U.S. SENIOR OPEN CHAMPIONSHIP

June 28, 1997

Johnny Miller

JOHNNY MILLER: It's a hard question, because part of me is a competitor, but part of me let the game go in 19 -- basically in 1989 in the fall. I knew the combination of my legs were not good, knees, lower legs, I had compartment syndrome and bad knees. I was having a lot of leg pain in the afternoons and evenings. I had to take a lot of Advil and stuff that wasn't good. Then my putting, I had the yips a little bit. And I did not like leaving home. When you have six kids, there's a certain responsibility to having that many children. You don't just have them and then say, well, you know, it was an accident. If you have that many, you have more responsibility to be a good father, I believe. You can fake it a little more with one or two I think. Six, there's all different kinds of needs there that are met at different years, the teenage years. So part of me did not want to go out on the road anymore for long extended periods that are required when you play the Tour. So, in the fall of '89, I said to my wife Linda, "The time is right. I feel good about it. I'm not going to tell anybody. I'm just going to walk away from the game." And it's funny, but a week later, I get a call from Larry Cirillo and he says, "If you want Trevino's job, you can have it." I says, "How do you know I even can do it? I've never done interviews. I've never been an announcer." But I didn't realize they were really desperate at that point. They'd asked about everybody. It was down to Hale Irwin and myself. So I ended up getting that and walked away from the game. I played basically one tournament a year in Pebble Beach Invitational which is not official, and I figured if it was at Pebble Beach, I'd play; if not, I won't. So, as far as a player again -- and I divorced myself from being a player, but now I sort of have to regroup again. I go around the course doing my yardages and the greens, and everybody goes, "You should be playing. You should be playing." Well, you know, somebody has to do my job. So, it's a bit of a war going on. There's a lot of people that like Johnny Miller as an announcer. It seems like an equal amount think I should be playing. So I have more of a problem with what they're thinking than what I'm thinking. So if you put it -- prioritize it, once you get to the golf department, my announcing takes a higher preference or priority than playing, but now that I'm 50, I feel a responsibility to the Senior Tour to support them a little bit because this is a pretty nice gig they've got going, and basically the Hale Irwins and Weiskopfs or Johnny Millers or whoever of the world, when they turn 50, they need to play a little to keep this thing going, right? So....

JOHNNY MILLER: I have July sort of blocked out. My idea of blocked out is not too blocked out, but I hope to play about 10 rounds -- I've only played about five rounds this year, so -- but I'm putting good. I actually am putting the best I've putted since I won at '94 at the AT&T. I got a new grip, and I went to a normal putter. And my putting right now, I have a little confidence in my putting, the first time in several years. So that's all I need is if I can just putt okay, I can compete out here. I don't really need to putt real well. I just need to putt average, and I can finish pretty high up because I know I can hit the ball good still. I still drive it well, and the Senior Tour basically patronizes good driving, long hitting. I'm a pretty long hitter by Senior standards, and my short irons are the strength of my game, so I know tee-to-green I'm there. I'm not too worried about that, even though I won't be able to practice much because of my knees. The cart will help. Just whether or not I'm competitive putting. If I'm not, I have no chance. You cannot be competitive no matter how good you hit it if you don't putt on a certain level. I'm feeling pretty good about my putting, trying to convince myself, instead of always saying how bad I putt. To answer your question, I'm going to play at least 10 to 12 rounds before I tee it up. The Park City thing, I don't expect too much. Hopefully by the Transamerica, which is in October, the next one will be in October. So I will have a break from end of July, I'm going to play the Shell's Wonderful World of Golf on about the 25th against Nicklaus at Olympic Club which will be fun. I picked that date because I'll have played Park Meadows for the Franklin Quest. I don't want to look too sloppy. I don't want to shoot a 78 or something. So that will be fun. And then I'll play a few this fall, and I got invited to the Wendy's Three-Tour Challenge and I also got invited to Lexus and got invited to -- there's one other one like that -- no, not Shark. I have never got invited by Greg Norman. I didn't say that.

