES: Yeah, yeah.
JAY HAAS: And I remember you saying you wanted me and Robin
Williams and Michael Jordan. So I appreciate at least picking
me. That was very cool.
FRED COUPLES: I think I put your name first, though, because
I knew I could get in touch with you. I knew how to find you.
But we'll cool down on the Michael Jordan, Robin Williams. I'm
tired of people thinking they're going to be out there telling
you and I what to do. They'll have fun, and hopefully they'll
come. I know Michael is going to come.
I'm thrilled to death, and I wanted to get it out there,
soon. I don't know when the captains usually pick them. But
you're right, we did talk about it. And we also talked about
Tiger at the table and asked him what -- that was quite a few
years ago, and I think he was talking about playing with Furyk
at that time. And that's kind of how that pairing developed. So
it's always fun to sit at these dinners.
And now several years later it was shocking to me in LA to
have Tim ask me to be the captain. And you're the first guy that
came to mind. I'm thrilled to death.
JAY HAAS: Seems like a long time from now, but it will be here
before we know up it. And you'll be 50 before you know it.
FRED COUPLES: My next tournament is on the Senior Tour after
The Presidents Cup. So I'm looking forward to that. But, again,
I appreciate it. I know you've got a lot of things going on. I'm
just glad you accepted it.
JAY HAAS: Glad you asked. Like I said, I can't wait. It's going
to be a ton of fun when it gets down to it. I'm just excited
that you've answered the phone when I called you a couple of
times.
FRED COUPLES: Right. I know. And I'm excited that when I come
down with laryngitis you'll be giving all the speeches in front
of everybody. I don't know if it can come on that quickly, but
weirder things have happened. We'll have dual speeches.
JAY HAAS: I think you can't get it spontaneous there. It goes
away quickly, too.
FRED COUPLES: Don't give me that. But that's -- yeah, I did
answer a couple of times. Pretty remarkable, isn't it?
JAY HAAS: I'm going to vote for getting rid of carts, because
you can't be riding a cart when you come out here.
FRED COUPLES: I won't get near a cart, I can promise you
that. That you've heard right here today.
Q. Fred, what's the thinking going with the guy from the
Champions Tour versus a younger guy? I'm sure, you and Jay must
have talked about that, since he's been out of the loop for a
couple of years.
FRED COUPLES: Well, we did. And my thinking on that was Jack
Nicklaus was the captain who wasn't on the Tour much and he had
Jeff Sluman. And my thinking is they're -- I won't kid you,
there's probably two names that popped into my mind. The first
one was Jay. And then the second one was Davis. And Davis I want
to be on the team. So what I felt like was I needed to make a
decision and I don't want to make it sound like it was a gut
wrenching decision, because, again, Jay was my No. 1 pick, and
of course Brad Faxon was another guy I played several matches
with. But I still think that when you go doing it, I'm going to
hopefully have Jay play in a tournament next year, where we can
both play. I'm going to be out a lot and he can bump into guys.
But I think once you get in there Sunday night -- Jay knows,
he's been on teams and he sees guys. They were really excited,
Tiger, Furyk, Mickelson, they all lit up. I'm not saying
anything bad for anyone, but I think Jay Haas a lot of respect
and I've known him a long time and he's a very good decision
maker, and he'll be 60 percent of a captain, I'll be 40, but I
have more authority to nix some of his decisions. But that's
really not an issue, I don't believe, at all.
Q. Could both of you address this? This isn't exactly a
couple of drill sergeants out there running this team. But are
these guys you don't have to worry about cracking a whip over to
get motivated to play in these events?
FRED COUPLES: I'll let Jay answer that first.
JAY HAAS: Just what I've read in the past, the way Jack has
handled the team in the last couple of times has been semi-hands
off, is from what I gathered, and just go out there and have
fun, and who do you want to play with. One thing that Fred, I
remember saying at this dinner we had back in Ireland, that has
been -- when was that tournament, four or five years ago -- that
on all these Ryder Cup teams, he'd say I want to play with
Davis, I want to play with Davis, and the captains are nodding
with their head. And when the pairing came out he wasn't playing
with Davis.
