THE PLAYERS CHAMPIONSHIP

March 24, 2000

Fulton Allem

FULTON ALLEM: Pretty good, solid start. I teed off 10 today, actually -- well, my first hole was 18. I had to come back and finish 18 from yesterday. And I 3-putted it and took the putter and put it up for rest and grabbed my older putter. I went out there and hit it about five feet at No. 10 with a 6-iron; made that. Hit two good shots at 11. Just is the pin was right in the front, and I got it out of the bunker, but just short of the green, so had a chip from about twelve feet, and got that up-and-down for birdie. Then 2-putted the next for par. Then made two at 13. I hit 7-iron in there about five feet behind the hole. Birdied that. Then 14, I holed an absolute monster. I hit a good tee shot, hit 8-iron, which I pitched four feet short of the pin on the right, about five feet on the right, and went all the way to the back of the green. That green got pretty firm. I holed that putt. That kind of really got the momentum going. 2-putted the next for par. Then birdied 16. I hit a 4-iron in there into the bunker on the right, got that up-and-down. Hit it to about two feet; birdied that. 17, got a little lucky. Took too much club. Kind of got it to the back of the green. It never went in the water, so I 2-putted that for par. Then 18, again, another bogey on 18. I just don't seem to have myself quite comfortable with my second shot on that hole. Then 1, 2-putted 1 for par. Then 2, I hit 2-iron into five feet; made that for eagle, which kept the momentum going nicely. Then 3, I absolutely hit the wrong club. I thought the wind was helping us, and it was actually hurting into us a little bit off to the right. It was tough to feel it, but I hit 7-iron. Came up about 10 yards short of the green. Hit a good little pitch to about three feet; made that to keep the momentum going. Then 4, hit a good tee shot down the fairway. 105 to the hole, hit sand iron in there about five feet; made that. That kept me going. Then 2-putted from a long way at 5, from about 45 feet; 2-putted that. Then 6, had probably another realistic chance from about 15 feet; missed that. 7, made a really good par. Left off the tee into the bunker, then hit it in the other bunker near the green over there. Got it up-and-down for par. 8, 2-putted from the front edge of the green. I thought a 3-iron was going to get back there. It hit and stopped on the front there, so, 2-putted that from about 45 feet. Then 9, hit driver and 2-iron and 8-iron about 25 feet pin-high left, and rolled it down there. I thought I actually made it. Just missed it from the right holed a little foot and a half putt. That was it. Good, solid round of golf.

FULTON ALLEM: 35 feet, at least 35 feet. I wouldn't recommend buying property from me, but it was about 35 feet.

FULTON ALLEM: I think -- when I 3-putted 18 this morning the first time around, it just kind of got under my skin. I said, you know: Here you are. For the last ten years, all you have done is hit the ball and putt like an absolute idiot. I said to myself: That is it now. Just go get your old putter, start hitting aggressive putts towards the hole; see what happens. That is basically what I did. So the 3-putt, I think the 3-putt I had on 18 when I finished it, that just, you know, got under my skin enough to where I just got aggravated to the point where I wanted to put myself at the next level again.

FULTON ALLEM: You got it. Same one.

FULTON ALLEM: Well, I bought it from Gino -- Gino, the old guy. I was over there just putting away at the NEC on a Wednesday. I saw this Ping putter. It was one of those old Ping Scottsdale putters. And he said he wants $2,500 for it. I said, "All right. Here is your $2,500. Give me that putter." And it paid for itself pretty well. (laughs)

FULTON ALLEM: Yeah. If you know anything about the old Ping Scottsdale putters, they are worth that much.

FULTON ALLEM: That was in 1993. Hell, I forgot what happened this morning. You guys are asking me to remember 1993.

FULTON ALLEM: In the closet, in the bag at home in the garage. It kind of comes out with me every now and again, but I have been persisting with the putter that I have been using.

FULTON ALLEM: Hey, golfers do strange things, my friend.

FULTON ALLEM: Hey, that was that week. That was that week. It was behaving very nicely that week. Who knows, it could misbehave again at the end of the week and go back in the closet for five years, you never know. It is all just feel and confidence. That is all it is.

FULTON ALLEM: If I sold it in Japan, I'd probably get about $4,500 for it. In the U.S., they are still probably worth between $2,500 and $3,000.