JOHNNY MILLER: I don't agree with any of that, if you want to know the truth. I think the Senior Tour is very healthy. The only problem the Senior Tour has if we happen to get unlucky where Palmer, let's say, decided to retire and Nicklaus did the same thing and Trevino maybe wasn't feeling well and Chi Chi decided not to play. If we lost -- there's a core group, as you know, that transcend performance. It's nice to have those guys performing, but the bottom line is, kind of like Frank Sinatra when he sings. He may not sing as well, but you want to go see how he's doing. Those guys transcend their play that's how you know you're a real superstar. We need those guys around, not all the time, but you need to have them around. Hopefully, we don't lose them. Hopefully, they keep playing and having a good time, and they seem to be doing that. Then young guns as they come in like myself, Larry Nelson, Hubert Green, Hale Irwin, these guys as they come online, those are the stars just because you know who they are. So, hopefully they smile a little and have a good time with the gallery, which I will do. I will probably be just one notch off what Chi Chi does. When I go out there now, I'm going to have a good time and really talk to the gallery, smile a lot, you know, yuk it up a bit. Play hard when it's my turn to hit, but I've learned that this is not all me and selfishness of what I'm going to shoot. There is a little bit of entertainment value that goes -- in other words, I see the game of golf from a whole different perspective. When I was younger, my dad taught me to pull the hat down a certain way, put the glove on a certain way, squint my eyes, set my jaw a certain way and take it pretty seriously, and it worked. But, there's a time in your career when you need to -- since you're not the gun you once was, I think you need to loosen up and be a little entertaining, like Fuzzy. Fuzzy, to me, is a perfect role model on the course. Perfect. I think that he was -- I tell my kids -- you know, he had that incident, which was very unfortunate, but when I tell my kids: You want to see a guy that's always positive, forgets the bad shots, has a good time, enjoys the gallery, always has time for everybody. That was the role model I wanted you guys. Peter Jacobsen's another one. Those are my role models. Not the super good players. My role model is Peter Jacobsen and Fuzzy. I hope I play well. You have to play well, too.

JOHNNY MILLER: No. I think the USGA is -- it's amazing to me how together the USGA is on course setup. It's just incredible. They have this thing fine-tuned where they've got the Senior Tour, they picked the courses right, set them up right. You can see the scoring this week is perfect. You see a couple weeks ago at the U.S. Open, the Ladies Open. They've got this thing where it's just right, and I think the way they've -- they're playing it is good. I think being within 10 shots of the lead is good. This is a tournament that should mimic a national championship, and it is. It shouldn't be where the guys got the shorts on and riding around with the fans on the cart and, you know, it's a serious championship. You have to be a little bit in shape I think. I think it's good. The way they've got this tournament, I really enjoy it. I'm not saying I would enjoy quote/unquote the way I'm playing right now playing in this tournament on this course, but establish who's got the best insides, who's got the best game right now, the way the USGA sets up the Senior Open is really good. And you'll watch the next two days the pressure and how it will weed out everybody but maybe the few stout ones, the guys -- the John Blands will probably -- they're already surfaced, but those kind of players that are tough players, good solid players, no weaknesses will win or contend anyway.

JOHNNY MILLER: Uh-huh.

JOHNNY MILLER: Well, look at how quickly Gil Morgan and Hale Irwin -- whether they love the Tour or not, they're out here, aren't they? I mean, if you're looking at it for, you know, being the man and wanting to make a few bucks, this Tour, it's actually better than the other one when you get to that age. I mean, Gil Morgan was competitive and Hale Irwin technically was competitive, but those guys if they were on the regular Tour would be making 300 grand a year, and these guys are a million dollar plus bonus babies, you know, out here. Plus you get a chance to contend about every other event. There's a lot of fun in getting into the heat of the battle on the last day. I don't care if you're playing in the Hershey Bar Open. I mean, it is fun to be contending even if it's with your friends, you know, the club championship. So, the bottom line is that's the thrill is having the chance to make the winning putt or winning shot. I'm sure some of them play for the money, and hopefully a lot of them play for the thrill of victory. You know, I'm going to try to take away the money aspect because I'm just -- the money I make on the Senior Tour is going to go to junior golf. I'm trying to -- my dream is to take some of my own money and some of the money I make and build a golf course that are just for kids. And so that's my -- my motivation is to play well enough so that I can either keep this thing running, because it's going to lose its shirt, but I want to do that. I feel like that's my -- I've already organized the Junior Golf Association in Utah, and I have my own Junior Golf Foundation now. I help some other charities. That's my main emphasis is for the kids in golf. I'm hoping if I do this near one of the major cities like in the Bay Area or Salt Lake, that that will help the inner city kids and help kids that are less fortunate, and hopefully Nicklaus will want to do one and Norman will want to do one, and they'll all want to do one. My hope is that I can -- that's the only way the game is going to be brought to all the kids if they've got a place to go for no greens fees, maybe they'll learn the jobs at the course, and I feel really strongly about that. So, hopefully I'll get better bounces because of that, too.

