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CONSTELLATION SENIOR PLAYERS CHAMPIONSHIP MEDIA DAYMay 30, 2018Fred FunkHighland Park, Illinois LAURA VESCOVI: Good morning. I'm here with you from Jacksonville, Florida, at PGA TOUR headquarters. I have the pleasure of introducing Fred Funk, but before we bring him up I'll give him a few introductory remarks. He's an eight-time PGA TOUR winner, including the 2005 PLAYERS Championship. He's a nine-time PGA TOUR Champions winner, including three senior major championships. A fun fact: Fred is one of the only PGA TOUR stars who was cut from his college golf team at Maryland. Following that, he had a paper route with the now-defunct Washington Star paper, and he graduated with a degree in law enforcement and returned to the golf team with a coaching role, and he's now enshrined in both the University of Maryland Athletic Hall of Fame as well as the State of Maryland Athletic Hall of Fame. Please welcome Fred Funk. FRED FUNK: Thanks for that. LAURA VESCOVI: I had to throw that out there. I think it's safe to say you bounced back. FRED FUNK: Wow. It was like making a triple bogey and then eagling the next hole or something. LAURA VESCOVI: Well, the 2018 SENIOR PLAYERS Championship is just 43 days away. I know we can't believe it. You've had five top-10 finishes in 11 starts at this tournament, including a runner-up in 2008, and considering our champion gets to compete in THE PLAYERS Championship, what would that mean to you to go back to your home course at TPC Sawgrass? FRED FUNK: Well, it's actually the biggest tournament I wanted to win on the Champions Tour. One, it's a major, but it's our golf tournament. It's like THE PLAYERS Championship is the players' -- it's our TOUR's signature event. Since I moved to Ponte Vedra back in 1991, it has become my adopted hometown, and I always wanted to go back after my exemption was up in 2011. I haven't been able to beat -- there's a guy named Bernhard that's been kind of hard to beat, and other guys, when Scott McCarron came in, and it's still an event that I really want to get back to because it is that big exemption to get back to THE PLAYERS. That's a big deal. For us, it's a huge deal. You know, I remember back in the day when you were on the regular TOUR and you won an event, and the first thing you thought of was I'm going to the Masters. Well, this event would be you're going to THE PLAYERS Championship, and it's a venue that I believe, if I'm playing well, I can still compete on because it's not a length issue, and it wouldn't be like going to an 8,000-yard golf course, and you go, oh, I'll pass. I don't want to do that. But it is, it's our tournament. It's a big event, and we all look forward to playing it. It's odd that we have -- it's not odd, but we have five majors on our Champions Tour, and it's one of our -- they're all significant, but that one is significant in a special way for me because of Ponte Vedra. I like that one. LAURA VESCOVI: Well, one of the unique aspects of this tournament is that it rotates each year, and it's been held at some very elite courses. We've been to Baltimore Country Club, to Fox Chapel, Philly Cricket Club, last year Caves Valley. Can you talk about from a player's perspective how exciting it is to switch venues each year but also how challenging it can be to tackle a new course every year? FRED FUNK: It is. In fact, I was looking up on the phone the history of the PLAYERS, where it started, and they pretty much kept it at one venue for a long time, and then they started rotating probably five or six years ago, they started moving it around, and they've been moving it around to really classic golf clubs that are really just old-school, a lot of the old-school clubs, and we're continuing that this year. I think it makes it a very special tournament in its own right because it's not at its normal venue, a host club each year that you go back to. You kind of come in, it's excitement because it's a new golf course. It has a lot of history, where the ones we've gone to and obviously with this one it has a lot of history. It's a course the minute you drive in, like this one, you have -- you're kind of amped up because it has the history that you want to be a part of. That's a big deal. I think it's fun for the old guys of the Champions Tour to go back to the old venues and experience the way golf was designed, the way golf courses were designed in the past, which in many opinions of especially my peers, that's when people that -- before they even had bulldozers, they built the best golf courses that we play. The Chicago area is just known for all these traditional-style golf courses, and it's one of the best areas in the world to play golf, and obviously this is one of them. So I think all of us are very excited to come here. I'm going to see it for the first time today, and I'm sure Sluman and a few guys that have played -- that live here have played here, but the word will get out pretty quick, I'm sure. LAURA VESCOVI: You'll have a leg up having been here and played a few months before. FRED FUNK: That was the whole intent. (Laughter.) LAURA VESCOVI: One thing we always hear about PGA TOUR Champions is when the guys turn 50, they expect to come out here and dominate, and that's not always the case, is it? FRED FUNK: No, it's not. A lot of guys have been coming out -- Bernhard is a year younger than me. He's 60, almost 61, and unbelievable what he's been doing, and I really believe that he hasn't gotten the credit that he deserves. He's doing what I believe and a lot of us on the Champions Tour believe is the equivalent of what Tiger did to all of us when he came out on the regular TOUR, just winning and dominating the way that Tiger did and the way Bernhard has, and keep doing it, breaking the odds, and all the history of when your window of opportunity on the Champions Tour is historically age 50 to 53, 54, and it really drops off after that. You just don't win that often, and it's kind of a