So I think what I've seen that Jack has done is more or less
kind of guide them, but not force them to do anything or be any
kind of drill sergeant, as you said. I think these guys all know
how to compete and how to handle themselves on the golf course
under all kinds of pressure situations. I don't know, I think
that -- obviously you need some kind of structure in practice
rounds, things like that. But I don't think either one of us are
going to be stubborn about who plays with who or we've got to
have it a certain way.
FRED COUPLES: Just to finish up, I think Jay is exactly right. I
think that when we go in there, all the guys will -- so far
everyone, the younger players want to be on the team. It's a
Ryder Cup year but they don't have to go out of their way. And I
think what Jay is trying to say is when we get there the
structure will be they all know what they need to do. I don't
post a practice round at 8:00. That's pretty much the PGA TOUR,
when we go. And they need to be up and they need to go and if
they're screwing up, one of us will say, hey, we didn't really
like what you did here today. There's never, ever been -- I've
never had a problem on any team.
As Jay said, Nicklaus was phenomenal. In asking who you want to
play with, if I can pair you against someone, who might that be.
He went out of the way in that. But as far as being a drill
sergeant, he was as far from any captain -- I think I had him
three times -- as any captain ever. And it was just a lot of
fun. It's a very relaxed event, first of all, and the guys seem
to love it and what we could do is basically get in their way.
That's the problem you have, is just trying to tell people what
to do and they've been doing it for 15 or 20 years.
Q. Fred, what in your mind is the significance of Jay's role,
how much impact can it make? I know you said you wanted to cool
down on the Jordan/Williams talk. How did you approach them? You
said Jordan will be there, clarify what their role will be?
FRED COUPLES: That's a great question. Jordan I talked to. He is
in. And Robin Williams I saw watching Billy Crystal play
baseball, so I'm sure he's busy. I've not spoken to him nor do I
know anyone who knows him. And that's something if he's heard,
he might have gotten a chuckle out of it and he can come help
the team stay loose and have fun. That would be his role in
that. Certainly not to walk around the course.
And then with Jay, people who know Jay, he's not a drill
sergeant, but Jay's probably played 32 years on both Tours,
besides everyone -- I latched on to him early, spent time at his
house, with his family. We've had lots of talk and lots of fun.
And I think when you pick this, it's just someone who will get
along with not three or four people but all 12 people, including
myself. And I think it's a no-brainer. Everybody likes Jay. And
in that -- my big decision is not do I like Jay, he's one of my
best friends, but basically I looked at the 15 or 18 guys that
may make the team. And besides the younger players who I will
try to spend a little bit of time with the Nick watt in his, and
the Hunter Manns and the J.J. Henrys, but those guys will look
up to any older player, and my main thing is how consistent Jay
it and he's very savvy, and when you get guys that know what
they're doing, it's just an easy thing. And there's not any
question that I would have in saying, well, maybe I need this
guy or that guy. And again, we all know my friendship about
Davis, but there's no way I could pick him and he's going to
make the team or be very close. So that was my next guy after
Jay. And Jay was my main pick besides some of my very, very good
friends it would be the same situation with whoever I chose
after Jay, if Jay couldn't do it.
Q. Fred, in comparing Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup, it
appears at least in recent years the guys who play The
Presidents Cup are loose, they're confident, they perform really
well. Ryder Cup they seem to be tight, sort of insecure, and
they don't perform as well. Basically they're the same guys. Can
you explain that?
FRED COUPLES: I've been on four or five of each teams. You know,
I really can't. I can throw something out there, maybe Jay can,
too. I just feel like we have a great -- such a new tournament,
comparatively speaking to the Ryder Cup and our record is
phenomenal. So if you had the Florida Marlins come in and win
two world championship World Series you would kind of chuckle at
that, but they've done it.