JOHNNY MILLER: Well, I'm going to give it that good run in October and November. I'm going to play the Transamerica, Raley's in Sacramento. The next, I think there's a Hawaii tournament in there, and then Ralphs in L.A. and then play in the Floyd one, and there's a couple other little invitationals, so I'll play at those. If my knees aren't squawking too much -- because part of me wants to go run like I did when I first went on the Tour, I used to get up at 5 in the morning, I was doing push-ups and sit-ups and ran five miles on the beach and went and played at seven o'clock at Olympic Club every morning. I was fired up and ready to go when I went on the Tour. Part of me wants to duplicate that like I did when I was 20, 21. Every time I go to hit 200 balls, I almost die that night. It's a problem. My brain is still feeling young. My knees and legs aren't too good. I don't know if I can practice too much tee-to-green, but I have no excuse not to work on my hundred yards in and my putting. That's the part of my game that needs work anyway. If I'm spending time in that area, I probably will be -- if I could get that part of my game where it should be, I should be quite successful, because it's not like I can't beat Hale Irwin if I'm on. Obviously, I won the '94 AT&T and I played one tournament in the year. I have some ability in there. You don't just waltz out on the regular Tour with no practice and win if you don't have some ability. So I know that I might not be consistent, but I know if I'm on for a week, I can still win just walking out the door. That's a pretty big "if," but it's possible. It's not like I choke down the stretch is what I'm trying to say.

JOHNNY MILLER: Well, the Open is always going to be the hardest event for Tiger. It was an interesting strategy he went with -- I don't know if I really agree with the strategy he used at the Open. What he did is it's like having a real -- the fastest car by far, the most horsepower and then saying, okay, this track -- we're just going to take the horsepower down to where everybody else is and just keep it on the track. It sounds pretty good for having a chance to win going down the stretch, but what he's done is the secret in winning and winning consistently is you've got to feel like you're either smarter or you work harder, you hit the ball farther, you have better technique. You have to feel like -- what do you think Jack Nicklaus felt like when he showed up a week earlier than everybody at every Major? What do you think that maybe signaled in his brain? I'm supposed to win. I'm the only guy here. I'm already the best player. So, Tiger's strategy to me, all he did was -- I would have liked the strategy if he would have used it more like 70 percent of the time instead of basically 100 percent of the time. I would like on certain holes that felt comfortable turn it loose. If you hit it in the rough, you're down there so far, you can still hit a wedge and muscle it up on the grass around the green. If you hit the fairway, then fine; now I have an advantage. But, I thought he took away his advantage too much, and he became just another player that was having a good week with the driver. He was just another player, because technically, if you put Tiger Woods out there 180 yards, he's just another player. He's not like at 180 is any better than anybody else. In fact, he might not even be as good as some of the guys with their irons. His advantage, of course, is muscling around the course. You give him a quote/unquote B course on Tour where he can turn it loose, if he's on, he's going to win. He's going to win a ton of PGA events because of his length. But so I would say at the Open was close to a good strategy. If I was caddying for him, I would have made him use the 3-wood more instead of 2-ironing it more. That's my own opinion. I love watching him, though, and it's fun to debate what he should and shouldn't do. If he's using the driver all the time, I would probably be the first one to say, "You play too aggressively." There's a fine line there. Nicklaus would pick a spot. He wouldn't hit a 1-iron off every tee. He was pretty good in the Majors, wasn't he?

