Q. Do you feel like you are rated on the brink of cashing in?
PAT BATES: I feel like I am. I have been playing well. I am on a pretty good run here. I have made like 8 out of 9 cuts or 9 out of 10 cuts. This is my eighth tournament in a row so I have played quite a bit. Usually you get pretty tired after playing that many in a row, but I have been taking it easy on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday in between tournaments. I am real sharp with every part of my game except for maybe some of my short putting that I am going to go work on.
But yeah, it is a great challenge to try to win out here on the PGA TOUR. I have been able to win out on the BUY.COM Tour last year three times. Obviously this is a step up. But if you look at all the guys that have won out there and come out here, the new winner has got to come from somewhere. I feel like I am playing very well and I'd love to have a chance with nine holes to go. I think you have done your job if you are in position to win with nine holes to go. I am hoping to get in that position. I was in Memphis, I think I was one shot back with four to play and made a few bogeys. I have been close this year. I have been close. I just need to get there again.
Q. What exactly has been going well with you of late and where did you make your birdies in today's round?
PAT BATES: I have been hitting the ball very well. Tee-to-green I think yesterday I hit 17 greens. Today I hit 16 greens. So hitting the ball well, and I made my birdies -- started on 10 I believe I parred 10, 11, 12, and 13.
Birdied 14. Made about a 12-footer from the fringe.
16 I had about 8-footer for birdie.
17, I hit a nice 5-iron behind the hole about 6, seven feet. Made that.
18, bogey, it barely caught the bunker off the tee, half a foot left. It would have kicked off the bunker been in the fairway. So had a tough shot. Left it -- hit short of the green. I chipped it over in the bunker, actually got up-and-down for bogey. That wasn't a very good bogey.
Hit 2 really good shots on 1, driver and 3-wood on the fringe, 2-putted for birdie.
And then I came right back and had a really long putt on 2, about 80-footer, 3-putted it:
Parred the next. Made about 6-footer on 4 for birdie.
Then came right back on 5. Good tee shoot, 8-iron about 35-footer, ran it by, 3-putted.
So I was a little bit frustrated walking to the 6th tee. Then I hit a perfect drive and 9-iron just right at it about a foot. I came back with a birdie there on 6. Made a about 10-footer on 7. And then 8 is playing tough, back left pin, hit a really good 5-iron made 15-footer for birdie there.
9th hole I played real well, 3-wood right down the middle, 6-iron right at it, about 15 feet short, missed the putt. But birdied three out of my last four, kind of mission accomplished on the last four holes.
Q. You left a few out 12 and 13 -- (inaudible)?
PAT BATES: I didn't birdie 12 or 13.
Q. (Inaudible)?
PAT BATES: Actually this summer I shot 64 the third round at Hartford which was my career low. Then 63 in Memphis, second round, then I shot 62 at the John Deere on my birthday on the second round. So I have been-- obviously I have got a good trend going on my career low. I don't know if those kind of scores are out there this week.
Q. They have been here before?
PAT BATES: Yes, they have, but I think there's enough tough holes on this golf course where you don't seem to have a lot of 2-putt birdies unless you can drag it on the green 14, 13. You can seem to really go low on the back nine if you can get it going, that 12, 13, 14, stretch, yeah, guys I know -- Billy Mayfair shot 28, something like that. 27 on the back nine. Yeah, so it's out there. The weather is perfect.
Q. (Inaudible)?
PAT BATES: There are some low scores out here. I think the greens are probably just fast enough -- I don't know, I would anticipate some low scores this afternoon definitely.
Q. (Inaudible)?
PAT BATES: Matthew 633 - (inaudible) Kingdom of God is his righteousness and all your drive will be in the fairway -- (laughter) - No, and everything will be fine. That's kind of my life's verse. I have been broke so many times playing the Buy.com Tour - (inaudible) help me pay the bills. Pressure winning four events is good pressure. I call pressure when you got $4,000 worth of bills and a thousand in your account. That's pressure to me. So this is going to be fun this weekend.
Q. In your bio you started as a pro in the Canadian Tour. Talk a little bit about that and what do you remember about that Tour?
PAT BATES: I played the Canadian Tour '92 and '93. Chris DiMarco and I were up there. I think he won the order of merit, another college golf teammate Jeff Barlow, I travelled with. I had great memories up there. Golf courses were excellent. Good experience played four rounds, cut, walk, and played well, and that's kind of how it started, putting (inaudible) on my golf balls, I was in third place in one of the tournaments playing the last day, and hit my second shot to the right on the 10th hole, we were looking for it, and right before five minutes, hit it, hit it again, got it to the green. I look at the ball and it was an old mangled up ball. Obviously not my ball. I actually done that twice in college - with my golf coach, Buddy Alexander, I hit the wrong ball twice. So I figured something needed a change, and it only took me one time as a pro to figure that out. And yeah, so that's why I put scriptures on the ball to identify it.
Q. Do you remember what tournament it was?
PAT BATES: Yeah, I think it was in Winnipeg. I think it was the Manitoba Open.
Q. Did you qualify yourself that day?
PAT BATES: I had to go back for a two-shot penalty for a lost ball; two-shot penalty for a wrong ball, made a 10. I was in third place. Obviously came off the leaderboard. Cost me about 10 grand. But haven't done it since.
End of FastScripts....
