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THE PRESIDENTS CUP

September 27, 2017

Jersey City, New Jersey

CHRIS REIMER: Thanks for joining us after our pairings. Go ahead and let Captain Price lead off with some opening comments on your initial reaction to the pairings, just a short second ago we got done with them. Where we stand and how the pairings process played out for you. Captain Price?

NICK PRICE: You know, I think all of us, our captains, anyway, on our team, we figured we got four out of their five pairings correct. We figured we got a little bit of a jump last year on The Ryder Cup, so we knew who would play with who this week or sort of took a guess at it.

The hardest thing in all this is to get the guys on your team and putting the best team forward. Even though it was sort of looking at what the U.S. Team was, we are trying to get the guys who are on our team, the ten best players, or who are playing the best at the moment out there, and then pair them up together so that they are happy and compatible.

So that's the difficulty in the early stages. For us, we were lucky because we have eight guys who played in the team in Korea, so we only had four rookies as opposed to Steve having six and I think that helped us a little bit.

But I think we've got some great matches tomorrow, we really do. We've got a lot of power, and you know, I think, always said, this: 18-hole match play is anybody's game. It's all about momentum, team spirit, and you know, who gets off to a good start.

CHRIS REIMER: Captain Stricker?

STEVE STRICKER: Yeah, I feel pretty much the same as Nick. You know, we pretty much saw these pairings coming from their side. Oosthuizen/Grace has been a tough team for them over the years, and I think they are undefeated as partners. We knew they would be coming out of there.

Day/Leishman, we had a pretty good idea. There's probably no shocks on both end of things. You know, you scope each other's team out pretty well, and you have some good ideas, but it's always tough. You know, it's always tough to figure it out completely. But like Nick said, there's going to be some great matches. All these guys are playing some really great golf and they are some of the top players in the world. It's always fun. I can't wait for 1:05 tomorrow afternoon to get this thing going and to see how these matches play out.

Q. How did the Kisner/Mickelson chemistry come about?
STEVE STRICKER: You know, they really gel well together. They love being with one another. Kevin Kisner is a guy on our team that a lot of guys want to play with. He's just a good, all-around player. He does everything very, very well. He drives the ball well. He's a good iron player and he putts the lights out of it.

You know, Phil is a guy that likes fiery players, and Kiz is one of those players. He talks a lot of smack, you know, when we're out there having fun and playing. He's a little bulldog, and Phil really gravitates towards that, and so does Kiz to Phil. It came along pretty naturally for them.

They are very excited to go out with one another.

Q. Were there any late-breaking decisions? I know you mixed up the pairings a little bit today from what you did yesterday. Did you figure some stuff out today that maybe opened your eyes to some of the pairings you made?
STEVE STRICKER: No. We really didn't have time today. With this being so early in the afternoon, we had a pretty good idea of what we were going to do. The guys were only able to play about four or five holes today before we had kind of, as captains, talk about our decisions and what we wanted to do.

So just wasn't a lot of time to make any different plans, and we're comfortable with what we've got going. We've had a lot of time to think about this and get the players into these groups that they want to play with. So there was no late-changing plans today.

Q. Obviously you've got Scotty looking after Jhonny there, the thinking behind that. And you have Si-Woo going up against the big guns. I understand they gelled really well yesterday; is that correct?
NICK PRICE: They did. Jhonny Vegas and Adam hit it off yesterday. I mean, it was great. They played phenomenally well yesterday together, and Adam being the senior member of the team, certainly I needed him to have one of the rookies. And just as Kevin Kisner is going with Phil tomorrow, I think they had the same sort of thought that we had.

Si-Woo and Emiliano are two incredibly talented young players. I think these two guys could be the start -- Si-Woo, he speaks English a lot better than he gives credit for, than he let's on, but he and Emiliano really gelled well yesterday, as well. They played really well in the practice round. To me that's an obvious choice.

It's always difficult with the rookies because they have never been on a team before and trying to figure out who is going to play with who. Tough decisions to bench Anirban and also Adam Hadwin, but they are going to get their shot.

But I think this is a pretty good matchup. If you look at these five matches, I think there's going to be some doozies there tomorrow.

CHRIS REIMER: You just gave away Si-Woo's secret that he speaks English. Now these guys are going to want to talk to them (laughter).