In The Presidents Cup we start out with a ball of fire, and if
you go way back, of course, we won every Ryder Cup, but the last
20 years it's tense because I think we know it's tense and it's
a different crowd. Whereas at the Presidents Cup pretty much the
crowd is the crowd and they know the international players as
well as the U.S. Players and most international players play our
Tour. Whereas in the Ryder Cup every now and then you get a few
people that basically don't play both tours, except for a
handful of events and you don't know much about them and people
make a comment or whatever and it kind of gets a little edgy.
Whereas The Presidents Cup very rarely does that, and when it
does it's under the table in about an hour. That's my take. I
don't know what Jay thinks.
JAY HAAS: My answer isn't very intelligent, other than you
basically have the history of the Ryder Cup involved. The old
guys, the era beyond me would say, well, you just go out there
and play, it doesn't matter who plays, just go out there and
play. That's kind of the way they used to do it back in the '50s
and '60s because the European team or the great British and
Ireland teams back then had about three or four guys who were
competitive with the PGA TOUR guys, and the rest of them were
just kind of probably they just didn't -- they weren't as
competitive. It just was a matter of fact that by the end of the
week it was going to be a foregone conclusion that the U.S. Team
was going to run away with it.
So I think the No. 1 thing is these guys are very, very good.
And there is a little bit more -- they still have the idea that
they're the underdogs, the European team I'm saying, they're the
underdog, and they play that role to the hilt. Now I would think
that in the last three or four Presidents Cups the U.S. Team has
been, on paper, the underdog. You go down the list of
international players, and they're fabulous. So on paper we've
been, in theory, the better team in the Ryder Cup, which I don't
think the players agree with that. But I just think that it's so
even, anymore, either match, it's a coin toss.
And you get going one way or the other, it's just like Freddie
mentioned a baseball team, there, you look at the Celtics and
the Rockets playing, or whoever. These teams can go play ten
games and each one win five, maybe. Or then they might go a ten
game stretch and one of them win eight or nine of them. I don't
think there's any definitive answer. But I think that all the
stuff that I read about the U.S. team's not emotional enough,
they're not passionate enough, they don't care, and stuff like
that, I don't go along with that, Freddie can attest, the teams
that I've been on, we have a ball in the team room. And you get
around guys and just have as much fun as you've ever had in any
kind of golf environment. So the guys are just very, very good
players now.
Q. Fred, I'm just wondering, do you have any preexisting
philosophy on captains picks yet? Would you be more apartment to
pick somebody with personality, stated that you want to keep the
team loose, a guy like Woody Austin or Calchevichia, even if
they're 15 or 16th in rankings?
FRED COUPLES: That's a great question, and since time where I've
been picked I've looked at a few previous lists I've received
and there was guys from obviously 11th through 30th. I think
there's a lot of ways you can do that if you want to be
chastised, you can pick guys and worry about it that don't play
well. It's a one week thing and you can easily say, geez,
there's a guy that's played great five of the six weeks and I
chose him because of that and he goes there and he doesn't play
well. And you had all these other guys to pick.
But I think chemistry, I would talk to Jay about it, we haven't
yet, but my take, and he may sit down -- I think The Presidents
Cup is a very easy thing to pair people. Everyone plays except
for one afternoon. So you don't have 12 great players that
you've got to sit four guys at all times. It's an easy pairing.
I think we won't mix a lot of pairings. But answering that
question by saying that, I feel like we need -- the two guys
that we pick certainly need to immediately go with the other
pick that we make and be a pairing or they need to go right in
with somebody and not just pick two guys because maybe they're
slightly better at the time or someone else. You look at the
pairings and let's just say it was Jim Furyk who was 11th, who
would still be phenomenal play. You would pick him in a
heartbeat. But if Jim Furyk was 23rd, you still might pick him
in a heartbeat.
