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NORTHERN TRUST OPENFebruary 17, 2015Bill HaasPACIFIC PALISADES, CALIFORNIA LAURA NEAL: We'd like to welcome Bill Haas to the interview room. Past champion of the Northern Trust Open, off to a great start this year with your win at Humana, and then a baby on the way. So a lot of exciting things going on this year. If you could just talk to us about your expectations coming into this week. BILL HAAS: Yeah, I'd like to play well. That's definitely the reason I came. Like you said, about to have a baby, hoping it holds off for another week, but due next Friday, so we've got time. I certainly showed up here thinking I could compete, and it's a course I've done well at before. My game feels okay. It could always be better, I'm sure. Feels good enough to win, so it would be a nice week to play well, for sure. Q. What's the scenario? Do you have a plane waiting or anything like that? BILL HAAS: No. I mean, I'll have my phone and probably be checking it every couple of holes. I assume somebody would contact the tournament or the TOUR and a Rules Official would probably find me before I even check my phone to know if anything was going on. Pretty much when I tee it up on Thursday, I'll be focused on the task at hand. Obviously if something happens at home we'll make the decision then but until then I'll be focused on trying to play. I think that's what my wife would want, too. She wouldn't want me out here not at 100 percent, I guess. Q. Did she give you any instructions? BILL HAAS: Yeah, she said don't unpack your suitcase. Just keep it packed up ready to go just in case. Yeah, I'll certainly make the family decision if I have to. Q. Are you taking some time off next month? BILL HAAS: A little bit. Pretty sure I'm not going to play Tampa or Bay Hill. Just that will be two weeks, the baby, get him to about three weeks old if everything is going right. Probably I'm going to try to sneak down and maybe play Miami, which will be the next week after he's born. But we're just going to have to line up some help at home. That's just a hard one to skip, a World Golf event, and my son would want me to play I think. That's what I'm telling myself (smiling). So that's the plan right now. Q. You've played some of your best golf recently in this stretch run for the baby. I'm wondering if in some odd way having this other event to sort of distract you has helped you on the golf course. BILL HAAS: Yeah, maybe. I mean, certainly I think things that make you happy affect you in every aspect of your life. So certainly with us adding a member to our family is a pretty huge moment and huge event for us and makes us extremely happy. So anything that can make me happier on the golf course has got to help me, so I need all of that I can get. Q. What else makes you happy? BILL HAAS: I mean, being home I think; any wife, my kids. William, my son now, is pretty much the thing that makes me smile the most probably. Playing well certainly helps. Watching Wake Forest basketball get better would be nice.  I like to fish a little bit, so that's fun, being on the boat, for sure. But winning golf tournaments, there's not much better feeling than that. So that would be nice this week. Q. When you look at a post‑Tiger, post‑Phil world in golf, what do you see? BILL HAAS: I think the PGA TOUR has survived a lot of good players and has continued to blossom after Jack and Arnold, they kind of became‑‑ they made golf fun and cool and a fan, like a fanatic type of sport I guess. You have you are around Arnie's Army and all that. And Tiger, the crowd he brought into the game, certainly grew the game more than anyone maybe. I think after them, it's just going to be something else I think. The young players today are really good, and Rory McIlroy I think is going to be around for a while. I think he'll be your next guy to win 20 times. I think he's the next person that can do that, win that many times on TOUR. A lot of good young players. I mean, I don't want to just single him out. Jordan Spieth is going to be around a long time. So bad at naming names, but Keegan Bradley, a lot of good‑‑ he's not that young I guess. He's my age somewhat. But young guys are good. So I think it's going to be fine. I look forward to seeing where the game goes. Q. Does it matter if those young guys are American? BILL HAAS: Well, the TOUR seems to be growing globally. The game seems to be growing globally. Certainly would like them to be American for Ryder Cup‑issue reasons. It's fun to see American guys play well. But I enjoy good golf from whoever it is. I enjoy watching Rory McIlroy as much as anyone and Adam Scott, I enjoy watching him hit it as much as anybody, doesn't matter where they are from. Good golf is what's going to grow the game, not necessarily American golf. But it would be nice to see, you know, good Americans, as well. Q. Just want to get your comment, talking about young players, you got to play with Will yesterday. Just your thoughts, this is a great opportunity for Will to play this weekend; just maybe comment on that? BILL HAAS: Yeah, that was fun to watch yesterday. I don't know if everybody knows the whole story there, but he had the opportunity to basically come Monday qualify with 14 other young really good players, and shot the best score by five shots and played beautifully. He could have given me three a side yesterday. That's fun to watch, especially a guy‑‑ he's a guy I pull for because of Wake Forest reasons and for my Uncle Jerry and knowing their team, they have got good young players back there that like to beat Will on a day‑to‑day basis. That's fun for a team to have a player like him. It's good for Wake, it's good for college golf. And