Q. This is the second time in The Presidents Cup history that you have players from Latin America, and two of them. What are you expecting from them and what are the contributions you think they will bring to the team? And what is your philosophy to make everybody gel as a team?
NICK PRICE: Well, we have been working on gelling as a team for a long time; obviously for the guys that just got in that were selected three weeks ago, you know, they weren't really part of the team. But the other ten guys, or other nine guys, there's been a lot of communication going on. You know, both Emiliano and Jhon -- Jhon is just starting to mature I think as a player. He's starting to understand how really good he is, and we're seeing some results that are proving that. But he's a fiery player that can make a lot of birdies, extremely powerful, and he's also a wonderful team man. He's got a great demeanor about him. He's very upbeat. He always smiles a lot, and he's just a wonderful guy to be around.

And Emiliano, you know, he's a little quieter but he also can make a lot of birdies. I know his game's been off a little bit the last sort of month, month and a half, but he's starting to play really well again. I think he's one of those guys that's going to really elevate his game for the next four days. He's going to bring his game up a notch. It's difficult for us to put two rookies together with Si-Woo and Emiliano, but I think they are both ready. They are ready to go at it tomorrow.

Q. Foursomes have sometimes been a bit of an issue for your team, especially like Jason and Charl don't have great records. Have you discussed it and tried to put your finger on what has been the problem, and why do you think it might be different this time?
NICK PRICE: The continuity aspect of having the same team members in the following year or the next Presidents Cup, Ryder Cup, whatever it is, is really important. I think that's what we've got a little more this time, a little more continuity. We know Louis and Branden are terrific.

You know, Jason was really tired in Korea. He had come off a phenomenal year and he was just spent, basically. So he had a really tough time there. So I wouldn't really look too hard for his record at that.

Jason and Leish, for me, were a shoe-in. That was a normal -- that was just an easy pick for all of us. You know, they are both very good friends, and I think we've got a great pairing in those two.

It's hard. You know, we have been on the back foot for the longest time in the alternate-shot or foursomes, so I'm hoping that we're going to change that tomorrow.

Q. Can you talk a little about the different dynamics between what you just did here with Nick and the blind Ryder Cup pairings? Obviously it's a completely different deal. Does it make it a little bit more difficult, or do you kind of stick to the guns that you had?
STEVE STRICKER: No, it makes it a little more challenging I think. I guess in The Ryder Cup, you're just -- you're putting out teams in an order that you want to put out, whether it's based on strength up front, or in the back.

Here, you're trying to figure out if the team that I've got can beat their team. It's so hard at this level because they are all great players. It's match play; anything can happen. So it does, it adds another element.

We were pretty close in what we wanted to do. There was a few matchups that we were looking for that we got. We're happy about that. But it does -- and I'm sure they can say the same thing; that there's some match-ups on their end that they wanted. So that's what makes it harder, I think, in this type of process, trying to figure out those match-ups, whether you can win or not.

Q. Which were the matchups that you liked?
STEVE STRICKER: Not telling.

CHRIS REIMER: Thank you, captains, and good luck tomorrow.

NICK PRICE: Can I just say one thing before we end, please? Something very special and dear to all of us, and I think it shows, you know, how important this whole week is to us as a team.

But on Monday night as a team, we sat down and we decided that as a team, we wanted to donate some money to the victims of Hurricane Harvey and Irma, and the reason we are doing this is because all of us play on this TOUR full-time. So many guys live here and have lived here for a long time. This is something that is close to us. We've got five of us, six of us that live in Florida. Two of our team members live in Texas. This is something that we really wanted to do.

So we've donated -- we're going to donate $170,000 which is $10,000 per man to the One America Appeal is a foundation, or a charity, which was started by all five or former living presidents. That's just a way of us saying thank you to The Presidents Cup and also to support the states that we live in.

I'm throwing it over to Steve, and I hope that they see the way to match that for us in the next couple of days (laughter).

STEVE STRICKER: And yeah, we are going to do the same thing, Nick. Following your lead on that, of course, and we appreciate that. There's a number of our players, too, that live down there and call home there. That was brought to my attention just a little bit ago, and we, too, as a team, are going to follow suit and do the same thing.

NICK PRICE: Terrific. Well done.

CHRIS REIMER: Wonderful gesture, guys. Thank you.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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THE PRESIDENTS CUP

September 27, 2017

Nick Price

Steve Stricker