JOHNNY MILLER: No, I don't think it's true at all. I feel like I have more of a heartbeat of kids and collegiate golf than maybe anybody on Tour. I go to all these tournaments with all my four sons. So I go to collegiate events, I go to amateur events, I go to junior events, I run the Johnny Miller, Jr. I mean, these kids are no -- I mean, there's going to be some new kids coming in that have no clue, but the core group is as well behaved and together as it's ever been in history. We run these tournaments; we don't even have an incident. We used to have more incidences, actually. I mean, that Lanny Wadkins, Curtis Stranges of the world would be helicoptering clubs all over the place. We don't have that. In fact, the junior tournaments, the junior tournaments now, if you throw a club, you're out of there. It didn't use to be that way. It used to be like Conners and McEnroe and Nastase time, you know. I remember the first time I watched Arnold Palmer play at the Lucky at Harding, at least three times he buried it down past the hosel. I mean, here's the guy worried about that. I was just about a 10-year-old when I watched it. Saying, "I guess that's what you do when you miss an iron, huh, Dad?" My dad says, "No, you don't need to do that."

JOHNNY MILLER: Yeah, almost every Tour events gives me the sad song, you know. But, I made a promise about a year ago that my first one would be that Utah tournament, because I'm still honorary chairman of the Utah Junior Golf and helped form it, and I'm involved with the Utah golf, and I'm there at the Utah Open every year. I'm very involved in Utah golf, and I thought, well, to promote -- they were having a little trouble with that tournament anyway. I thought maybe if my debut is there, it will push their tournament up a little bit, and it will be good for them, and I'll have fun, too. A lot of these tournaments wanted me to take advantage of the fact that I just turned 50, and it was tempting, but I made this promise that that would be my debut, and even though I hedged a little bit, I said, "Well, what the heck. My word is my word. I'm going to stay with the plan." I'm happy that I did because I wasn't really ready. I really won't even be ready for that one, but who knows, maybe there will be some magic. I'm hoping my attitude is good and I won't be too nervous. Do you guys have any pills for nervousness? Have any Beta blockers or something? I don't know what I need. This tournament next year, this is a very big temptation to me basically to get down on my knees to Dick Ebersol and say -- or Tommy Roy and say, "I have to play Riviera." That was my favorite -- besides Pebble, as a player, my most consistent play is at Riviera. Every year at Riviera, I had a shot, or I felt like I did. I won there in I think it was '81. Should have won in '82. I lost in a playoff to Watson. I love that course. It's a ball-striker's course. You have to work the ball, tiny greens. It would be tough for me to do the announcing next year. Especially when I'll be more in the groove. I might see if I can play and announce which doesn't usually work, but, you know, maybe I could do that. Nobody has ever won and announced. That would be fun. That would be cool. Hit the club. Give me that mike, "Hey, that wasn't too bad, was it, folks?" "Oh, am I choking. Do I have to putt this?"

JOHNNY MILLER: No. The only regret I've got is when I got here and everybody is basically saying, "We wanted to watch you. You need to play. Why aren't you here? You should be playing." And I'm thinking, Well, maybe I should. I don't know. But, I take my NBC, USGA package very seriously. Maybe that sounds corny, but to -- to you guys, but to me, the chance to do our national championships is every bit as interesting and rewarding as playing. Now, you might say, that can't be, but it is. I'm telling you when I do the U.S. Open, I am pumped. It's like I'm playing again. And I know that, you know, it's history, and somebody's got to make it -- the tournament's compelling on its own, but I think it needs to have good announcers. So the NBC team really takes it seriously. We do all that coverage, and so I'm happy doing the announcing. I've accepted the fact I'm an announcer, so it's taken awhile. It took me about five years before I finally could walk up to a tournament and go, yeah, I'm the lead analyst for NBC. For a long time, it was like, I should be playing, I think. You know, it was hard. Now, Curtis is fighting that I think. You guys have talked to him. It's hard because he wants to play and announce. He can't hardly do it.

