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THE PRESIDENTS CUP

September 26, 2017

Jason Day

Jersey City, New Jersey

Q. How does it feel to be back in the Presidents Cup in such an exciting city?
JASON DAY: It's exciting. Looking forward to it. We have a good team. I think the guys are all starting to become really good friends, which is great, because we're starting to feel comfortable with each other which is nice.

You know, coming into this week, obviously it's going to be a tough match against the United States as it always is, especially on their home soil in the backyard of New York City. That's always tough. But looking forward to a good week and hopefully we can rally and give them a good show and hopefully pull one out for the guys.

Q. You had such a great tournament two years ago, and you made such huge progress. How much have you talked about that?
JASON DAY: That's the biggest thing for us is that, you know what, I said it morning, on paper, we are not the best team. The Americans are. I don't know what the last guy is in the World Ranking on the American side, but they are very accomplished.

I said this morning, I don't think we've got a lot of pressure because I think a lot of people are kind of writing us off already, and we're all solid players. On our weeks, we can beat anyone, and that goes throughout the whole team here.

So I think if we can get off to a great start with the alternate-shot; the alternate-shot has always killed us in the past. If we can play well in the alternate-shot, I think we've got a really good shot at winning. Because the point changes went from, I think 30-something down to 30, which has helped a lot and narrowed that gap in competition-wise.

So hopefully we just have a really good, solid, competitive week.

Q. How much does it hurt if you lose and how much will it mean to win?
JASON DAY: Well, I let the team down two years ago in Korea. I didn't have a good Presidents Cup and it was close. If I actually played well, we probably would have had a good shot at winning. Unfortunately I take the blame for that. I didn't play good. I was ranked No. 1 on the team for a reason, and I didn't show up.

So that was my fault and I felt like I let the guys down, a lot, two years ago. I'm hoping that I can redeem myself this week. It would be nice to be able to get more than the points that I got back in 2015.

I'm just trying to do the best job I can to prep for this week.

Q. Before this event starts on Thursday, the National Anthem is going to be played. There's some discussion about how the American Team goes about that. Given what happened in the NFL over the weekend -- you've made your home here. What do you make of what happened?
JASON DAY: I can't get into politics. That question is way above my pay grade and I'm just trying to, my main focus is to try to beat the American side. I mean, they can do whatever feel like they want to do but right now I'm trying to make sure that our team is ready to take on this team that's have I tough. That is way above my pay grade with that question, so I've just got to keep quiet on that one.

Q. Adam was saying the optimism and attitude is at an all-time high.
JASON DAY: Definitely. I guess we know that we have a shot at winning if we play well. 2015 was a huge indication of that, and I think we come into this week feeling a lot better about ourselves knowing that we do have an opportunity to beat the American side, even though they have pretty much -- it's been one sided throughout the years.

I mean, last time we won was 1998. If we can pull off a win here, this is going to be one for the ages for our team because it's been a long time since we've won.

Like Adam said, the team room's different. The atmosphere is different. Everyone is kind of light and cheery. Obviously it's kind of quieting down over the week, but I still think it's going to have that same feeling just because I think we're all good friends. We're all good mates.

For some reason, I just don't feel like the guys are too nervous about the week. I think they are just going to go in there and embrace the moment and go from there.

Q. Do you feel you have a better opportunity than in past years --
JASON DAY: With the points system, it was always hard. When you have to play -- it's hard to say because I think a couple years ago, I think the No. 12 guy was No. 60-something in the world. I think the American side, was like maybe 20th in the world.

If every guy has to play -- I'm not saying that, like, our guys are worse than those guys. It's just pure ranking systems. That's just facts. With this wind change in the point system, and it happened to The Ryder Cup, as well, at some point and they changed the point system over time, and they found a formula that actually kind of quite worked.

Now they have a boatload of great players in Europe. For us, I think that points system has kind of narrowed that gap in a little bit, hopefully. We still have to go out there and play well. But there's an opportunity for us to capitalize on, and if we can do that early on in the week -- because we actually played really well in the singles two years ago. It's really anyone's game if we can all put our minds together and actually be aggressive with the alternate-shot.

Q. Can you talk about your own game and where you are, and what did you see in the FedExCup Playoffs in your game and are things starting to settle down a little bit?
JASON DAY: Yeah, I think things are starting to settle down a little bit. Actually I'm enjoying the golf again, which is nice. My chipping, my putting, my wedges, are all starting to come back in line. The last thing is my driving. I think if I can get that down, that I'll get back to the form that I was in 2015 and 2016.

But, saying that, I think I'm in good form coming into this week and I'm actually looking forward to playing the formats. I'm hoping, I don't know if -- when does Nick pick the teams? Tomorrow? So Wednesday. So I really won't say anything right now about the teams.

But I feel like I've got a good partner starting Thursday.