It's so far from now to worry about, but that's my take on it. I
want to get someone that's right there. And it would be easy for
Jay and I to have a very, very top player be somewhere in the
11th to 20th category, and there wouldn't even be any hesitation
at all. But if it doesn't work that way, then he and I will sit
there and I'm sure we'll have other people help us, too, and
we'll figure out two guys.
JAY HAAS: Fred, I misunderstood, when you called me I though you
and I were going to be the pick.
FRED COUPLES: I threw you under the bus. I said Azinger, if you
pick me for the Ryder Cup, you're in for the Presidents Cup. But
we could do that, as well as you're playing, we could pick you
and one of your buddies on the Senior Tour, and that would
really spice things up. I'm sure that would really go over well.
JAY HAAS: Yeah, that would fly, wouldn't it?
FRED COUPLES: Yeah. I don't know, Jay and I, we're very -- we
get adamant about a lot of things and we like to pick on each
other. For people who don't know, we'll play practice rounds and
I like to stir it up and he continues to like to stir it up. And
we get very stirred and by the end of the day we laugh about it
and it's all fun. But it will be a fun evening or couple of
days, I don't think a week, but it should be figured out pretty
quickly.
Q. Fred, a couple of quick things. Given that Jay is on the
Champions Tour would you go out of your way to see more PGA TOUR
events than if you had chosen an assistant captain on the PGA
TOUR? Unrelated, you mentioned that Jordan is in. What exactly
role do you see him filling?
FRED COUPLES: I think he's maybe one of the greatest, there's
several of them, but one of the best athletes of all time. He is
someone that if I was going to make a team and someone said,
wow, Michael Jordan might be around, my eyes would light up. And
I've been saying it ever from the beginning because he's at -- I
believe he's been at every Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup I've
ever played in. And I thought that was kind of neat. And this
isn't like charity and say, wow, Michael, thanks, go ahead and
I'll have you. But what he'll bring is Jay coming out and Jay
can tell Tiger that Phil just hit a 4-iron here and was on the
back edge. Michael can just be out there and in full spirit. I
could see him saying a couple of things that would help out.
What I'm trying to do is, again, The Presidents Cup flows
really, really well. The last one I played in Jack Nicklaus
wasn't around a night and a half, he had things to do, so Sluman
ran one. And Jay is there. There's no rah-rah speeches, no
nothing. So that part of it for Jordan.
The first one I'm confused whether I'm going to play a lot of
events next year?
Q. Not play, but be out there and see the younger players.
Jay obviously is playing a different Tour, he won't see as many
as if you had chosen Davis or someone on the PGA TOUR.
FRED COUPLES: As soon as I walked up the hill on Riviera when
Tim asked me to do it, and I just felt it would be awkward --
again, if Jay would say no, to be honest with you, I don't know
-- I wouldn't want -- Davis Love is the obvious choice to
probably everyone there. Davis Love has played on every team
forever. I just felt like it wouldn't be the right thing to do.
Now if Davis doesn't make the team and I say, hey, Davis, can
you come out and just be there and show up, he would probably
come out and do that. But Jay is my guy, obviously, and he'll
come out, I'm hoping he and I and his son, Bill, can play a
practice round. We were thinking about Memorial, because that's
always middle of the year and people -- we have meetings and
stuff, so that's one. And Jay Haas said that would be great.
As far as me, I've already played quite a bit with Nick Watney,
hung around with Hunter Mann, played nine holes at Bay Hill.
It's irrelevant what we do right now. I just want to show these
guys that, hey, I'm kind of watching you and I like the way you
play, and obviously way back when when I played, and I was a
young player, everyone said, wow, you'll be on this team
forever. And that's kind of how it happens. And the J.J. Henrys
and the Hunter Manns now will start to be on these teams. I
don't know them that well, although I know them. But next year
I'll play with some of the young players, J.B. Holmes or Bubba
Watson, just to see what they're like. If one of them is close,
and they can hit it 340 yards and you can pair them up with a
dicey wedge player, I don't know how that wouldn't be a good
team. There's so much to do so much to worry about that for me
playing, knock on wood, I'm hoping to be playing next year, so
I'll be out. I can cover that. And Jay is a huge mainstay. He
doesn't need to be around them, there's no -- like I say, Jack
Nicklaus was our main captain. He was never on the PGA TOUR, and
he was captain, I hope I'm right, three years in a row. So it's
not a huge deal. Jay and I could actually show up the week
before and say, hi, you guys, we're ready to go. And they'll be
ready to go. I would think so, don't you, Jay?