FULTON ALLEM: Gino. He is a club collector. He collects all the old valuable clubs, the original stuff. This was one of the original Ping putters is what it was.

FULTON ALLEM: I left it in the trailer.

FULTON ALLEM: I hit some really good irons, I did. I hit a -- long irons, I hit a lot better than I did my mid-irons. It is just that I think I have a good penetrating ball flight for the windy conditions that we have out here. And that really, you know, also kept me going up. And I kept saying to myself not many guys hit it on the trajectory that I can hit it on with the amount of spin that I can hit it on, so you got a little advantage over everybody, and enjoy the challenge. And I hit some really good long iron shots, I did.

FULTON ALLEM: Terribly man. They said it is plantar fasciaitis (phonetic). I feel like I am standing on a thorn all the time, you know, it is just so painful. And it is starting to get my right knee, because I am hobbling now, so my right leg is taking a little pressure. It is hell getting old, fellows.

FULTON ALLEM: I don't know. I have got to try and find somebody to help me. I have been taking Voltaren (phonetic) which helps, but that stuff is not very good for you.

FULTON ALLEM: Left heel. That is why -- I have lost a little distance. I can't get my weight onto that left side. It hurts when I do that. I have got away with it.

FULTON ALLEM: About two and a half weeks now.

FULTON ALLEM: I tried that, but they are so uncomfortable to play golf in. I feel like I am tilted forward.

FULTON ALLEM: I also went through a divorce. When you go through a divorce, it was -- you know, it was a pathetic divorce too. They are all pathetic, as far as I am concerned. I kind of, you know, I was on the golf course, but my mind was nowhere near golf. I just wish, you know, I was in a situation where I could say: Hold on. I am taking the next couple of years off to sort my life out again and try and come back. I tried to play through all of that, and it leads to frustration, then it leads to losing your confidence. And it just -- it is just, you know, like a rolling stone. It just gets bigger -- you know, gets to snowball. It just snowballs, gets bigger and bigger. And fortunately I have met somebody very special now. I have settled down again. Trying to get my confidence. And it is slowly coming back again. Behind every great player, there is a great woman, that is all I know.

FULTON ALLEM: Well, I got my mulligan, yeah,. Now it is a pity it didn't happen ten years ago, you know.

FULTON ALLEM: I couldn't care less what my ex-wife does. She must just take care of my kids.

FULTON ALLEM: If you want to get involved in my personal life, I was leading The Colonial golf tournament going into the last round, and that Sunday morning my ex-wife and two kids were flying back to South Africa. So they weren't going to watch the final round. And I won the golf tournament. I knew when I'd finish winning the golf tournament if I waited a few more hours they would be home in South Africa and I will to be able call them up and, you know, tell them I won the golf tournament. I called, and my ex-wife answered the phone. I was like so excited. I say: "Hi, sweetheart. I just won the golf tournament." "I don't love you anymore. I want a divorce. I am not coming back to the United States." I thought she was joking. I tried to -- that was it. She put the phone down. That was it, that was me. Then I managed to go back to South Africa, try and patch things up. And she said, "Well, go back and see how you go." She said, "If you do well, we will see what" -- So I won the World Series. Then she came running. There was money. She came running. Then we spent the next four or five years kind of in between misery and happiness. Somewhere in that area. And eventually she left with some ski instructor from Denver.

FULTON ALLEM: Honestly, I don't think she knows too much from a hole in the ground. How does that sound?

FULTON ALLEM: I got custody of the Scottsdale putter, exactly. Right. Everything else went halfway down the middle, including my pension fund, which I don't own. It is part of the Tour, but I had to pay it.

FULTON ALLEM: I can't get in. Even if I win this week, I don't get into --

FULTON ALLEM: You win this, you get a three year -- they chop and change with all their different exemptions and stuff. That would be a dream come true. That would be an absolute dream come true, because I love that golf tournament. It is just so special, The Masters. Hell, I am glad you told me that. That is a little more incentive to go -- I thought if I won this week I couldn't get in. I didn't realized that.