Q. Do you feel like even though this is a home game for the U.S., with the melting pot in New York City --
JASON DAY: There's lots of different types of cultures and different types of nationalities that run through this city. I saw a lot of Australians out there today and a lot of supporters of the International Team. And even the Americans, they are going to support us. You'll hear a few hecklers out there but that's a given. Every week we have that.

It's definitely going to be heavily favored to the United States, but, I mean, we understand that. I think we've just got to go out there and just embrace it. We can't really get too into what's being said out there or who they are cheering for. We've just got to try to stay in our lane and hopefully get things done.

Q. How would you describe your practice round?
JASON DAY: Yeah, the practice round was quite good. I mean, I played with Leishman, Anirban Lahiri and Adam Hadwin. I've known those guys; me and Lahiri and Leishman played on The Presidents Cup team two years ago. Hadwin is new to the game, so it was good to be able to catch up with him and get to know him a lot more.

Going out there and playing 18 holes today, I think we lost, so we didn't end up winning any money. So I'm a little disappointed about that. Have to shell out a few dollars for that. It was a great day. We had some good weather, and I'm looking forward to tomorrow' s practice session again and hopefully getting into this tournament.

Q. Can you talk about the first hole, walking up to the tee, the first shot, any nerves?
JASON DAY: Well, saying that, I think it's going to be a lot more -- I'm going to try and get my partner to hit it first. Because it is, it quite tight down there. You're hitting, for me, it's a 2-iron. You're hitting 2-iron down there, you've probably got a 9-iron in.

So it's quite a tight tee shot. With people all the way around you, it's going to get really loud there really quickly. We should have some of the Fanatics in town, so that should be hopefully something to counteract the United States fans. It will be nerve-wracking on the first tee, I guarantee it. It feels like everyone is on top of you already, so when that happens, it's always cool to see.

Q. Was your partner in the game?
JASON DAY: Leishman.

Q. Jumping ahead -- Royal Melbourne in two years --
JASON DAY: Yeah, that's something that we're looking forward to. I think if we keep playing the way we're playing, we might have the same team as we have here. That's just something that we can always grow on top of. It's always good to go back to Australia and play. We had it back in 2013, I believe, yeah -- 2011, sorry. We did get beat down there. I feel pretty bad about that because we kind of grew up on that kind of style of golf course. The Americans played phenomenal around there.

We won the World Cup there. Me and Scotty won the World Cup around that golf course. Myself, Leish, Scotty, we've kind of all grew up playing those golf courses, so we're very used to it. Something like if there was Adam or Hideki or even Gracey, those guys, they didn't grow up playing that golf course. So it's kind of like links but you've got to be creative, as well, in a sense. But there's usually like a lot of wind.

Yeah, it's tough to get used to.

Q. Playing later in the year --
JASON DAY: We're going to play in December, I think, which will be very hot. Really hot. It will be hot. It might be getting up in the upper 90s sometimes if it's in December. Yeah, it will definitely be around the 90-mark. That being said, the ball is going to go very far and if it's dry, it's going to, we'll be hitting different clubs to what we were probably hitting back when we did play it in 2011.

Q. You mentioned the support. How is your mom?
JASON DAY: She's coming along. I talk to her every other week. I'm going to go down to play the Australian Open, so I'll see her there. We FaceTime every so often. She's always getting scans to make sure that she's okay. Fingers crossed, everything is moving in the right direction. And then I'm going to bring her back over here to get the proper scans again at the same place that she had her surgery at.

We're in that monitoring stage, and hopefully that she feels better over, you know, this period and it doesn't come back, fingers crossed.

Q. Last time, you had five wins and a major, similar to Justin. Do you feel like maybe looking back on it now, do you think you were overgolfed at The Presidents Cup?
JASON DAY: I was definitely burnt out. Unfortunately the last thing that was on my mind was, you know, playing The Presidents Cup after quite a big stretch. I think I won four tournaments in six weeks, and mentally, I just kind of wanted a break and it was just tough for me to lift myself up.

I went there -- that shouldn't be an excuse. It shouldn't be an excuse. I played poorly. I was coming off a good second half of the year stretch, and I should have showed up, and unfortunately, I didn't.

Q. Not to take anything away from the talent you guys have on your team, but is it fair to look at you guys as underdogs?
JASON DAY: Yeah, definitely.

Q. But can you use that to some degree?
JASON DAY: Yeah, I think, you know, I honestly feel like this could be like anyone's tournament. I mean, these guys, they have a very deep team. The way they have played, with Jordan and Justin, I think they have had, what, nine wins, or eight wins together combined. That's already deep with those just two names straight off the bat. Let alone having a Phil Mickelson who has been on 23 straight teams, and that experience, as well.

It's going to be tough, I know. It's going to be hard. Like I said earlier, I explained that, you know, most people are writing us off already. They think that the Americans are always going to win, which takes a lot of pressure for us; if we're looking at it that way, there's no pressure on us. We just have to go out and play and be aggressive.