JAY HAAS: That's a good point about Jack. He's pretty far
removed from the PGA TOUR, yet he seemed to have pretty good
success. So following in his footsteps with that.
Q. Fred, I've been looking into some information about a
story I'm doing on Amen Corner at Augusta. And of course you had
the fame to have shot there in '92 at No. 12. Is that area
anything like anywhere else in golf, meaning three holes kind of
a separate course within a course?
FRED COUPLES: Well, I would say that there's a tournament coming
up in May in Jacksonville with 16th, 17th and 18th are about as
wild of a finish as you'll ever see, and that's sometimes you'll
see consistent golf. Sometimes you'll see people go eagle,
birdie, bogey or par or whatever. But Amen Corner has just got
the rich history. And my ball stayed up on the bank, it
basically -- several things happened. It was a huge sigh of
relief. I played rounds of golf there where I'm on the third
hole and I've got a little 8-iron in my hand to that green, and
I'm thinking about, unfortunately, the 12th hole and the same
shot. I don't know if that's good or bad. But the 13th is a
par-5, which to be honest I've always struggled with. And 11,
it's not one of my favorite holes, either, although it's more
now because it's much longer. I don't know why that is. The last
couple of years I've seemed to play better at 500 yards than I
did with hitting a green with a 7-iron and 3-putting half the
time. But that's one, the stretch there at TPC, and I'm sure
there's others. But it's a unique spot where now length on 11
and then a little accuracy on 12, and then of course 13 has been
lengthened, that not nearly as many people go for the green.
It's a little different hole, 13. But the rest of them, 11 and
12 are certainly thrilling shots and fun for the gallery and for
history, too.
And the same at TPC, the last three holes, a lot of memories. I
had one of them where I went through there and won in '96 with
an eagle and birdie. I believe I parred 18. But I'm sure there
are others, too.
Q. I'm wondering if you ever had -- do you think there might
be a time when captain of a Presidents Cup or captain of a Ryder
Cup that they'll ever change the thing where you had to win a
Major to be one of those? Do you ever think that you would like
to try to be a captain of one of those teams or maybe lobby for
it, if things go pretty good next year and you've decided you
like this?
JAY HAAS: I think some day perhaps that would be changed. It is
kind of an unwritten rule. But you look at a guy like Jeff
Sluman, who won the PGA -- guys have won major tournaments that
played on Ryder Cup teams and were not Ryder Cup captains. So
now with the Champions Tour you've got to look at that window
where Freddie is. Freddie, are you 48 yet?
FRED COUPLES: I'm 48, yeah.
JAY HAAS: A guy who's in that area that may be not playing as
much on the PGA TOUR, but still wants to play on the Champions
Tour, does a guy 50 years old want to give up, and he's going to
be the captain at 52, I think The Presidents Cup is maybe -- I
don't know, just from what Curtis has told me, maybe less of a
commitment than the captaincy of the Ryder Cup. And I don't
know, but I just remember when Curtis was the captain, he was
fielding 25, 30 e-mails a day a year out. So this is a huge
commitment.
Now, do you really want to give up two of your best years on the
Champions Tour? I think that's an issue, right there. But I
think there's plenty of guys that qualify on both counts that
are major winners and Ryder Cup players. Now, if Tiger keeps
winning every other major there's going to be a gap there where
there's not going to be any of those players anymore. If you get
some International winners, so there may be a time where there's
a guy who doesn't qualify, in theory, or unwritten rule, that
he's done both. And there may be a guy that's just a great
leader, that the guys gravitate to and everybody would kind of
campaign for him. I would never do that, and I would never say
that is something that I'd really love to do.