FULTON ALLEM: Not unless he has got a gun. No. He is something. Hits 50 yards by me, and he can beat me by 15 strokes. But when I stand on The First Tee, I look into his eyes, I am looking to try and beat him. I am not going to go, Davis Love and all these other guys that say, "Oh, you know, he is so tough" -- that, that, that. I am going for the gusto. Beat me, you can beat me, try my best, I am not going to sit back and watch you. I am going to have a go.

FULTON ALLEM: A lot of them are. Look, the kid is great, he is the best player, bar none, undisputed, he beautiful to watch; he is unbelievable but you got -- you can't go out there -- you have got to go out there and enjoy the challenge of the fact that you got the opportunity to beat the guys who is the best player, that is the way I look at it. Not go out there and say: I wonder how I am going to beat this guy. If I start thinking how I am going to figure out I am going to beat this guy, I look at his record; I look at mine, ain't know way. You got to be positive, go out, be a go-for-guy. He can make mistakes. You might hole a 6-iron or hole something and the momentum can swing any time and if he has got a gun he intimidates me, that is all.

FULTON ALLEM: Hey, some of them like me and some of them think I am a jackass. What can I tell you, nobody is perfect. But overall, I have been out on Tour, this is my 25th year as a professional golfer overall. I have got a lot of friends out here. We have all lived and suffered together and we have all had moments of glory and it has been great. I am sure there is a couple of guys that don't like the fact that I am outspoken and that I open my mouth. Hey, I never got charged anything to say something, you know. But overall I have a lot of fun, we have got a great fraternity of guys. The professional golfers, we all seem to understand what it takes to be a successful professional golfer and we all kind of know there is a little line over there where everybody knows.

FULTON ALLEM: Depends how many I am over par. I don't know, I smoke a pack a day.

FULTON ALLEM: Marlboro Lights. You got a pack?

FULTON ALLEM: My friends, no. I don't wish divorce upon my worst enemy. It is the worst feeling in the world, especially in my -- I am not going to say especially in my case, but in my case it was a total surprise. I mean, it looked like it was going great, then all of a sudden, boom. And the kids -- the kids, it just -- the kids, it just destroys you. I hardly see my children. I see them for a month and a half of the year.

FULTON ALLEM: No. They live in Denver, Colorado. The snow is over there. I don't know what they do when the snow melts, but anyway --

FULTON ALLEM: Pretty similar to Firestone. It is hard. When the conditions get hard and fast when the ball starts to really bounce and run, that is when I feel I have got an edge over everybody else, because I learned -- if you go back to where I learned golf in South Africa, there were no sprinkler systems there. You know, the golf courses were pretty tight when you hit a ball 15 yards off line, it ended up going 50 yards off line. Come to the United States where they got sprinkler systems and lush green grass and soft conditions, you hit it 20 yards off-line, it stops. So I kind of like gave up a lot of length for accuracy in the beginning stages of my career, which I regret now, because we don't play those types of conditions anymore. But yet when we come to majors, we do. The U.S. Open, the PGA, sometimes Augusta -- depends on weather, the rain, you know -- TPC. And that is what I find I have a little advantage over the field, because you need to have ball control. It is not so much brute force. A lot of the courses we play today are brute force. You just get up and hit it as hard as you can. And if it goes off-line, it is going to stop anyway. You know it is not going to bounce another 25 or 30 yards off-line. So it is a little disadvantage for me under those conditions.

FULTON ALLEM: No, I have been playing well for the last, I'd say, five months I just haven't putted worth a damn. I haven't -- like last week at Bay Hill that was disappointment. I walked off the course. I played with J.P Hayes and Mark Calcavecchia. I hit 31 greens in 36 holes; shot 1-over par. Missed the cut by 1. J.P. Hayes hit 8 greens in 36 holes and made the cut. And Calcavecchia also hit 31 greens and just made the cut. Calc and I, we were pulling our hair out. It is just so frustrating when you -- especially playing with a guy who is chopping it all over the show on the green, and you are over there, beautiful shot on the green, 2-putt. Beautiful shot on the green, 2-putt. You turnaround, and the guys hit one or two greens and he has made those birdies and he is beating you, it looks like you should be drumming him. It is just frustrating. It gets to you and it kind of gets to you.

FULTON ALLEM: Omar the tent maker. He is a good guy. I have played with Omar. He is a little deliberate. He is very slow, and I am very fast. So it is not a great combination to be honest with you. It will be fun. I like Omar. He is a good guy. Hard-working professional golfer. He is good for the game. Just got to speed it up as far as I am concerned.

