	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

SHELL HOUSTON OPEN

March 29, 2017

Adam Scott

Humble, Texas

JOHN BUSH: We'd like to welcome Adam Scott into the interview room. He's the 2007 Shell Houston Open champion, making his first start here since 2010. Adam, welcome back. If we can get some comments on coming back here to the Golf Club of Houston.

ADAM SCOTT: Thank you. It's obviously always good to come back to a golf course that you've had some success on, and it's been a few years, but very happy to work this back into my schedule this past year.

The course is just as I remember it, in fantastic condition, going to be very enjoyable playing on these surfaces. Even though we're getting some rain, I think it will hold up well. It was very firm out there. If this is all we get today, we're going to have a really great week. I'm excited to try to play well. Obviously everyone who is playing next week has that in the back of their minds and would love to take some nice form in with me.

JOHN BUSH: Talk a little bit about the state of your game and also your season up to this point before we open it up for questions.

ADAM SCOTT: I've had a fairly quiet 2017. I've played three events over here. Played fairly average tee to green by my standards. My short game has actually been the one thing I've been quite pleased with. If I can bring the striking up to where it's at, which I feel like it's pretty much there, then I feel like I can do some good things the next couple of weeks.

JOHN BUSH: Questions.

Q. Jordan said earlier that he called Dustin Johnson's explosion. Have you been surprised where he's at now and what do you think about what he's doing now?
ADAM SCOTT: Dustin?

Q. Yes.
ADAM SCOTT: I'm not really surprised because we've known he's kind of the whole package for a long time. And don't know exactly what he's done to put it all together, but occasionally we do that as golfers. And, you know, to be able to keep it going is the hardest thing, and so far he's on a three-tournament winning stretch, and that's pretty impressive. Not many guys win three in a row. We'll see if he keeps it going. Obviously he's got to be feeling incredibly confident. That's a great place to be.

Q. That said, you've won there and he hasn't. You've won at Augusta, he hasn't. Jordan has won at Augusta and Dustin hasn't.
Is it oversimplifying things to go into the Masters saying that this is his tournament, this is Dustin Johnson's tournament?

ADAM SCOTT: Yeah, absolutely. It's far from that at this point. You know, the game changes so quickly with this stuff. Back in January everyone would have had Hideki and Justin Thomas win the tournament. Now clearly Dustin is playing better. There's this group of players, I don't know the number we'll put on it, 10, 15 guys who if they play really well can control the golf tournament.

You kind of look at Jordan, Rory McIlroy is No. 2 in the world. You can't just breeze past him. He's won four Major championships. He would win the Career Slam if he wins. He's got to be incredibly motivated.

Q. When did you make the decision to add this tournament back into your schedule and what are you hoping to get playing this week that you haven't gotten the last few years practicing at home?
ADAM SCOTT: Yeah, just to get some good work done here this week I think is really what I hope to get out of it. I wished we'd had a better afternoon so I could do a little work. So I'm half a day out of work on my plan. But, you know, I haven't played a lot of golf and, you know, I spent enough time on the range the last few weeks, I want to get out there and play and try and get sharp on the golf course, and I felt I might have lacked that if I hadn't played this week going into the Masters.

So, you know, I think my game is all in good shape. I just got to try to put it all together.

Q. I guess what was -- what were you weighing in terms of skipping last week that you decided to play this week instead for your --
ADAM SCOTT: Look, my family has been down in Australia, so until now I've been going back to Australia on my off weeks, and it's not that easy to just pop over for a week here and there and also trying to balance getting to see them as best I can.

This year the schedule is a little bit funny with my wife being pregnant, where she can and can't travel to. A few logistical things like that. That also made this become very easy for me to put on the schedule and change things up, and it's part of my plan for the rest of the year is to play the week before the Majors and doing something a little different than I have the past few years.

But there are lots of different things to consider, too. I have two caddies on the bag, and I got to make sure that where my game is at before going to the toughest test in golf. It's important that Steve sees me play this week and doesn't come in blind going to Augusta.

Q. Obviously there's no perfect way to plan for a Masters. You tried it both ways. How did you play when you won here in 2010?
ADAM SCOTT: In '07? When I won I think I made the cut. I don't know. I finished 30th, probably.

Q. You played the course yesterday?
ADAM SCOTT: Yeah.

Q. You got a feel for it. You've been around a lot of golf course that's have been rained on. Just based on what you've seen of the storm this morning, do you see it having any impact at this point?
ADAM SCOTT: It's going to soften it a little bit. Of course this amount of rain will. But it started out very firm and firery. I mean the greens were very quick in practice and quite firm to hit into. So, I don't think this course is going to be a pushover this week at all. However, it's softening up, and because they keep the rough fairly short here, you know, the stray tee shots aren't too severely punished, which is also nice because you want to be able to play a little bit, you know, that week before Augusta. And if you're just off, you're not punished and the confidence doesn't get hit.

Q. Would the greens here be more representative of Augusta, bone dry as opposed to being softer?
ADAM SCOTT: Speed-wise, absolutely.

Q. Sunday with no rain --
ADAM SCOTT: I don't think they'll have a problem with the speed of the greens any day. Obviously, they're just going to get softer, receive shots, and that's probably going to affect the scoring a little bit because the ball won't take that first firm bounce. I expect scoring to be pretty good at least for the first couple of days.

Q. More fun though, right?
ADAM SCOTT: Absolutely.

Q. Adam, the way this golf course is manicured as far as greens and chipping areas, you use that as a way to prepare for next week?
ADAM SCOTT: Yeah. I think that's the biggest thing is very similar kinds of grass on and around the greens and the way it was with the firmness, the position of a strike is so important, spin control, all those kind of things. That's been fun the last couple of days, chipping around the greens, and even on the practice green on the range being able to work on it and feeling like this is also being very productive for going to the Masters next week.

Definitely has that kind of feeling, and the more familiar you can get with that, the better. Of course, when you get there, it's slightly different. It's a different golf course, got a lot more severe slope on the greens, but at least you're working on the right kind of thing.

JOHN BUSH: All right. Anything else? All right. Short and sweet. Adam Scott, thank you, sir. Best of luck this week.

ADAM SCOTT: Thank you.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297