I guess I never gave it a thought and I'm kind of like what Fred
said about Davis, you would think, boy, he'd be a great Ryder
Cup captain. I think Davis's situation, I think he's coming back
off an injury, he wants to get back to where he was player-wise,
and has no thought at all right now of being a captain. So I
certainly would not campaign for it, but to me there's plenty of
guys that fit the bill that would deserve it more than someone
like myself.
Q. (Inaudible.)
FRED COUPLES: Well, I love Augusta, because everyone wants to
get in the event. The first year I got in the event I just fell
in love with the place because it suits my game or I thought it
did. I think '83 was my first year and I believe I might not
have been in one of those years, '86 or so. But after winning in
'92 I played every year but one because of my back. And this cut
streak is just a very, very nice thing. I am looking forward to
playing this year and trying to keep it going. But last year I
kept it going by showing up and playing and that was probably a
bigger deal than going in this year.
This year I'm certainly looking to do more than just play on
Saturday and Sunday. If something happens it certainly won't be
because of not liking the course and not playing. But there were
other years I remember making a long putt on 18 for birdie to
make the cut on the number. And other years being right near the
lead. So it can go both ways. But to have a streak, you know, I
mean it's a very nice thing. I don't think it's one of Augusta's
great, great records to have. That would be winning this thing
with O'Meara won or Phil won, two Masters jackets would be a lot
better than making these cuts.
But as they say, in a very positive way it is what it is. And
I've felt very good every year I've gone there, stepping on the
first tee. It is a place that I've really, really liked. And I
like everything about it. So that's very positive for me.
Q. This week, Ginn Championship you've come in here, you've
had sort of an interesting year thus far with four official
starts and not out of the top six, but yet to get a win. Talk
about your year thus far and how your game is coming into this
week's tournament?
JAY HAAS: I really feel good about the way I've been playing. I
obviously had a great start and had a couple of very legitimate
chances to win tournaments, and I'm disappointed that that has
not happened. But that's the nature of golf and championship
golf, when there's a lot of guys trying to win tournaments out
here. I just enjoy the fact that I've been there and feel like
I'm not far away from closing the deal one of these weeks. That
being said, this course beat me alive last year. And today was
no different. I didn't play very well in the Pro Am today, but
it was a Pro Am, so hopefully tomorrow will be a little bit
better.
It's a difficult golf course, I think, and seemingly a little
bit harder than last year. Although the wind blew last year, we
didn't have much rough. And this year they've over seeded and
they've moved the fairways in in certain places. I'm not too
sure that it's, even with good weather, I think the score here
is not going to be that great. But that's looking from my
perspective and somebody who hasn't shown a lot of low scores
here yet.
Q. (Inaudible.) My mindset is that I've really got pile it up
between ages 50 and 54, because I thoroughly expect a drop off a
year after.
JAY HAAS: I think somewhat, that was in the back of my mind,
maybe. And although I was slow to come out here, kind of in the
Fred Funk mode, where I was exempt on the PGA TOUR and wanted to
play there. But I think from the last few years and onward what
you're going to see is a lot of guys playing well into their
late '50s, early '60s, taking better care of themselves. The
guys on the PGA TOUR that have done that for a long time now
with the fitness advance out there. I think the guys are in
better shape, there's no doubt about it. And with the Champions
Tour being as lucrative as it is, you know, guys are looking, I
can play until I'm 65 if I take care of myself. So when you're
looking at it -- I think guys 35, they don't ever think they'll
be 50. They think that's not even for them.
Then all of a sudden they're 45 and they go, this is not that
far away. So then they start focusing a little bit more. And
what I have said all along is that guys have changed their whole
thinking that 30 years ago, 40 years ago, you got to be in your
early 40s, you game started to go down a bit, you started
looking for something else to do, just because there wasn't any
money out there.