fluke if you do. And all these guys come out at 50 and 51 going, I am going to take down Bernhard, and they don't take down Bernhard. Bernhard is an enigma. He's unbelievable, what he does. He's become one of my best friends out on the Champions Tour, and we have a -- you know, there's a big -- you can almost call us we're all family because we've been together for so long and have had careers on the regular TOUR, it's beyond a fraternity. We are a family out there, and we have a good gig going, and we understand how lucky we are. And these 50 year olds that are coming out realize when they come out on the Champions Tour, it's a little different than they expected. It's a lot harder than we expect. It's not easy to win. We're playing golf courses -- we average almost 7,100 yards, which doesn't get recognized. Everybody thinks we're playing at 6,600, 6,700 yards, and we're not. For the year, I think we averaged just under 71, over the past year. So we're still playing pretty long golf courses, and the guys are shooting it up. It's amazing. One thing I do like more than the traditional events when you come to the majors, it's four rounds, and I still like four-round tournaments versus three, but I understand why we have the three. But the four rounds, the cream rises -- the more you play, the more the cream rises to the top. That cream seems to be Bernhard again. (Laughter.) But I know Scott McCarron won last year. It was a great venue, and we've had a lot of great ones recently, and I think this is just going to fall in line. The young guys coming up, Stricker is tough. We knew he was going to be really good. Jerry Kelly is tough, and Miguel Jiménez is a character. He's a needle mover. Our rock star is Freddie Couples, and unfortunately Freddie's back is just a time bomb, and you never know when the thing is going to be bad, and he just really struggles with that, which is very unfortunate because he is our guy, and hopefully -- is he committed here or not? Yeah, he's still struggling and everybody knows that. But when he comes, he's our guy. He's our true needle mover. But we have some great characters out there, and yeah, it's just a lot of fun, and very, very competitive. That's the one thing that really spurs everybody on, at age 50 on. It's not that we have this opportunity to go out there and play, it's that we've been competing our whole life, and that's what it's all about. We're really good friends on and off the golf course, but we still want to beat each other's brains in on the golf course, and nobody likes losing, and we're trying to give it our best. It's unbelievable how hard the guys still work at their games and try to get prepared and try to be the best they can be as long as they can be. Age 50 is a big advantage, but they're not Bernhard. I keep spurring him on, building him up, but -- LAURA VESCOVI: He says you guys tease him, you give him a hard time. You don't let him off the hook with how competitive he still is, in the locker room, at least Scott McCarron -- FRED FUNK: Yeah, if Lake Michigan was saltwater I'd throw him in the lake and see if he'd rust. He's like a true machine when he's out there, and he's just different. Just there's always somebody different, it's like LeBron James or Michael Jordan or somebody like that, that just comes along, and Tiger. They're just different. Better different, in a good way. LAURA VESCOVI: We've touched on this a little bit just now, but on PGA TOUR Champions there's definitely a little bit of a different culture than on the PGA TOUR. They always say on the PGA TOUR you get to see the stars, on the Champions Tour you get to meet the stars, and I think that the fan and sponsor interaction is a little bit different. Can you touch a little bit on what fans can expect to see at Exmoor this July when they're out as spectators? FRED FUNK: Well, I think we really do interact up close and personal a lot more often than the regular TOUR, and we're a little more laid back in respect to the regular TOUR. You're uptight when you get on the regular TOUR. You're just super, duper competitive, and some of the players are trying to get established, other ones are trying to stay in the top. There are just so many different levels of the regular TOUR that you need to try to get to, top 50 in the world, top 30 for the TOUR Championship, and everybody is just grinding and grinding and grinding. Their personalities don't come out as much. The Champions Tour, most of the guys have already had great careers, and we realize how fortunate we are to have this opportunity to go out and still do what we do and what we've done for our whole life, and realize how important it is to give back to the community and give back to the fans that are coming out, and we love when we go out and we have a lot of people watching us. It really raises the energy level for all of us. It's something we -- we didn't buy into it, it's just that we naturally do, because it's an appreciation for the fact that we're still doing what we love to do in front of a lot of people, so it's great. LAURA VESCOVI: We love the crowds. We get great crowds at the Constellation SENIOR PLAYERS no matter what market we go to. Before I open it up to Q&A, I want to do a quick rapid-fire session. Who is your favorite playing partner on PGA TOUR Champions? FRED FUNK: Probably Bernhard. (Laughter.) I've got a story. This is pretty funny. In my opinion, it was really funny. But we're playing in Texas, in San Antonio, a few years ago, and I was in the last group with Bernhard and David Frost, and we're walking off the 6th hole on Sunday, and Bernhard is like where the podium is, and we're walking to our drives, and I go, Hey, Bernhard, I know what you're thinking. He didn't respond. I go, hey, do you hear me? I know what you're thinking. He goes, (with German accent) What am I thinking? I go, you're thinking, You have no chance of winning. I will beat you with my mind. I will beat you with my putting. I will beat you with my ball-striking. You