JOHNNY MILLER: It's incredible. I mean, when I do outings now or do store appearances for Callaway, I mean, I do 46 corporate outings a year, this year I do. I mean, a lot of them -- several -- and I do about five or six freebies, but I do about 50 of them total. Mostly in the West. I have my own plane now, so it's not too tough. But when I do it, that's all they want to talk about. They want to know about Tiger. That's the guy, and it's -- I haven't heard that kind of response -- there was some excitement when Crenshaw came out. It was excitement -- obviously Nicklaus was there. It got exciting once they accepted him. It was similar to what Arnold was. I had my run. Trevino had an exciting time. Watson had a good time. But I've never seen it where kids, they think he's a kid. That's a big advantage. In other words, the kids think he's a kid. So it's like he's one of them, and what he wears and how he carries himself and how hard he swings, the junior golfers -- you know, I do a lot of lessons with the kids, and they want to know why Tiger hits it so far. Why does he do that. And I analyzed his swing and found some reasons why he does, and they get a kick out of it, you know. So, Tiger's a good impact. He's made a few bogeys, but that's going to happen. When he gets interviewed about everything he does, the Esquire thing, all those things, those things are going to happen. You know, so I think all in all he's got at least a A-minus so far, which is great at 21. Most guys at 21 and at best will get a B on interviews. I think the guy is really good. Don't you think so? He handles himself real well.

JOHNNY MILLER: The only thing I think that's going to really help him is he has some goals that are incredible. I never really had goals like that. You know, I had a run that was Tigeresque in a way. Starting in '73 -- '73, in the summer of '73, I won the Open up through the British Open in '76, I had a heck of a run, and I was going against some guys that were a lot more guns than he's playing up against. I had Nicklaus in his prime and Trevino and Weiskopf and Irwin and Floyd and a whole ton of other guys and Player and name them. There was 12 guys that you didn't want to meet in a dark alley with golf clubs. Now it's more like a little easier for him. I think Tiger in some ways, the players are better, but he doesn't seem to have the real guns that were in the game. I thought that was the golden era of golf was mid-'70s. It was just full of super players. Not too many good players, but super players. Tiger has got these great goals and ambitions to win maybe beat, surpass Nicklaus' records, which is really hard to do at the quality of play now. I think that that's going to push him past the fact that he's super rich, and there's a lot of pain in the butt stuff with you guys and the fans he has to deal with. I don't want to say that negative. I'm one of them, too. He has to put up with me too. A lot of guys that are worried about what I'm saying when they 5-putt the 18th green, you know. But, I think Tiger's goals are so good and established and firm that he's not going to get as burned out as easy because he has this long, bigger picture, where I was just playing year to year. I got burned out with all the kids I was having. If he were to get married and have kids right away, it's very difficult to stay hungry when that baby comes out, that's a heck of a lot nicer and more important than your golf game. As soon as you establish that being a father is a lot bigger deal than golfing. It's very tough to keep the priority where you're supposed to, and it softens you. That's what happened to me. I got softened by the family, which is good. I'm happy about that. A lot better than ignoring my family and going and playing golf every day. So, a lot will depend on what happens with marriage and kids and all that stuff.

JOHNNY MILLER: The players want to see me come out because they want to see me screw up. They all wish they had a mike and go, "Hey, Johnny, nice putt. Little yipper there, huh?" Actually, they want me to come out. They also, in one way, can't wait, you know, when you get behind the mike -- even though as many times as I say on the air how crappy my putting is and I'm glad I'm not putting that, they still want to see me quote/unquote embarrass myself in front of a TV camera. But, no, the players have been really nice. Most of them have been really nice. I have a few that aren't real thrilled with me, but not too bad. Most of the guys are looking forward to me coming out, at least they're saying that, and it seems like I can usually feel from their heart that they're not just saying it with their lips. Yeah, they think it would be cool having me out.

JOHNNY MILLER: Well, I mean, it would have made me feel worse if the guys were 12-under because I know I couldn't shoot 12-under. When I looked at this course and analyzed it the first couple days in practice, I said: Even par is going to win this thing. Anything under par is going to just be that big of a victory margin. Somebody might get to 6-under, but I don't think the next guy is going to do better than even. So, the bottom line is I know this is a hard course. I established maybe what I could have shot if I had my game in gear, and basically I guess that's how I analyze what it's going to take to win. I'm looking and I'm saying if I shot four 70s, I would be jumping up and down and I'd be holding that trophy. That's how I figure it. Somebody might have a magical weekend, but if you look at 2-under leading one guy, and it's a guy that's had trouble bringing it to the barn, so to speak, he's only won once on the Senior Tour. Kermit is a good player, but you have to think that if Kermit were to shoot 71, 71, I think that will do it. In a way, that's good because I feel like if I had a good week, I could maybe shoot even par. If they were 12-under, I would probably stick to announcing. I appreciate you guys' time. Have a great weekend.