If you finished 100th on the money list in 1970, I bet you
didn't make ten grand. Now a hundred is 800 grand. So you could
kind of struggle or just get by for a few years, and still make
a great, great living, whereas back in 30, 40 years ago, you
could not do that.
So guys are taking better care of themselves, again, and leading
on to the Champions Tour. I just think that, sure, the majority
of the guys, they're going to do their most damage between 50
and 55, I think that's just a fact. But look at Hale, still
competitive, still capable. Jim Thorpe last year won the Schwab
Cup, he's 59 or 60. So you look at guys like that, you go,
that's for me.
Q. Back up to what we were talking about before. You
mentioned The Presidents Cup versus the Ryder Cup. I seem to
remember DiMarco telling me one time that when you guys were
teeing off you had this great strategy all mapped out and he was
supposed to go first, this was Detroit, and you were going to go
second. And he got up there and basically needed to make a
diaper change. And everything went right out the window. What
was your version of that story?
JAY HAAS: We played practice round a couple of days, and they
said you guys are looking like a great team. And I love Chris's
rah-rah attitude. And almost like he's still a college football
mentality out there. That charges me up, I love that. We kind of
went through the course and the first hole at Oakland Hills, you
can hole a little drive out there. And Chris likes to play
left-to-right. And then the second hole, kind of a draw drive.
And the fourth hole definitely draw to hold it in the fairway.
He went through the front nine and he said the odd holes are
perfect for me, I just love the odd holes. About ten minutes
before, and we were on the chipping green over on the other
course there, he says, that pin on 3 is way in the back left,
and that just doesn't suit my cut. He said I just can't do it. I
can't do it. I said, well, okay, I'll go off the first tee. So
it was kind of a good thing for me, because I didn't have to
sleep on it or even think about that until the time came.
And I just remember that bank of grandstands, most of them red,
white and blue, and chanting go USA, and go Jay. I remember
gripping the club and saying you've done this a million times,
maybe this one will not be a top or a whatever. And then it was
a pretty good drive. But I think that was what the pressure of
team competition is, especially the Ryder Cup can do to a guy.
And I don't know if you've ever heard the story, you guys might
want to turn off your tape recorders on this one, we were
playing with Sergio. And I could really elaborate this, and I do
in a -- but Sergio thought that Chris was getting a little bit
too excited and just said, calm down a little bit. And Chris
said, this is a home game, basically. So deal with it. And then
we can elaborate that. And like I told people, when I tell the
story, I don't know that's exactly what he said, but it's a
great story.
But, anyway, yeah, it's -- like we said, we had it all laid out
there, Chris was going to drive on No. 1. And it was going to be
perfect. And he couldn't do it and didn't like the third pin.
Q. (Inaudible.)
JAY HAAS: No, I don't think -- I think what you see now is the
young guys, like Hunter Mahan last year and Lucas, Lucas was
great and we talked all about that. He was so excited about
that. He never played on a team, I don't care what kind of team
it is. And you're in that room with Tiger and Phil and Jim Furyk
and those guys. You look around and you go I'm one of these
guys, that means a lot. And that's kind of to me, when I said, I
won't say made it, but Curtis and I were on the first Ryder Cup
team in '83, and Jack was captain, and there was Tom Watson, Gil
Morgan, and Lanny and Calvin Pete and Fuzzy. And wow, I'm one of
these guys. This is pretty cool. As soon as you play on one of
those teams you can't wait to get back on it. I think that's
what's so pressure-packed is you want to do it, after you've
experienced one time you've got to do it again, that's what's so
hard for most of the guys to get on it. And I think The
Presidents Cup is becoming that. It doesn't have the 70 year
history or whatever the Ryder Cup has, but if we keep winning
pretty soon it's going to be, you know what, the Internationals
are tired of this, we're going to win this thing now.
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