Q. You mentioned Mickelson. How impressive is it to be in form for that many in a row, and will we ever see a number like that again?
JASON DAY: Granted, we are talking about one of the best players that ever lived. There's a lot that you couldn't put past Phil because of the amazing accomplishments he's had in his career. I mean, that is probably one of the best accomplishments that you could probably have in and amongst your career, because it means you were consistent from 1994 all the way up to 2017. You've been consistent your whole career. That's hard to do, be that consistent over that many years.

Q. Seems like it's a little bit taken for granted maybe.
JASON DAY: Yeah, I think a lot of people -- now, granted, he's Phil Mickelson for a reason but I think a lot of people don't realize how good he is. Obviously he was in the Tiger era and I think Tiger kind of overshadows his career a little bit. But we have to understand that these guys, if there was no Tiger Woods, I wonder how many times Phil Mickelson probably would have won, and vice versa with Tiger and Phil.

It was an amazing era watching those two guys at their peak, and even still. You look at Phil now, he's still as competitive as he was going back ten, 15 years. I think this was the first year that he had not won because the first 20-so years, he's won every year on TOUR, and this is kind of one of first years that he didn't.

Q. In the bigger picture of this event, how important is it for your side to win this thing?
JASON DAY: I mean, it's important. I'm not going to put it past -- sooner or later if we keep losing, you guys will get sick of it, you know what I mean.

We need to step up and play well and win. It's important for us. But once again, we can't think of that. We've just got to go out and like you said, be the underdogs, if we are. If we are not, then just go out and play and be as aggressive as he can.

Q. Tiger said that he would like to see you face off against Jordan on Sunday. Would you welcome that?
JASON DAY: I'm okay with that. Jordan or Justin or whoever is playing good, I'll play against him. I'm fine with that. I enjoy stiff competition. So the harder, the better, for me.

Q. Is that fourball? Foursomes?
JASON DAY: I do like foursomes. I do like fourball because you're playing your own ball but I do like foursomes because it forces you to concentrate a lot more. It forces you to focus and try and give every shot 100 percent. I like that format a lot.

Q. How do you rectify the deficit on the first day?
JASON DAY: One thing is just play better. That's the biggest thing for us is we've always started out poorly. But I feel like this is kind of a different team. I feel like we're a lot closer than we have been in the past.

Like I said earlier, there's a different buzz atmosphere-wise in the team room. I think Captain Price and the other assistant captains have put a lot of time and effort into trying to pick who is going to play with who.

I think he for the most part has an idea. But, you know, saying that, he'll probably tweak something tomorrow just to try and see how one guy plays with the other guy, if he's not quite happy with that team.

We've got to go out there and not think that par is going to win a hole. You know, we've got to go out and try to birdie as much as we can, because if we can do that and stay aggressive -- like every year, the Americans come out and do that to us. So we have to kind of do that to them and really try and put some pressure on them early.

If we can get some pressure on them early where we're not so far behind and they are just kind of like playing smart, you know, we've got to try and get in their face a little bit, get them kind of under pressure and kind of out of place and see how things go over the weekend.

Q. Do you see Thursday as being really important?
JASON DAY: It always is for us because we're always so far behind. I think it was 1 and a half to 3 1/2 two years ago. We're sitting there going, we're that far down, so we have to pick it up a little bit. If we can get off to a good start, that would be key. But you never know. We may get off to a bad start; we may get off to a good start. We just have to go in and make sure we're a hundred percent happy with the guys that we're playing with and a hundred percent happy with the golf we're playing, as well. That's obviously huge for us.

I feel like I've got a good teammate. Nick is probably going to announce the teams tomorrow, so should be fun.

Q. Talking to Branden, he said the difference in the teams, you have more veterans now than more rookies.
JASON DAY: Definitely. We've got a couple of rookies on the team but for the most part, compared to the last -- but we've been playing on like three, four Presidents Cup teams now, and we see each other during the year. It's not like we're playing every year like the Americans, but we're pretty close. Everyone knows each other's wives. We hang out with each other after the round and everyone is close. It's a totally different atmosphere going into it.

Q. How was JR Smith's caddie skills?
JASON DAY: His caddie skills is not too bad. I was out trying to teach him a few things. If you don't know JR, or if you do know JR, you know that he is addicted to golf. Heavily addicted to golf. So he actually, it was between the Playoffs, I think last year, he wanted to come down and play Muirfield Village. So I ended up getting him on there and him and his wife came down and played. It's cool to see other guys from other sports play golf. When you look at JR, you wouldn't think you'd see a guy like that on the golf course but he's actually got a really good swing. Hits it a mile. He was telling me how he got into golf, but he was sitting in a cart, pretty much drinking the whole day, and one of the other guys said, "Hit this shot." Hit it 300 yards down the middle.

He's like, "This is easy." Then goes off, 20 minutes later, the guy hits another one and he like topped it or something and he's like, from that moment, he bought three sets that day and went on from there. He's a good dude. I've known JR for a while now and fingers crossed for a good one.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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