obviously for Will this week, it's just going to give him more confidence. I don't want to say it's going to show where his game stacks up, because I don't know if that's fair to say, well, this one week is going to show where he stacks up against the PGA TOUR at age 18. But it's certainly a steppingstone in a correct direction for him. Without a doubt, he'll play professionally and without a doubt I think he'll play out here. It's just, you know, I think steppingstones are important, and this is an unbelievable opportunity for him. Pretty sweet that Northern Trust and everybody got together to create that opportunity. Q. They used to talk about you when you first came out of Wake and were coming on TOUR as some of the young people to look out for. Is the group now, whether it's Jordan or Justin, Thomas, that group, are they any better than you guys were ten years ago? And if so, why? And if not, don't answer it. BILL HAAS: I don't know that they are any better. They certainly seem, like you watch Jordan, Patrick Reed, they seem on Sunday to play well and they don't seem to be nervous. I mean, everybody's nervous, but maybe a little more ready to win for some reason. Who knows why that's happening, I don't know. I don't really have a good, correct answer for that but they seem‑‑ there's a lot more guys, talented, coming out of college ready to play, ready to win. But I think we had that, too. I look at the list‑‑ I love looking at my All‑American plaques, something I'm very proud of, but also the other names on there.       Of the 30 or 20‑something names on that plaque, I think 19 of the 22 are on TOUR. So that's something that shows that college golf is one of the greatest proving grounds for getting out here as anything. Q. Who else is on there? BILL HAAS: Ricky Barnes, Camilo Villegas, Nick Watney, Hunter Mahan. Q. Bill Haas? BILL HAAS: Myself. It's fun to see. There's actually just a handful‑‑ I think Matt Hendrix was a guy that's on there. He's played out here. Ryan Moore, I think Dustin Bray, he was on there. He's got status on the Web.com he'll be out here. Q. The theory, and there may be a crossover, but some of these kids, when they were ten and just getting into the game, they were watching Tiger just destroy people during that stretch of his career and they wanted to be just like that. Did you have that? Where were you? BILL HAAS: I think I was different because I had my dad. I certainly thought he was better than Tiger growing up. He's my dad, you know. I guess I didn't have that, but that could be something to do with it. When you watched him and he was winning at his best and you saw his mentality, that's something that maybe these kids emulate and want to be like; and therefore, it makes them glass‑faced and not nervous and this is how I'm going to hit it, straight right at the pin every time and they are good and they do it. That might have something to do with your earlier question. They all seem to be ready to win mentally. Q. Talk about the challenges of coming into this place and some of the feelings that you bring in with your previous successes here? BILL HAAS: Yeah, the course is ‑‑ the best part about it, it doesn't change much over the years. It's right there in front of you. The par3s are difficult. I think you've got to get those, No. 4, if you can play those well; the par 5s, obviously everybody takes advantage of those. But any time you play well anywhere, I think it helps you in the future years. You can draw back on it. You get off to a tough start, you can say, hey, you've been here, you've done it before, and it gives you the confidence that you can turn it around. And I think I like the fact that it won't be 20‑under this week that wins. And if you are 20‑under, you will win, I'll say. 69, 68 is a heck of a score around here. Q. How many names were on the plaque ‑‑ BILL HAAS: 22 I think. Q. Out often since you've won here have you tried that putt on 10; ever? BILL HAAS: I've probably tried it. Like today I probably hit a putt kind of back there. But the hole is not back there so you can't really putt to a certain hole. No, that was something I'll never forget, for sure, with it being against Phil and Keegan, and everyone was cheering for Phil; to be able to make that putt and have the quietest cheer ever‑‑ I don't know, it was a neat feeling for me, just to be in that playoff against those guys and execute like I wanted to. I didn't hit a great drive but I was able to get it on the green. Just really trying to 2‑putt, but for it to go in, those are the things that you do on the practice putting green, like, oh, I'm going to make this 30‑footer to win. You don't get many opportunities like that, so that was probably something I'll never forget; at this golf course, which is probably top three on Tour, for sure. Q. Is that as much fun, winning a tournament where they want the other guy to win, as wining one where they either don't care or want you to win? BILL HAAS: I'm just teasing a little bit about that. But he's certainly a crowd favorite on the West Coast and everywhere, really. I mean, why wouldn't you be? He's easy to be a fan favorite for. I think so. Certainly takes maybe a little pressure off. You just say, well, if he's supposed to win, match this. I think it gives you that little bit of an edge maybe. Maybe I had that a little bit on that put. But to be honest, I remember thinking, well, if I make four here, I can go to the next hole. I don't think anybody can make three. That was my mentality. For it to go in, that was, like I said, something I'll never forget. LAURA NEAL: Thanks and good luck this week. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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