have no chance. And he's just shaking his head, and I go, I'm right, aren't I? And he goes, Yes. (Laughter.) And then he comes up to me and he goes, how do you come up with this stuff in the middle of a tournament. That wasn't rapid-fire, was it? LAURA VESCOVI: No, that's okay. It actually leads me to my next question. True or false: Bernhard is actually 30 years old, not 60 years old? FRED FUNK: Yeah, exactly. He is. LAURA VESCOVI: Going back to your degree in law enforcement, if you weren't playing golf, do you think you would be a police officer? FRED FUNK: I was going to -- I wanted to be a cop, and I was too short to be a cop until they started hiring women, and they started hiring women, had to drop the height requirement, and I was qualified. So I said, yeah, I'll be a cop. But I gave golf a shot first, and obviously it worked out. LAURA VESCOVI: It did work out. We're glad it did. FRED FUNK: I probably never would have given anybody a ticket. I'd be like, oh, just go ahead. LAURA VESCOVI: How many games do you think the Chicago Bears will win this year? The answer is all of them, undefeated. FRED FUNK: Two. (Laughter.) No, as long as they lose to the Jaguars, if they play each other, I don't care. And the Redskins. I'm a Redskin and a Jaguar fan. LAURA VESCOVI: We'll open it up to questions. Q. You said you're going to go out to see the course today. How long does it take for you guys to learn a new course, and especially are there any nuances for a Donald Ross course that make the learning curve a little more challenging? FRED FUNK: It'll be the green complexes that will be the most important thing to take in, I would think, on a Donald Ross course, and usually the old-school golf courses, a lot of them are back-to-front slope, and you just don't want to be long. You want to know where not to miss it more than where to hit it, and try to get some of the lines if there's strategy on your approach, the best angle to come into the greens and things like that. You know, the first time around when you're just kind of taking it all in, and every course is totally different. It would be like going to Whistling Straits, and you see 9 million bunkers, and you realize the second time you play it that 8 million of them aren't in play, and it's visually intimidating. So you've got to see what's visually intimidating and what is for real, and you'll probably have some tricky holes out there that you go, uh-oh, there's one that you really check off and go, okay, par is a really good number on this hole, and whether it's a green-light hole or a red-light hole or a caution, that's the way I kind of put the way the layouts go. There's always that No. 1 handicap hole, which you've got to fear, those tough ones, and figure out how to play them. Q. In that regard, what's the toughest hole you've ever played? FRED FUNK: Toughest hole I've ever played? Wow, toughest course I ever played was Bethpage, in my opinion. Wow, toughest hole I've ever played? I don't know, I'll get back to you on that one. Remember the "better than most" putt that Tiger hit at TPC? Well, I was ahead of him. It was a Saturday and I was playing really good, and I hit it to 12 feet and five-putted. So that was the toughest hole I ever played that particular day. (Laughter.) And Tiger witnessed that and then made the 2 when he should have made 6. Q. Fred, is your current caddie a longtime caddie for you, and can you talk about some of your caddie experiences? FRED FUNK: No, I actually have George Willett, who was a TaylorMade rep for years on the regular tour and then our tour, when TaylorMade did all their trimmings, and he got canned last year on the third trimming of TaylorMade where they were downsizing their higher-salaried employees. They were cutting them all out, and I promised him I'd hire him if he got cut, and I did. Unfortunately, my caddie got fired. I fired him, but I told him, if George gets fired, he's coming out with me. So that's who I have. We're pretty new together this year, but he's good. He has two kids at home in Carlsbad in California, so trying to help him out as much as I can until he finds something else. Who am I playing with today? LAURA VESCOVI: That's a question for -- FRED FUNK: Just you and me? LAURA VESCOVI: Well, thank you for -- FRED FUNK: Yeah, thank you. We're all looking forward to this venue, and the turnout today was really great. I think it'll be a great week. I know it'll be a great week, and there will be a lot of great golf. The guys that are playing on our Tour right now, we're playing at a really high level, and I think people are shocked at how good the Champions Tour is, at the level the game has that these guys, even when they get into their 60s, what Bernhard is still doing, and when I'm healthy, I can still go. But it's fun, and all the attention that we can muster is great, and this is a great sign, and what a great turnout. So thanks for coming this morning. I look forward to seeing you guys out there today. Q. What Chicago courses have you enjoyed playing the most? FRED FUNK: I haven't played that many, but I played Old Elm yesterday, that was really nice. I've played Butler, but a full diet of Butler would make you quit. That would just beat you up. You know, I played Skokie when we were playing North Shore here, and I loved Skokie Country Club. That was one I just went, wow. If it had a really nice driving range, and it has basically no driving range, but the golf course itself is just so much fun to play. You could probably go around all of these. I played Chicago Golf, which is totally different; Medinah, fantastic venue. You can probably just go like door to door and you'd just say, wow, that was unbelievable, and that's unbelievable. So I'm really looking forward to seeing this one, and after today I might be saying this one. Hopefully so. LAURA VESCOVI: Thank you, Fred. Good luck this summer. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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