FULTON ALLEM: I can't do it. I can't do it. I mean, yesterday was quite -- that is quite strange having a tournament where slow play kind of holds up everything. I just figure there is that 40 seconds you got to hit that shot when it is your turn to play. You got 40 seconds to pull the trigger, and there is a lot of guys out higher just don't do that. They are not aware of it. But I can remember in the old days when I first turned pro, and I was out in '76, '77, '78 all the older pros, if you were slow, man, they'd tell you straight off the kicker: Hey, buddy, pick it up. Let's get going. Get cracking. Today, I guess it is like - I will send-a-lawyer's-letter-kind-of.

FULTON ALLEM: Yeah. I think I -- Bob Estes, I wrote it right across his score card: "You are too slow." But him and I are okay now. But there was a while there where he just didn't want to look at me. I just think it is wrong. We have got a set of rules. We should try and play the game within the rules. Ettiquette is not a small city in France, it is -- we have got to stick with it. We have got to play by the rules. 40 seconds, get up there. It is your turn to play. You got 40 seconds, don't stand there and mess around, because it is just -- it is not fair on everybody else.

FULTON ALLEM: Yeah.

FULTON ALLEM: I swore. I used the F word in front of some old lady. And she turned me in. It wasn't the first one it was about the 10th one. Cost me 5,000 and three weeks.

FULTON ALLEM: Reno.

FULTON ALLEM: Yeah. She was hiding in the bushes. I thought I was pretty safe.

FULTON ALLEM: In the desert air there. I used the F word. I gave it the "uh-huh" and she heard it. She wrote the Dear Johnny letter. Dear Mr. Finchem. And he has to abide by the rules; do what is right. And unfortunately it wasn't my first offense.

FULTON ALLEM: Yeah, got cut short two weeks actually because when they reviewed everything, it was kind of like we didn't even give the guy a chance to defend himself. We just sent him the letter.

FULTON ALLEM: No. But he turned me in once. Him and Tom Kite. They turned me in, him and Tom Kite. Bay Hill about seven years ago. That cost me 2,000.

FULTON ALLEM: Yeah.

FULTON ALLEM: Never swear at a person, no, I never have. Ain't going to swear at anybody. I just swear at myself. It is frustrating golf. You all know golf can be so frustrating at times. I guess I am one of those guys that I don't know how to swallow it. I have learned a little bit, but I am not the best at it. There is times where I just got to vent my feelings and I paid for it. Hey, I have paid about 20 grand in finals. I have paid for it.

FULTON ALLEM: Finals?

FULTON ALLEM: In a fight?

FULTON ALLEM: When I was a kid, plenty.

FULTON ALLEM: No. Not on the golf course ever. Never. Never ever hit anybody.

FULTON ALLEM: No. Just the slow play. That is the one thing I have struggled with for the last 25 years of my career. I don't mind slow play if it's within the 40 seconds. - in other words, if a guy is hitting it on 39 seconds, that is fine to me. That is slow play. But when it starts going over that and nobody is out there -- the way they have got it structured unfortunately it's a tough rule, the way we have got it structured. It would be like you going down the highway 100 miles. A cop says: Listen, bud, you go down this freeway, you are doing 100. I am going to follow you now. I am going to measure your speed. You are not going to go over the speed limit, you are going to drive perfectly. Same thing, the way we have got it structured, is that if somebody is out of position and is slow, official has to come up to him, say to him you are out of position, you are slow you are on the clock. Obviously, once you know you are on the clock, you are going to pick it up and try and get a move on. But the thing is you just need three or four groups in front that are slow, and it backs everything up for 40, 50 minutes during the course of the day. That is the one real problem I have had with golf. And as much as I love golf I will tell you slow play is just something I just -- there is no excuse for it. The ball spends two seconds on the club face in a round of 18 holes. If you shoot 72, why does it take us five hours and 20 minutes to play? It doesn't make sense, does it?

FULTON ALLEM: Today?

FULTON ALLEM: While I was thinking of the yardage. 140. Let's go. What can you do? It's only two things going to happen: Either going to hit a good shot or a bad shot. I have got to take care of this heel now. Make some nice articles, leave the ex-wife out of it.